Rodman Lucas '46 called St. Albans School his home for twenty years, from 1929 until 1949. Now, the son of St. Albans' third headmaster has deeded his own home, in Essex, Conn., to St. Albans School. Through a "retained life estate," Lucas is free to reside there throughout his lifetime.

Rod Lucas was only one and a half when he moved into the Lane-Johnston Building with his father, the Rev. Albert Hawley Lucas; his mother, Frances Wharton Scott Lucas; his older brother, Albert II '43; and his sisters, June and Bess, who would attend NCS. Lucas attended Beauvoir and then St. Albans, where he played tennis, baseball, and basketball; served as a prefect and a senior warden of the Vestry; and, according to Lucas, became "the Headmaster's biggest headache for eight years."

Recalls Lucas: "I acquired more demerits than any other student at St. Albans," partly because his father doubled any demerits he received. His punishment: raking leaves and shoveling snow on the Cathedral grounds. Today, Lucas denies any serious wrongdoing: "I was a pain in the neck growing up, but I just did the kind of things young people do!" Lucas's classmates, in the 1946 yearbook, seem to agree: "If ... limited to the selection of two qualities to fit Roddy, one would probably name honesty and playfulness. ... It is characteristic of Roddy that if an eraser has been thrown, he has been 'more or less nearby,' but it is equally typical that he is one of the first to admit that he had a part in it."

Lucas fondly recalls his school years at St. Albans. "I had a ball. I was very fortunate to be part of a class that was and is very close. I loved the School and the Cathedral, and was lucky to be able to see the Cathedral from a very early period of construction through its completion in 1990."

After St. Albans, Lucas attended the University of Pennsylvania and, like his father and brother, served in the Marines, with two years of active duty during the Korean War. Lucas then joined the Electric Boat Division of General Dynamics in New London, Conn., supporting the Navy as it turned to nuclear power. In 1951, he married Mary Gertrude Durant, with whom he would share 57 "unbelievably beautiful years," before she passed away in 2007. In 1953, they purchased a recently constructed cape, in Essex, Conn., where they would raise their two daughters, Mary Gertrude "Trudy" and the late Sharon Scott. Today, Lucas divides his time between Essex and Southwest Harbor, Maine.

Asked why he donated his home to the School he attended some sixty years ago, Lucas mentioned the free education that he and his siblings received on the Cathedral Close, and he recalled his father's words: "My father used to say to me, 'Roddy, if it's ever possible—if there's ever anything that you can do—to give back to the School in thanks for what the School did for you and your siblings, I hope you will."

St. Albans, which of course owes so much to the Lucas family, remains grateful to Canon Lucas for his years of leadership and to Rodman and his extended family for their continuing support.