The Final Days

<body topmargin=0 leftmargin=0 marginheight=0 marginwidth=0> <table cellpadding=0 cellspacing=0 border=0><tr> <td valign="top" colspan=2 height=90 BGCOLOR="#006699" TEXT="#080000" bgproperties="fixed" background="02c285a1erlcgo.gif"> <div> <FONT SIZE="5" COLOR="#FFCC66" FACE="Arial" ><B>Staunton Military Academy Alumni Association</B></FONT><B>     |     </B><A HREF="index.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Staunton Military Academy Alumni Associa"><U><B>home</B></U></A></div> <div> back to <A HREF="history.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="School History"><U><B>School History</B></U></A></div> <div> </div> </td> </tr><tr> <td valign="top" width=210 BGCOLOR="#FFCC66" TEXT="#080000" background="02ad2c00dkelyh.gif"> <div> <IMG SRC="03f393d0.gif" border=0 width="57" height="61" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></div> <div> <A HREF="history1.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Earliest Records"><U>Earliest Records</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="history2.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="The Beginning"><U>The Beginning</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="history3.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Ownership Sale"><U>Ownership & Sale</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="history4.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="The Final Days"><U>The Final Days</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="history5.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Loeffler Obit"><U>Loeffler Obituary</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="history6.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="SMA Alumni Association"><U>Alumni Association</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="history7.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Rest of the Story"><U>Rest of the Story</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="smalogo.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="SMA Cadet Logo"><U>SMA Cadet Logo</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="http://silkscape.com/SMA/smaghost.htm#cacy" TARGET="_top" TITLE="http://silkscape.com/SMA/smaghost.htm#ca"><U>SMA Ghosts</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="halloffame.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Hall of Fame"><U>Hall of Fame</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="howierifles.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Howie Rifles"><U>Howie Rifles</U></A></div> </td> <td valign="top" height=390 BGCOLOR="#FFFFFF" TEXT="#080000" bgproperties="fixed" background="06a96b13.gif"> <div> <I>The Final Days</I></div> <DIV ALIGN="LEFT"></DIV> <div> <B>SMA School History</B></div> <div>  </div> <div> <I>The following article was written by Jay Mathews, a Staff Writer for the Washington Post, and published in a January 1975 edition.</I></div> <DIV ALIGN="LEFT"></DIV> <div> <B>Staunton Military Academy (SMA)</B></div> <div> <B>To Be Sold at Auction in July</B></div> <bR> <div> Staunton Military Academy, supposedly saved from extinction last month, is now scheduled to be sold at auction on July 11.</div> <div> Layne E. Leoffler, the real estate magnate who bought the 108-year-old academy in 1971, said the heirs of the school's founder, Capt. William H. Kable, insisted on a mortgage foreclosure when it took him six months to come up with $22,000 of an overdue mortgage payment.</div> <div> Leoffler bought the school, whose graduates include both Barry Goldwater Sr. and Jr., and John W. Dean III, for more than $1 million. Unless Leoffler can pay $490,000 remaining on the mortgage by the auction date, the school will be sold, Page M. Kable, one of the mortgage holders, said yesterday.</div> <div> Mrs. Kable, whose late husband was the grandson of Confederate Army Capt. William H. Kable, said she "had no idea who will bid on the property. I can't really speculate on whether the school will survive or not."</div> <div> Leoffler said yesterday that he was still trying to persuade the Kable heirs to accept the final $22,000 payment, borrowed from one of his relatives, so the school can survive. He raised $1 million earlier this year, to pay off the school's operating debts, but said yesterday he could not find another $490,000 to pay off the rest of the mortgage.</div> <div> "<I>The saddest part of this whole thing is I could have gotten them the $22,000 if they had let us work this out</I>," Leoffler said.</div> <div> The staff of the school, once the largest private school in the South, has been frantically calling parents of cadets for a month, encouraging them to re-enroll their sons so the school can meet its enrollment goal of 250.</div> <div> The school's enrollment dipped from a high of 654 in the 1960's to 243 this year. With bleak economic prospects and without a wealthy, interested owner like Leoffler, the school will probably close if it is sold, school officials said.</div> <bR> </td> </tr></table></body>