Kenneth Browne was the official war artist in the Middle East (from October 1944 onwards), an architect, and for many years the townscape editor of the Architectural Review
Kent School is known far beyond the banks of the Housatonic River in Kent, Connecticut. Kent is well known at England's Henley_Royal_Regatta, where its crews have rowed many times since first winning the Thames Cup in 1933. Kent was the first American secondary school to race at the Henley Royal Regatta. The NEIRA (New England Interscholastic Rowing Association) championship silver bowls for the first and second boats bear the names of Kent's founder and first head coach, Father Frederick H. Sill and his successor, "Tote" Dixon Walker. Every KSBC oarsman knows the importance of sportsmanship and excellence to the school. Father Sill was a coxswain at Columbia University and built his school directly on the Housatonic so that with a river running through it, there could be rowing one day.
While Kent has had five headmasters since 1906, KSBC has had only four coaches, including Father Sill, "Tote" Walker 19, W. Hartwell "Hart" Perry and Eric Houston80.
Kent's impact on scholastic and collegiate rowing is vastly disproportionate to its size. Among others, Hart Perry has been past president of the NAAO and was a founder of the National Rowing Foundation and the Rowing Hall of Fame in Mystic, CT. He remained the only American steward at the Henley RR until his death 2010. Steve Gladstone 60 has headed rowing programs at Princeton, Harvard, Brown, Cal Berkeley, California Rowing Club, and currently at Yale. Curtis Jordan70 heads Princeton's rowing program. Bill Stowe 58 once ran the Columbia and the Coast Guard's program, and he stroked the Vesper Boat Club eight to olympic gold in Tokyo in 1964. Fred Schoch69 has won many national and international races, and directs the world's largest rowing event, the Head of the Charles Regatta. Many others have rowed in world championships and in the olympics, both establishing Kent's legacy in the 20th century and ensuring it will continue into the next one.
George Kett (1809 – 1872) of Wymondham, Norfolk was a skilled carpenter and wood carver. In the late 1830s, he was employed on the restoration of Norwich cathedral, where he met the young James Rattee, with whom he later set up the Cambridge architectural masonry company Rattee & Kett.
He moved to London with his wife Sarah (née Lincoln, also from Wymondham) and five children – George, Joanna, Edmund and twins William and Alfred – to work on the interiors and furnishings of the new Palace of Westminster under architect and designer Augustus Pugin. Pugin was said to be so pleased with Kett’s finely detailed work that he chose him to carve the royal coat of arms in the Chamber of the House of Lords.
By 1848, Kett had moved to Cambridge to set up an architectural wood and stone carving business with James Rattee, who was now renowned locally as a highly skilled wood and stone craftsman. Their company was originally known as the Wood and Stone Carving Works, Cambridge, though its name was quickly changed to Rattee & Kett. The company operated from substantial premises on Station Road, with offices, stone works, a joinery and a builder’s yard adjoining James Rattee’s house, Poplar Cottage.
George, Sarah, their seven children (with new additions Susannah, born 1846 in London, and Frederick, born 1848 in Cambridge) and maternal grandmother lived in a house in Petersfield, off East Road.
The company flourished and Kett took over the responsibility of running it after the sudden death of James Rattee, at the age of 34, in 1855.
former tenant of the ground under discussion
A member of the 1961 Henley crew for the Kent School, Connecticut, and Harvard Varsity Heavyweight crew manager at Henley in 1965.
Last dated receipt is from 1927.