Charlie Lovett

When I was fifteen years old, I arrived at Woodberry Forest School, a boys’ boarding school in rural central Virginia. On the first day we took a tour of the Walker Fine Arts Center and in the choir room a bearded man read out a list of names of boys who had expressed an interest in choir. I had no recollection of expressing any such interest, but when I heard my name, I remained behind with the others. That’s how I met Bob Davies, and because he read my name out, I’m still singing in a choir almost fifty years later.

Bob was the choir director at the time (on an interim basis), along with his duties as science teacher and assistant coach of the cross country team. I would get to know him in all those roles over the next three years. I remember Bob as always smiling and with a twinkle in his eye, often ready with a quip or a bon mot. When you were around Bob you got the feeling that you were special, that he was winking at you and tacitly saying, “Just between me and you . . .” Before long, I met the rest of the Davies family and often I hung out in their basement on Saturday nights, watching Love Boat and Fantasy Island and playing ping pong with Ted, who was my younger brother’s age.

At the start of my fifth form year, after we returned from an early cross country camping trip in the Blue Ridge Mountains, Bob asked if I’d like to come to the house to meet the new music teacher, Ron Hemmel. That night I found myself standing in awe as Bob, Ron, Bob’s wife Bobbye, and assorted other adults stood around the piano singing a Swingle Singers setting of Mozart. This was my kind of party. Afterwards, Bob and Bobbye invited me to come sing with them at church in nearby Orange the next morning. Thus began two years of riding to St. Thomas Episcopal Church every Sunday morning with the Davies family, rehearsing with Mr. Hemmel, who conducted the choir there, and singing at the eleven o’clock service.

The fifth form also found me in Bob’s physics classroom, and while I may not have been his best student, it was my favorite science class ever. Bob had the ability to explain concepts in a way that not only kept teenage boys awake but even amused. His real-world physics problems were legendary. (I remember one about a boy and his date sitting a meter apart on a frictionless bench seat—how long before their gravitational attraction caused them to meet?) He would tell us tales of his life in the world outside of Woodberry Forest—sometimes pulling the door closed and lowering his voice to take us into his confidence.

Bob and Bobbye were the closest thing I had to in loco parentis in high school. They welcomed me into their home, their church, and their lives. Through the choir and the acapella group The Dozen, Bob made me see that singing could be fun and could also enrich the lives of others.  He even sang with me and two friends in the Tiger Tones barbershop quartet. (I remember him driving us into Orange to sing at a talent show at Orange High School). There are two extra-curricular activities I did at Woodberry that I still do on a regular basis—running and singing—and I did both of them with Bob.

I also wrote a good deal at Woodberry, as we all did, and I’m writing still. My latest novel, The Paradox Club, is about a young woman who learned about science from her father, a brilliant astrophysicist. As I was writing conversations in which Harry teaches Tess about life by teaching her about physics, I felt, at times, that I was channeling Bob Davies. When the book was finished and it came time to write the dedication, I could think of no more appropriate inscription than:

In memory of Bob Davies—

teacher, coach, director, and friend,

who made physics fun.

On one of my trips back to Woodberry Forest to serve as a visiting writer a few years ago, I had a wonderful visit with Bob and Bobbye at their home in Orange. We had dinner together in town and talked about the old days and what we had been singing in our choirs recently. It felt as if not a day had passed.

In the spring of 2025, I drove to Orange to attend the memorial service for Bob and Bobbye at St. Thomas—the first time I’d been in the church since the three of us sang there together back in the 1970s. It was wonderful to catch up with the Davies’ children, Susan, Anne, and Ted, and when I remarked to Susan how kind it had been of her parents to more or less adopt me she said, “Well of course. You were one of us.” I think she meant someone who loved music and art, who appreciated a good joke and a story well told. All I know is, Bob Davies smoothed my path at Woodberry, guided me toward talents and passions that have stayed with me for life, and taught me things about physics that, I discovered when writing The Paradox Club, I still remember. So, to all the Davies family, this is one Woodberry boy who is supremely thankful to have been “one of you.”

—Charlie Lovett ’80