PETER C. GREER

Born: October 1, 1940
Died: December 8, 2013

Born in Cambridge, Mass., Peter was the first Bates-Russell Distinguished Professor at his high school alma mater, Philips Exeter Academy, where he taught for 39 years. He was known for his signature class, "Literature and the Land," informed by his love of the natural world. In our 40th reunion classbook he noted that "among other things, I travel around the country visiting schools and talking with educators, absorbing what I can about practices, principles and initiatives from which my school could learn."

At Yale he was an honors major in English, lived in Silliman, got a major Y in Golf and was a member of St Elmo. After an MA at University of California Berkeley, he did Peace Corps service in Columbia from 1965-67. He taught for one year at Brewster Academy in Wolfeboro, NH.

In the months after his death an extensive, rich and loving blog came into being: http://blogforpeterdotcom.wordpress.com/.Contributors included former students, colleagues and friends. At his memorial service his colleague Michael Drummey said "in our early years at Exeter, the 70s, the schedule was such that for at least one hour during the week... five or ten members of the English Department gather(ed) to talk about To the Lighthouse or All the King's Men....They were wonderfully rich conversations. I began to see what was distinctive about Peter. What he been offering was not an intellectual assessment, not the usual banter of academicians. It was an invitation...inviting me to expand the subject, to keep it open - and that meant expanding me." He finished his memorial quoting Frost:

I'm going out to clean the pasture spring;
I'll only stop to rake the leaves away
(and wait to watch the water clear, I may):
I shan't be gone long. You come too.

Peter's survivors include his loving wife, Dale Ann Atkins; his daughter, Alexandra L. Greer; and three stepsons: Vinson Bankoski and Gregory Bankoski, both sons of the late Anja S. Bankoski (for 15 years until her death a beloved teacher at Exeter), and Colin Atkins Mixter, son of Dale Atkins.