The Horace D. Taft Medal is the school’s highest alumni honor and is given each year to a person whose life work best typifies the school motto: Not to be ministered unto but to minister. The recipient’s life and actions must demonstrate something humanitarian apart from a vocation or service. He or she must have gone above the ordinary demands of life or occupation. Success in a chosen field does not necessarily quality a person for the honor. At the same time, it is possible for a person to be eminently successful and go beyond the call of duty to serve others.
An alumni committee meets each January to review names that have been recommended by fellow alums and to determine the recipient. Alumni are encouraged to put forth the name of an alumnus or alumna to be considered. Eligibility for the Horace D. Taft Medal is also extended to those who are or have been connected with the school or who have shown special interest in Taft. Candidates must be living to receive the award. The name of the recipient remains secret until Alumni Day, when the award is bestowed at the Old Guard Dinner.
All citations, since the award’s creation in 1960, hang in a place of honor along Main Hall. The Horace D. Taft Medal is a reminder of Taft’s commitment to serve others.
Rodman W. Moorhead
Class of 1962
For over 50 years your influence on your Alma Mater has been unparalleled. As a young student from Louisville, Kentucky, you arrived with considerable athletic ability, exceptional tenacity and an undisciplined but incisive mind. Emerging as a class committee member, monitor and varsity athlete in football, basketball and track, you led the Football team to Taft’s finest record since the 1930s while winning recognition as the school’s first All-New England player. Following Harvard College and the Harvard Business School came a long and creative career as a managing director of Warburg Pincus, where you discovered and then nurtured investments in medical care and research and in K-12 education. Your leadership gave birth to great companies: Coventry Health Care, United Healthcare, Cambridge Neuroscience, Scientific Learning and Columbia Healthcare to mention but a few. Ever devoted to leaving the world a better place, your pro bono service has been equally profound: Stroud Water Research, Brandywine Conservancy, Harvard College, Harvard Medical School and the Jackson Hole Land Trust are all stronger institutions because of your loving service. Ultimately your greatest devotion has to been to The Taft School, where you entrusted your sons and have served for over two decades as a trustee, the last six as chairman of the board, leading your school to unprecedented success in the opening decades of the 21st century. Rodman W. Morehead, your life of service to your school and country gives witness to the enduring power of Horace Taft’s ideal: Non Ut Sibi Ministretur Sed Ut Ministret. It is with admiration and the utmost gratitude that we confer upon you Taft’s highest honor, the Horace D. Taft Alumni Medal.
May 2012
To nominate someone for the Taft Alumni Citation of Merit award
Simply send a message to CitationofMerit@TaftSchool.org.
Please include the person's name, class year, and the reason you think he or she should be considered.
Thank you.
Citation of Merit Awards
1960 Thomas D. Thacher, Class of 1899
Robert A. Taft 1906
Charles P. Taft 1913
Henry N. Mallon 1913
Robert L. Johnson 1914
Linn F. Cooper 1917
Yale Kneeland, Jr. 1918
1961 Frederick H. Wiggin, Jr. 1899
J. Irwin Miller 1927
1962 M. Heminway Merriman 1897
Mason W. Gross 1929
1963 Mr. & Mrs. Paul Cruikshank
1964 Austin D. Barney 1914
1965 Sherman Baldwin 1914
1966 Francis O. Ayres 1927
1967 Harold Howe, II 1936
1968 John M. Schiff 1921
1969 Henry S.F. Cooper, M.D. 1913
1970 Barclay Robinson 1915
1971 James I. Armstrong 1937
1972 John C. Esty, Jr.
1973 Harmar Brereton 1927
1974 John Lyman 1914
1975 Donald V. Buttenheim 1933
1976 John H. Mallon 1915
1977 Orin Lehman 1938
1978 Kate Peterson Mailliard
1979 Charles C. Finucane 1924
1980 E. Philip Snyder, Jr. 1938
1981 Henry L. Hillman 1937
1982 Deane Keller 1919
1983 Horace D. Taft 1943
1984 Andrew K. Marckwald 1930
1985 Robert W. Sweet 1940
1986 Henry W. Taft 1943
1987 Harold B. Whiteman, Jr. 1937
1988 Louis F. Laun 1938
1989 George H. Weyerhaeuser 1944
1990 Centennial Year-No award given
1991 Henry P. Becton 1933
1992 Maynard Mack 1927
1993 Katherine duPont Gahagan
1994 Peter R. Fink 1951
Charles E. Yonkers 1958
1995 William R. Duryee 1923
1996 William H. Risley 1935
1997 William A. Waldron 1931
1998 Lee Paul Klingenstein 1944
1999 Donald F. McCullough 1942
2000 H. Wick Chambers, Jr. 1927
2001 Lance R. and Patricia K. Odden
2002 Cheves M. Smythe 1942
2003 Alfred Gilman 1958
2004 Wesley S. Williams, Jr. 1959
2005 John L. Vogelstein 1952
2006 Samuel F. Pryor III 1946
2007 John A. Logan, Jr. 1942
2008 John S. Wold 1934
2009 John Merrow II 1959
2010 John Orb 1937
2011 Lowell Thomas, Jr 1942
2012 Rodman W. Moorhead 1962
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