Joseph A. McPhillips III ’58

Our Joe, delightful companion, world traveler, educator, and headmaster of the American School in Tangier (AST), Morocco, died June 11, 2007, in Tangier from a heart attack and resulting fall.

Joe came from Point Clear, Ala., and Andover. At Princeton he was in Cottage Club. After the Army, he traveled in South America with John Hopkins ’60 and Harry Rulon-Miller, and then with Hopkins in France and Italy, and, astride their motorcycle White Nile, across North Africa and finally to Morocco and jobs at AST. Joe stayed on, becoming headmaster after three years.

Successful and revered, Joe helped many of his students enter Ivy League schools. He attracted prominent figures in the arts, music, literature, and fashion to AST as speakers and benefactors. He recently opened a branch in Marrakech.

“When we were playing sports, Joe was reading books,” Hopkins remembered in The Paris Review. “An honors student in English, he was nicknamed ‘Rebel,’ not because he came from Alabama, but because he kept a motorcycle hidden off campus, and rode it into New York to see Tennessee Williams’ plays. His dynamic personality and intellectual reputation made him a big man on campus.”

The class extends deepest sympathy to Joe’s brother, Frank, and sister Lynn Meador.