Ann Macdonald; paved way for female school administrators

ANN MACDONALD

In 1959, women could not aspire to high administrative posts in many fields. Yet, that year Ann Macdonald became the first female assistant superintendent of schools in Brookline. She was thought to be the highest-ranking female public school administrator in the Commonwealth at the time.

"That well might have been," former governor Michael S. Dukakis, whose children attended Brookline schools, said by phone. "Ann was the rock that kept the system going."

Ms. Macdonald, who served 27 years in the Brookline system as a teacher and administrator and later 10 years as director of Harvard's summer school precollege program, died of heart failure April 23 at her Brookline home. She was 98.

Carolee Matsumoto, with the Education Development Center Inc. in Newton, said Ms. Macdonald "paved the way for women to be in educational administration." In the process, she touched the lives of generations of students and younger colleagues.

"Ann was an amazing woman in a man's world," said Kerry P. Brennan, headmaster of The Roxbury Latin School, one of the young teachers she mentored.

As an administrator, there was no problem too big or too small for Ms. Macdonald. When she heard that one principal had banned his women teachers from wearing anything but skirts and dresses, she acted quickly.

"On the coldest day of winter, Ms. Macdonald arrived at that school wearing a black pants suit," said Michael Halperson of Foxborough, a former student. "Word of her arrival swept through the school, and the issue of the dress code evaporated."

Never married, Ms. Macdonald was an independent woman. In London with the American Red Cross during the Blitz in World War II, she refused to run for cover underground.

"She told us that if she was going to die, she wanted to do it above ground and see who was trying to kill her," Halperson said.

Mostly, he and others said, she taught from the heart and loved children. They, in turn, adored her, even those who required discipline.

"The '80s were a difficult time for young people, with changing mores, alcohol, and pot," issues that Ms. Macdonald handled gracefully, Brennan said. "Ann always came armed with the facts. She listened carefully and asked the right questions, but always in a loving and concerned way. Then she would ask, 'What have we learned here?' "

Patriots owner Robert Kraft, one of Ms. Macdonald's pupils at the Edward Devotion School in Brookline, recalled that knack in his tribute to her on her 95th birthday.

"You were someone who could be disciplining and firm but at the same time relay it with strong sensitivity," he wrote. "Thank you for making my childhood recollections of Devotion School so memorable."

She was diminutive in stature with sparkling and commanding blue eyes, Halperson said. She had a quiet presence, "but when she walked into a room, even if you had your back to the door, you knew that she had come in." A stylish dresser, she favored high heels.

Ann Elizabeth Macdonald was born in Boston to Scotland native James E. and Mary E. (Bannon) Macdonald of Boston and raised with her sister in Malden. From childhood, she loved the theater and in the early 1930s graduated from Curry Dramatic School in Milton, now Curry College.

Parental objections kept her off the stage, though she was still reciting passages from Shakespeare years later. Instead, she taught drama for a time at Good Counsel College in White Plains, N.Y.

Her sister, Catherine, who taught school in Connecticut, was just as adventurous as she. In the 1930s, they drove to Mexico and Alaska.

Ms. Macdonald graduated from Boston University in 1935 with a bachelor of science degree in education and began her teaching career in Malden elementary schools. From 1943-1948, she volunteered overseas with the Red Cross, serving as recreational director in military hospitals in England, Guam, and the Mariana Islands.

While serving in Japan during the US occupation, she discovered an orphanage where the children had no food, friends said, so she went around to Army bases collecting food for them.

She earned a master of science in education from BU in 1954. In 1983, Regis College awarded her an honorary doctor of laws.

Soon after retiring from the Brookline school system in 1975, Harvard asked her to direct its summer precollege program, and she traveled around the country recruiting applicants. When she retired from the program in 1985, she had expanded it from 80 students to 1,000.

Her second retirement in her late '70s gave her more time to spend with her young friends.

"Ann was like Auntie Mame," said Franco Mormando, professor of romance languages at Boston College. "She loved nothing better than to gather us all together. She introduced us to the finer things in life, like theater, music, fine foods, and flower arranging."

Retirement also gave her more time to devote to the arts. She volunteered with the Boston Symphony Orchestra's youth concert series, conducted by Harry Ellis Dickson, the father of Kitty Dukakis.

"Ann was an extraordinary woman way ahead of her time," Mrs. Dukakis said.

Ms. Macdonald leaves no immediate survivors.

A memorial service is planned for 3 p.m., Sept. 21, at The Roxbury Latin School in West Roxbury.