Westover: Giving Girls a Place of Their Own

Garnet Books

by Laurie Lisle

Westover, a girls' school in Middlebury, Connecticut, was founded in 1909 by emancipated "New Women," educator Mary Hillard and architect Theodate Pope Riddle. Landscape designer Beatrix Farrand did the plantings. It has evolved from a finishing school for the Protestant elite, including F. Scott Fitzgerald's first love, to a meritocracy for pupils from many backgrounds and from around the world.

The fascinating account of the ups and downs of this female community is the subject of Laurie Lisle's lively and well-researched book. The author describes the innovations of the idealistic minister's daughter who was the first principal, her intellectual successor who turned it into a college preparatory school in the 1930s, the quiet headmaster who managed to keep it open during the turbulent 1970s, and the prize-winning mathematics teacher, wife, and mother who leads the high school today. This beautifully illustrated book tells an important story about female education during decades of dramatic change in America.

324 pages, Hardcover

First published January 31, 2009

About the author

Laurie Lisle's most recent book is her memoir, Word for Word: A Writer's Life. Publisher Weekly's BookLife says "it pulses with intellectual discussions, lived feminist history and its resultant tensions…It's great for fans of Vivian Gornick's Fierce Attachments and Rebecca Solnit's Recollections of My Nonexistence."

She also wrote the first biographies of artists Georgia O'Keeffe and Louise Nevelson. Her best-selling biography of O'Keeffe, Portrait of an Artist, first published in 1980, has been translated into six languages. It is included in Five Hundred Great Books by Women.

Her biography about sculptor Louise Nevelson, known for her dramatic black walls and assemblages, is titled Louise Nevelson: A Passionate Life.

She has also written books about childlessness, gardening, and the small girls' high school, where she decided to become a writer. Their titles are Without Child: Challenging the Stigma of Childlessness, Four Tenths of an Acre: Reflections on a Gardening Life, and Westover: Giving Girls a Place of Their Own.

Laurie lives in the village of Sharon, Connecticut with her husband, artist Robert Kipniss. When she is not writing or reading, she is hiking or working in her flower garden.

Reviews

[Sue · Rating 3 out of 5]

A fascinating, no holds barred history of this special place. This is a wonderful read for those of us who know Westover School, those who are interested in Westover School and those who are curious about the pros and cons of single sex education for girls. It's a moving lesson of the determination and vision of the women and men who worked to make Westover School what it has become in the last 100 years and what they overcame to make it happen.

[Abby Browne · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great review of a school l thought I knew well. I learned alot about the history of the school, of women's institutions and the women who had the foresight to establish the school.