President's Office. Rev. Gerald Dupont, SSE, 1958-1969 | Saint Michael's College Archives & Special Collections

In August 1958 Superior General Jeremiah Purtill wrote a memo outlining the roles of the President of Saint Michael’s College and the Superior of the Saint Michael’s House.  The memo noted that the role of the president had grown too complex and that religious living in the SMC House needed to have the same governance and oversight offered in other SSE houses.  Therefore, he split the roles of Superior of the House and office of the President.  The role of the president then became to run the College in temporal and all other ways, the role of the Superior was to administer the house and the religious assigned to it in spiritual and other matters.  Superior General Purtill then appointed Father Vincent Maloney Superior of the house and Fr. Gerald Dupont took over as President of the College. Dupont was the last Edmundite to serve as president of the College.  Although he was originally from Rhode Island, he attended Saint Michael’s and spent all of his priestly life at Saint Michael’s after attending graduate school in Toronto and Montreal.  His ten-year term of office is marked by the continued growth of the College.  Dupont oversaw the continued construction of buildings on campus, including Saint Michael the Archangel Chapel, Durick Library, Alliot Hall, and the final two quad residence halls.  Students continued to attend at record rates.  Student life changed as the makeup of the student body changed from returning GI’s to primarily 18-22 year olds.  Financial growth did not follow the other trends however, and fiscal problems grew throughout his term.  Of most importance however, was the groundwork he laid for the eventual switch to lay leadership.  Dupont was not unaware of the impact such a change was likely to have and there is some evidence that he planned significantly for something he saw as inevitable.