Russell Inslee "Inky" Clark Jr. (1935 – August 3, 1999) was an educator, administrator, and a key player in the transition of the

Ivy League The Ivy League is an American collegiate athletic conference comprising eight private research universities in the Northeastern United States. The term ''Ivy League'' is typically used beyond the sports context to refer to the eight schools ...

into co-education in the 1960s and diversified student bodies to the present from the 1960s.

Personal life

Clark was born in 1935 and graduated from Garden City High School in 1953. Clark graduated from

Yale College Yale College is the undergraduate college of Yale University. Founded in 1701, it is the original school of the university. Although other Yale schools were founded as early as 1810, all of Yale was officially known as Yale College until 1887, ...

in 1957 where he was a member of Skull and Bones. Clark earned a master's degree from the

Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs The Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs (Maxwell School) is the professional public policy school of Syracuse University, a private research university in Syracuse, New York. The school is organized in 11 academic departments and 13 ...

Syracuse University Syracuse University (informally 'Cuse or SU) is a Private university, private research university in Syracuse, New York. Established in 1870 with roots in the Methodist Episcopal Church, the university has been nonsectarian since 1920. Locate ...

Career

As Director of Undergraduate Admissions (1965-1969) at

Yale University Yale University is a private research university in New Haven, Connecticut. Established in 1701 as the Collegiate School, it is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and among the most prestigious in the wo ...

, Clark oversaw the school's transition to a coeducational admission policy, and shares credit with Yale President

Kingman Brewster Kingman Brewster Jr. (June 17, 1919 – November 8, 1988) was an American educator, academic and diplomat. He served as the 17th President of Yale University and as United States Ambassador to the United Kingdom. Early life Brewster was born in ...

for establishing academic credentials in the admissions process. Clark was academic dean at

Trumbull College Trumbull College is one of fourteen undergraduate residential colleges of Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut. The college is named for Jonathan Trumbull, governor of Connecticut from 1769 to 1784 and advisor and friend to General George Wash ...

, one of the twelve residential colleges constituent to

, 1963 - 1965. For decades prestigious northeastern colleges had used "character" as a code word to limit the number of acceptances afforded to secondary school students with

Jewish Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...

and working class Catholic backgrounds to colleges traditionally defined by an Episcopalian or

WASP A wasp is any insect of the narrow-waisted suborder Apocrita of the order Hymenoptera which is neither a bee nor an ant; this excludes the broad-waisted sawflies (Symphyta), which look somewhat like wasps, but are in a separate suborder. Th ...

social standard.

Negroes In the English language, ''negro'' is a term historically used to denote persons considered to be of Black African heritage. The word ''negro'' means the color black in both Spanish and in Portuguese, where English took it from. The term can be ...

were invisible on campus. Associated with this move, Yale, followed by other prestigious colleges in the northeast section of the United States, recruited for the first time beyond the prep school orbit of New England and mid-Atlantic boarding schools, and private schools in

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

Boston Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- mo ...

Philadelphia Philadelphia, often called Philly, is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the sixth-largest city in the U.S., the second-largest city in both the Northeast megalopolis and Mid-Atlantic regions after New York City. Sinc ...

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, and

Washington, D.C. ) , image_skyline = , image_caption = Clockwise from top left: the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall, United States Capitol, Logan Circle, Jefferson Memorial, White House, Adams Morgan, ...

This new policy is now a standard in their respective admissions practices. Headmaster and President (1970-1991) of the

Horace Mann School , motto_translation = Great is the truth and it prevails , address = 231 West 246th Street , city = The Bronx , state = New York , zipcode = 10471 , count ...

in the

Bronx, New York The Bronx () is a Boroughs of New York City, borough of New York City, coextensive with Bronx County, in the U.S. state, state of New York (state), New York. It is south of Westchester County, New York, Westchester County; north and east of the ...

, Clark reintroduced co-education and oversaw the school's merger with the Barnard School. His obituary, published August 7, 1999 in ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

'', read: "a brilliant, dynamic teacher, he taught an Urban History course and took students into prisons and courtrooms to learn first hand about the complex urban issues confronting

. His inspirational leadership, his ebullient personality...His impressive intellect and passion for baseball are legendary."

Horace Mann School pedophilia scandal

A cover feature was published in ''The New York Times'' Sunday magazine, datelined 6 June 2012, that reports on many years that faculty members practiced

pedophilia Pedophilia ( alternatively spelt paedophilia) is a psychiatric disorder in which an adult or older adolescent experiences a primary or exclusive sexual attraction to prepubescent children. Although girls typically begin the process of puberty a ...

among the Horace Mann School student body while Clark was Headmaster and President. Clark was described as one of many teachers and administrators implicated in the criminal behavior and resultant coverup. Clark is acknowledged as a member of the cohort of homosexual and heterosexual pedophiles described in the resultant legal proceedings. In March 2013, the school, with legal and other counsel, settled many claims brought by victims of sexual abuse during many of the years Clark was associated with Horace Mann School. ''

The New Yorker ''The New Yorker'' is an American weekly magazine featuring journalism, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. Founded as a weekly in 1925, the magazine is published 47 times annually, with five of these issues ...

'', datelined April 1, 2013, presented further reportage on pedophilia at Horace Mann School during Clark's tenure. The REPORTER AT LARGE feature was authored by

Marc Fisher Marc Fisher (born December 15, 1958) is a senior editor for ''The Washington Post'', where he writes about national, foreign and local issues. He was previously a ''Post'' enterprise editor, leading a team of writers experimenting with new types ...

, an alumnus of Horace Mann School. Efforts to rename the school's main athletic field, at present named in honor of Clark, have been successful. Alumni Field was voted the preferred new name.(4) https://pagesix.com/2015/10/19/horace-mann-strips-former-headmasters-name-from-field/

Notes

Bibliography

Paid Death Notice (New York Times, August 7, 1999)
*New York Times Magazine Section: Prep School Predators, Amos Kamil, June 6, 2013 *New Yorker Magazine: The Master, Marc Fisher, March 25, 2013, online

External links

*[https://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/10/magazine/the-horace-mann-schools-secret-history-of-sexual-abuse.html?pagewanted=all%20 New York Times: Prep-School Predators, The Horace Mann School’s Secret History of Sexual Abuse] {{DEFAULTSORT:Clark, R. Inslee Jr. 1935 births 1999 deaths 20th-century American educators People from Garden City, New York Educators from New York (state) Yale College alumni Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs alumni Garden City High School (New York) alumni