Daniel Gerard Lee Jr.

Born on May 15, 1949, Dan was raised in Meriden, Connecticut. He was the first-born son of Ita Daly Lee and Daniel Gerard Lee, Sr.

Dan left home at the age of fourteen, receiving a scholarship to attend The Taft School in Watertown, Connecticut. Energized by the vibrant and competitive academic community, Dan never looked back. After graduating from Yale University in 1971, he began a passionate forty-four-year career in independent secondary education. He served as a Headmaster for nearly thirty-years and touched and improved countless lives in the process.

Dan initially served as the Director of Admissions at the Trinity-Pawling School in Pawling, New York where he reinvigorated their enrollment and built many lasting friendships with colleagues and students alike.

In the summer of 1977, Dan was presented with an opportunity to return to The Taft School and serve as the school's Director of Development and to teach English. Excited by his return to Watertown and his opportunity to broaden his professional experience, he couldn’t have foreseen how this move would truly impact the rest of his life. While leading Taft’s development office, Dan fell in love with Susan Davidson Lee, a talented member of his team who ran the school’s annual fund. After marrying, they welcomed their son, Daniel. Susie would become his partner in service to school communities and his devoted, lifelong love.

Then, in the fall of 1984, and at the young age of thirty-five, Dan was appointed Headmaster of Miss Hall’s School in Pittsfield, Massachusetts. While campus facilities were upgraded and expanded under his leadership, Dan mostly relished the opportunity to hone his student and faculty centric leadership style where he focused on building a close-knit community that cared for and gave trust and respect to young women spreading their wings in a boarding school environment. Simultaneously, he seized on the opportunity to develop a leadership team, and a faculty focused on serving this noble mission.

After nearly a decade of service to Miss Hall’s, Dan became intrigued by a unique school set in the Western foothills of Maine and nestled alongside New Hampshire’s Mount Washington Valley. At one of America’s oldest schools of any kind, Dan became Fryeburg Academy’s 53rd Headmaster in 1993, its 201st year serving students. One of Dan’s few predecessors included the notable American statesman and orator, Daniel Webster.

Under Dan’s leadership, and with deference to his many treasured colleagues, the school experienced a twenty-year renaissance. The endowment grew nearly six-fold, five new state-of-the-art buildings were added to the campus, access to technology and the arts were expanded for the school and local communities, and the quality of the boarding program and academic experience was enhanced for students of all levels, and from all backgrounds. This was reflected in increased test scores, improved college matriculation, and many state and regional accolades for athletic teams and performing arts groups. Dan was deeply proud of his students, and of those he worked with at Fryeburg Academy and all they accomplished together.

Upon retirement, and after living and breathing independent schools for his entire career (Dan never lived anywhere without a dining hall from age fourteen until his retirement in 2013!) he tried his hardest to engage passions new and old. He found success with his enthusiasm for Red Sox baseball, Patriots football, and dockside clam chowder and lobster rolls. He loved complaining through his enjoyment of fancier meals, reading the Sunday paper, travelling with Susie, and listening to opera, folk and classical music. He especially enjoyed his seaside home and his neighbors in Kennebunk Beach, Maine.

But most of all, Dan embraced visits to New York City and Greenwich, Connecticut in his role as Grandfather to Walker and Eliza, who will forever affectionately remember their special times with their silly and wise “Dunk”.

Lastly, Dan was proud of his service to and leadership of the board of the Independent School Association of Northern New England (ISANNE) and the Wolfeboro Camp School, as well enjoying his long-time memberships in The Yale Club of New York City and the Mory’s Association in New Haven, Connecticut.

Dan is survived by his only son Daniel (wife Kelsey), his cherished grandchildren Walker Brooks and Eliza Grace, as well as his brothers John (wife Loretta and their daughter Ginevra) and Jeffrey (wife Ann).

Dan was predeceased by his loving wife Susie, his parents Ita and Daniel, and his sister Jennifer.

Details of a memorial service in Kennebunkport, Maine will be communicated at a later date.

Please consider joining the Lee family in our plan to support his memory at The Taft School, the institution that gave rise to both of Dan’s great loves in life, Susie and the independent secondary school community.

Donations in the memory of Susan D. and Daniel Gerard Lee Jr. ’67 can be made via mail, c/o the Alumni and Development Office, The Taft School, 110 Woodbury Road, Watertown, Connecticut 06795 or made online at the following address: https://www.taftschool.org/giving/make-a-gift