Inducted in 2009
Prep Teacher (1923-1963)
Father of a Prep Graduate

Induction Video

James Melican was born in Worcester, Massachusetts on January 29th of the last year of the 19th century. His parents were John Melican and Delia Hurley Melican, a brewer and a homemaker, Irish immigrants who had come to this country around 1890. Jim was the oldest of five. He and his brothers and sisters, Mary, John-Edmund, William and little Gertrude grew up among the hills of Worcester during those first years of the 1900s.
 
Melican attended Worcester Classical High School and graduated from Holy Cross in the Class of 1920. In 1923, he received his master’s degree from Clark University before accepting a teaching position at the Prep and moving to the Bronx later that year. Though the Bronx and his beloved Fordham would be his home for the next 40 years, the New England of his boyhood would always remain a part of him. He married a Worcester girl, Abigail Helena Donahue, with whom he would share his life and raise two children, Mary and James, Jr., Prep Class of 1958.  Without fail, the Melicans spent their summers back in Massachusetts.

Melican's early years at Rose Hill were a dynamic time at Hughes Hall. He was part of a core of school legends who would begin their Prep tenures between the 1920s and the early '40s — a list of names that includes fellow Hall of Honor members Rudolph Hanish, Albert Kirchner, Harry McDonough, Arthur Shea, SJ, and Paul Carielli, longtime caretaker of Hughes Hall. These extraordinary men came together at just the right time in the Prep’s history. Together, they would take an institution that had been born in the 19th century as a college’s lower division and reforge it into a high school unto itself, with all that high school implies. The impact that Melican and the others would have on the Prep down through the decades has earned them a chapter of their own in the official history of Fordham Prep, When September Comes. The chapter is aptly titled “A Golden Age of Prep Teachers.”
 
During his time teaching at Hughes Hall, Jim was an instructor of mathematics, algebra and trigonometry in particular.  As has often been recalled by Prepsters from the Melican years, he demanded hard work and insisted on precision, but was always willing and available to help anyone needing extra instruction. Because of his clarity in the classroom, his unflappable patience, and his generosity with his time, he was loved and revered by generations of Prep students.
 
In the words of John Blessington, Class of 1951: “Mr. Melican taught me algebra.  I remember being struck by his patience, and not just in mathematics. There was this one time, I saw him one day walking with his son off-campus.” Melican’s calm, unhurried fatherliness left quite an impression on young Blessington that afternoon: “I recall having an unexpected feeling of being very happy for this father and his boy.  That's just the kind of man he was.” 
 
Among Jim Melican’s first students were future fellow Hall of Honor inductees Joe Fox, Frank Holbrook, Chuck DaParma and Ed McHugh — Prep legends every one — all of whom became not only colleagues but close friends. 
 
In 1947, Melican became chairman of the Math Department, a position which he held until the end of his life. In 1956, in recognition of Jim’s many years of service to the finest ideals of Jesuit high school education, he was awarded an honorary degree from St. Peter’s College in Jersey City, New Jersey, and from that day on, Prep boys would address him as Dr. Melican. In 1963, as he marked both the 40th anniversary of his marriage to Abigail and his 40th anniversary as a member of the Prep faculty, James’ service to Catholic education was again honored, this time by Pope John XXIII, who conferred upon him the Papal Cross of Honor, the Pro Ecclesia et Pontifice Medal. 
 
According to John “Jack” Foley, Class of 1963, longtime member of the Prep Faculty and fellow Hall of Honor inductee: “Melican was one of the great teachers in Prep history. His reputation among the boys was stellar. He was old-school in all the best senses of the phrase. He taught with rigor and authority. And he commanded respect because he gave it.”
 
James Patrick Melican passed away in September of 1963. Among the many memorial gifts given in his remembrance were the gifts of the student body: a set of white vestments, an engraved ciborium, and a plaque to be placed near the altar asking perpetual prayers for their beloved Dr. Melican. He was posthumously awarded a 40-year double Bene Merenti Medal, which was accepted on October 13th of that year by his son James, who would continue his father’s legacy of loyal service to the Prep as a member of the Board of Trustees. 

It has been written of Dr. Melican, “He was an elegant Prep teacher” — and that is precisely how Fordham Prep will always remember him.