Class of 1945 Library, Exeter Academy, NH - Philatelic Photographs on Waymarking.com

The Phillips Exeter Academy is a private secondary boarding school located in its namesake town of Exeter, New Hampshire. It was established by wealthy merchant and banker John Phillips in 1781, making it one of the oldest secondary schools in the United States. It is also one of the richest (on several recent occasions, its endowment has exceeded $1 billion).

The school’s library was initially housed in one of the academic buildings until a separate library building was opened in 1912. The Davis Library as it was known contained shelf space for about 5000 volumes but quickly became inadequate for the school’s growing collection. By the early 1950s a project was underway for the construction of a new larger facility.

Plans were formulated for a traditional library building but the project dragged on for years with little progress. Eventually a change in school leadership resulted in all those early plans being scrapped in favor of a more modern design. Louis Kahn was commissioned to design the new library in 1965 (with obligatory help from the school’s library committee). The resulting structure (completed in 1971) contains enough shelf space for 250,000 volumes and is the largest secondary school library in the world.

Though unassuming from the outside, the library’s interior is quite impressive. Large circular openings provide glimpses into the book stacks much the way a cut-away diagram of an internal combustion engine shows the workings of the inner mechanisms. Appropriately, it is the interior of the building that is depicted on the stamp.

Originally called the Academy Library, it was renamed The Class of 1945 Library in 1996 in honor of Dr. Lewis Perry who was the principal of the school in 1945. The next year, it received the prestigious 25 Year Award from the American Institute of Architects.

The stamp was one of a set of twelve showing icons of modern architecture in America.

Stamp Issuing Country: United States Date of Issue: 19-May-2005 Denomination: 37 cents Color: multicolored Stamp Type: Single Stamp Relevant Web Site: [Web Link]

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