The Old Martinians Association of New England, OMANE, a recently formed organization of the alumni/ae of the La Martiniere boys and girls schools located at Lucknow and Calcutta (India), and Lyon (France), celebrated with enthusiasm its first Founder's Day over a sumptuous dinner on 14 September, 2012 at the Masala Art restaurant in Needham, Massachusetts. The participants introduced themselves and recounted memorable events from their times in school, some that involved events related to the annually held sports meet between the Lucknow and Calcutta schools. The evening concluded with the singing of the school song: "Hail, Hail, the name we own...."

The attendees at this first ever gathering of Martinians in the New England area numbered twenty five, which included eighteen highly accomplished Old Boys (alumni) and Old Girls (alumnae) from the Lucknow and Calcutta schools, some with spouses and children. A visiting Lucknow Martinian from India joined the gathering along with his spouse. A newly designed OMANE banner designed by a young Martinian MIT student and sporting the La Martiniere coat of arms served as the background for the dinner gathering. (The coat of arms had been designed by the Founder of the schools himself.) Old Martinian Associations have been active worldwide and celebrating Founder's Day for decades, most notably those in the UK, Australia, Delhi, and more recently the New York/Tristate area.

This Founder's Day celebrated the 212th death anniversary of the Founder, Major General Claude Martin, a Frenchman who joined the East India Company in Calcutta as a soldier, and later made Lucknow his home. Martin was largely self-taught and had many talents, including being an excellent surveyor and architect. Two schools (girls and boys) each at Lucknow and Calcutta and three at Martin’s birthplace of Lyon, France, were started under his Will from the large fortune he left behind. More details on the La Martiniere schools and Claude Martin are available at the following urls:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_Martiniere_College

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claude_Martin

The La Martiniere schools have a glorious heritage. The Lucknow boys school, which has been referred to as the "Eton of the East," is the only school in the world to have received Battle Honors for its protection of the British troops in the Residency at Lucknow during the 1857 revolution. It has been featured in many movies, including the 1950s Errol Flynn Hollywood starrer "Kim," based on the novel of that name by Rudyard Kipling, and more recently "Gadar." The Principal of the Calcutta girls school was named as the best Principal in the country a couple of years ago. A listing of distinguished alumini/ae of these schools reads like a veritable Who's Who of India. They include, among many others, Vijay Mallya (Calcutta) - industrialist and Member of Parliament, Leander Paes (Calcutta) - tennis ace, Merle Oberon (Calcutta) -actress, Shahnaz Husain (Lucknow) - cosmetics, the Keelor brothers (Lucknow) who shot down the Sabre jet and won gallantry awards in the 1965 war, Priyanka Chopra (Lucknow) - Bollywood actress, Muzaffar Ali (Lucknow) - Film producer of Umrao Jaan fame, and Dr. R. K. Pachauri (Lucknow) who served as the chair of the Intergovernmental (UN) Panel on Climate Change that shared the Nobel Peace Prize with Al Gore in 2007.

OMANE expects its membership roll to grow as more New England Martinians become aware of OMANE's existence and activities. It is hoped that word may also get around to any Old Boys or Girls in the area from the French schools, so that they too can come together to join their brothers and sisters from the India schools in the true Martinian spirit. For additional details, please contact one of the following: Dr. Kaplesh Kumar <KapKumar@aol.com>; Mr. Syed Ali Rizvi <alirizvi@aol.com>; or Dr. Anurag Bajpayee <bajpayee@mit.edu>.

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