Wantage School driveway named for longtime teacher

The front entrance to Wantage School has been named Terwilliger Lane in honor Allen Terwilliger, a 40-year teacher who died in 2021.

“I’m glad you named the driveway after Mr. Terwilliger,” Nicholas D’Agostino, president of the Sussex-Wantage Regional Board of Education, said at the board’s meeting Jan. 26. “He was, obviously, a legend in our district.”

Terwilliger was a lifelong Wantage resident who attended Sussex-Wantage schools and graduated from High Point Regional High School in 1975. After graduating from college in 1979, he began teaching in the Sussex-Wantage district.

According to his obituary, Terwilliger, who had no children, was dedicated to his students and enjoyed seeing them grow up and succeed. He also was generous, paying for an annual class trip to the U.S. Military Academy at West Point and supplying pizza for class parties when needed. He donated many items, such as trees and the Eagle weather vane, to Wantage School.

Superintendent Michael Gall said a school committee considered several ideas to honor Terwilliger. There was brief discussion about renaming the Wantage School in his honor, but Gall said he didn’t believe that Terwilliger would have wanted that because it would detract from the school’s legacy.

“I became pretty close with Mr. T,” he said. “He was very vocal about sharing what he thought his legacy should be. It wasn’t morbid in any form, but he would love the idea of the driveway because that’s consistent with what’s been done around the district.”

There also is talk of building a walkway in front of the school to honor others who have died.

“I have a picture in my head,” Gall said. “It was kind of a meandering walkway with benches and certain plantings that would recognize all the people who have passed on from Wantage School.”