McCollom Institute

The McCollom Institute, in Mont Vernon, New Hampshire, until 1871 called the Appleton Academy, was a high school between 1850 and 1906, when it closed due to low numbers.

In the 1840s, citizens of Mont Vernon wanted higher education for their children in the town, and in 1848 the Center District voted to build a new schoolhouse for the purpose.

Money was raised by public subscription, in June 1850 the "Appleton Academy" was incorporated, the building was completed, and in the fall of that year the new school opened.

They feel assured that the pleasant location of this Institution, and the universal interest of the people of Mont Vernon will insure success.

[4] In 1860, soon after graduating from Dartmouth College, Cecil Bancroft (1839–1901) was appointed as Principal of the school, where he stayed until 1864, leaving to marry Frances A. Kittredge, one of his students.

In that year, George W. McCollom (1814–1878) of New York City, a rich man born on a farm near Mont Vernon, gave the school $10,000 (equivalent to $254,333 in 2023) in memory of his late wife, Mary Ann Stevens, a niece of William Appleton born in the town, and the school was renamed as the McCollom Institute.

A colonnaded porch and porte-cochère were added to the school building, and by 1873/74, numbers were back up to 86, with an average student age of eighteen.

H. P. Peck, pastor of the Congregational church, was employed as principal, for five hundred dollars a year, but at the end of the year the trustees were concerned that this did not provide full high school privileges, so that parents could send their children to any high school in the state, and the town would have to pay for the tuition.

In September 1903, Professor Leslie A. Bailey and his wife were then hired as principal and assistant, but they stayed only one year, resigning to move to a school in Maine.

The regular fitting schools had, by their superior advantages, drawn many of the class that formerly came to Mont Vernon, and McCollom Institute could no longer compete in the work.

[8]After the end of the McCollom Institute, its trustees treated the school's building and remaining investments as educational resources.

In 1990 the classes finished moving to a site on Harwood Road, and the McCollom trustees gave the building to the town to be used for offices.