College Preparatory School

A long-term lease turns Baltimore County's historic Dumbarton House in Rodgers Forge over to the Baltimore Actors' Theatre Conservatory.This is truly a happy match. It gives that 150-year-old Greek Revival mansion in Rodgers Forge a new purpose. And it creates a permanent home for the non-profit theater group, which bills itself as Maryland's only college preparatory school (grades 1-12) for the arts.BAT operates the Wixie Children's Theater as well as the Oregon Ridge Dinner Theater, where the conservatory students' two annual school productions are presented.

James C. Fletcher, who reluctantly agreed to head NASA for a second time after the Challenger shuttle accident in 1986, died of cancer yesterday in Washington. Mr. Fletcher, 72, had lived in suburban McLean, Va., since his most recent retirement from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. He served on the boards of several corporations and held a part-time teaching job at the University of Pittsburgh, his family said.Dorothy Bush, 75, who called the roll at every Democratic National Convention for more than 40 years, died Saturday in Naples, Fla., of lung cancer.

In Baltimore County Mount de Sales Academy names new headmistress CATONSVILLE - Mount de Sales Academy has a new headmistress, Sister Mary Reginald. A native of Bedford, England, Sister Mary grew up in Oak Ridge, Tenn. She received a bachelor's degree from Siena College in Memphis, Tenn., and master's degrees from Xavier University in Cincinnati and the University of St. Thomas Aquinas in Rome, Italy. A Dominican nun for more than three decades, she has been a principal of schools in Tennessee, Ohio and Virginia and was president of Aquinas College in Nashville, Tenn.

Local businesspeople Kathryn B. Freeland, founder and chief executive officer of RGII, a high-tech company, and Ann M. and John W. Jacobs of Rendez-Vous caterers were honored with "Small Business of the Year" awards for their companies from the local chapter of SCORE, the Service Corps of Retired Executives.Ralph S. Blakeney, chairman of the Southern Maryland SCORE Chapter, said "the awards are in recognition of the outstanding success of both businesses."Freeland started RGII in the basement of her home.

A Mass of Christian burial for Thomas D. Farrell, a partner and founder of the Concord Mortgage Co. in Bethesda, will be offered at 10 a.m. today at St. John the Evangelist Roman Catholic Church, Ritchie Highway and Cypress Creek Road in Severna Park.Mr. Farrell, who was 53 and lived in Severna Park, died Sunday at George Washington University Hospital of complications of cancer.He was born in Norwalk, Conn., and graduated from Fairfield College Preparatory School in Connecticut.Mr. Farrell began his career as an appraiser in the Hartford, Conn.

The Oldfields School in Glencoe has received a $7.4 million gift that ranks among the largest donations in the nation to a private girls schools, a school official said. The donation was made by Tammis Day, a member of the graduating class of 1969 who lives in Tampa, Fla. Day took a leadership role in the school's capital campaign, which has an overall goal of $21 million by 2003, said Ret Talbot, director of publications and public relations. "Oldfields needs to quietly walk into this century prepared for the business of educating young women," Day, a poet, playwright and member of the board of a California-based family foundation, said in a prepared statement.

Sister Patricia McCarron, SSND, headmistress of Notre Dame Prep School, announced the following Harford County seniors have been named Commended Students in this year's 2012 National Merit Scholarship Program, which the National Merit Scholarship Corporation conducts. Honored are: Julia Bellantoni and Sarah Fetcho,both of Bel Air. About 34,000 commended students throughout the nation have been recognized for their exceptional academic promise. Although they will not continue in the 2012 competition for Merit Scholarship awards, commended students placed among the top 5 percent of more than 1.5 million students who entered the 2012 competition by taking the 2010 Preliminary SAT/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test.

Elliott and Phyllis Ruby of Aberdeen announce the engagement of their daughter, Kristin Ruby, to Nathan Ander, son of Paul and Janet Ander of Baltimore. The bride-to-be is a 2003 graduate of Aberdeen High School and is employed at Aberdeen Proving Ground. The prospective groom, a 2001 graduate of Calvert Hall College Preparatory High School, graduated from Towson University in 2004 with a bachelor of science in business administration. He also graduated from U.S. Army Infantry School in 2008 and is a sergeant in the Maryland Army National Guard 1/175th Infantry.

Itzhak Karpman, 82, who spent his life helping to chronicle Jewish history and achievements, died of lung cancer Tuesday at his home in New York.In the early 1950s, he conceived the idea of publishing a compendium of Jewish men and women of accomplishment. After obtaining the rights to the name from the publisher of "Who's Who in America," he brought out the first "Who's Who in Jewry" in 1955.Although the reference work continued to be published until 1978, he relinquished day-to-day control in 1959, when he was enlisted to help complete and translate into English the 16-volume Encyclopedia Judaica.

GLENCOE -- Oldfields School students and faculty members broke ground for a $6.6 million building yesterday that will house five science labs and a library when it opens in September. Windows at one end of the library will allow students to gaze at Old House, the country cabin in which the school was founded in 1867. Another set of library windows will offer a view of Chicken Hill, where horses graze, said school spokesman Ret Talbot. Money for the 24,000-square-foot building was raised through the school's Largeness of Heart Campaign, which was begun last year to raise $21 million.