Royal S. Adams

Royal S. Adams spent most of his working life in the Billerica schools, first as a science and mathematics teacher and coach at Howe High School and later as principal of the high school and of the Howe Junior High School. A graduate of Bates College, he came to Billerica in the fall of 1929, when the superintendent reported that "as teacher of science and director of athletics in the High School, Mr. Royal S. Adams of Bates College, was secured" as successor to Wilfred W. Clark. The high school principal added, "we again attempted to do something with football, starting with practically a 'green' team." On June 21, 1934 he married Margaret M. O'Sullivan in Billerica.

As a teacher at Howe High School through the 1930s he taught mathematics, physics and chemistry and ran the school's athletics. The yearbooks name him as coach of the baseball team, and his reports as athletic director describe a program of football, basketball, baseball and girls' field hockey coached by teachers "without remuneration for the many hours of coaching," kept going with dances, socials and an annual athletic supper because gate receipts never covered the cost. Students of the period remembered him in their class wills and joke pages for his chemistry tests and classroom questions. During the Second World War he added a course in aeronautics, and in 1943 he was listed among the teachers who resigned from the high school.

He returned to the Billerica schools in 1952 as vice principal of the high school with charge of junior high guidance, and in 1953, after the resignation of Cyril D. Locke, he was appointed principal of Howe High School. The class of 1957, the first to spend all four years under him, addressed a letter to him in its yearbook. He remained principal when the high school became Billerica Memorial High School, and led the faculty through a self evaluation that ended on December 2, 1960 with the school's election to membership in the New England Association of Colleges and Secondary Schools.

In 1962 Chester D. Ingraham, until then principal of the junior high, took over the high school, and Adams became principal of the Howe Junior High School, writing that year of the new addition that would give the old 1915 building gymnasiums, science laboratories, shop and household arts rooms and a library. He was still principal there in 1967. The school department's section of the town report for 1969 carries an In Memoriam page for him, with his photograph and the words "Principal, Teacher, Coach."

References

1. Superintendent Report, 1929 (appointed teacher of science and director of athletics)
2. Marriages, 1934
3. Superintendent Report, 1943 (resignation)
4. Superintendent Report, 1952 (appointment)
5. Billerica Memorial High School Report, 1960 (accreditation)
6. Howe Junior High School Report, 1962
7. In Memoriam, 1969
8. Howe High yearbook, 1957 (letter to Mr. Adams)