Archbishop Molloy High School

My High School.
A lot of things happened here, most of them I’ve forgotten or forced myself to forget but I find myself still drawn back to here even after all these years. Go Figure.

My alma mater, and one of the oldest and most prestigious Roman Catholic high schools in the city, it was founded as St. Ann’s Academy on the Upper East Side of Manhattan in 1892. In 1957, the Marist Brothers moved to this site in Queens, and renamed the facility after the man who had donated the property on which it stands. Old traditions die hard, however. .. the student body is still referred to as «Stanners,» and the name is attached to the school newspaper — of which I was an editor in my Senior year — as well. They still don’t have a football team, but since my graduation they’ve added soccer, tennis, bowling, swimming, golf, volleyball, and ice hockey to the athletic program (amazingly still under the direction of Jack Curran, who seemed old way back when), a new wing (the Ralph DiChiaro Center for Arts and Sciences, dedicated in 1987, houses a theater, computer centers, and a biology lab), and — most significantly of all — female students and instructors. No longer do they need to import young ladies from the Mary Louis Academy for Saturday night sock hops. .. although I doubt they call them sock hops anymore.