June 2012 Volume 25 Number 8 - Our Town | St. James, NY

continued from page 40
mer mansion. Thirty-eight founding
families “raised almost
$20,000 toward the purchase” of
the estate and raised the balance
of the purchase price “through
pledges and grants.” in the fall of
1958, the harbor Country day
School opened its doors to its first
38 students. (“harbor Country
day School: a look Back,” article
on the background and history of
the school in the Commemorative
Journal and 2009-2010 School
Calendar that was published in
2009 to commemorate the 50th
anniversary of the school.)
Mrs. Mclean lived on the estate
in South Kortright until 1948,
when “she donated her estate
house there to a foundation established
to aid Europe’s displaced
children.” She “then moved to
Baltimore to live with one of her
– 42–
H I S T O R I C A L L Y S P E A K I N G
Alice Throckmorton McLean
sons. She died there on “October
25, 1968 still the president of
aWVS.” (Barbara Van liew, op.
cit., p. 165.)
Mrs. Mclean’s English country
house in head-of-the-harbor has
a new life today as the home of
the harbor Country day School, a
private school that serves some
130 children living throughout
Suffolk County. it is a day school
that has nursery, kindergarten,
and first through eighth grade
classes which meet in the rooms
of the mansion. The original
rooms of the house have been expanded
and modified to meet the
needs of the school children and
classrooms occupy the first and
second floors of the original
house. in 1967, wings were
added to the back of the house
adding a gymnasium and a library.
With class sizes that are
never larger than 16, harbor
Country day School offers a
warm, homelike setting for the
students, and they become much
attached to Mrs. Mclean’s former
home. alice Mclean would have
been pleased to know that her
house is now a day school, filled
with happy school children. But
she probably knows this, since
her ghost has been sighted in various
rooms of the mansion watching
over the activities that
continue in the house today.
Editor’s Note:
Brad harris is the town of Smithtown’s
official historian. Brad was a high School
Social Studies teacher who spent 30
years teaching in Commack. as historian
he has written many newspaper articles
on the history of our town, he has published
pamphlets and written histories of
Commack, Nesconset, St. James, kings
Park, hauppauge and Smithtown Branch.
he resides in St. James.
OUR TOWN • JUNE 2012