CM YEARS
Bill Curley’s arrival in ninth grade from the Needham public school system wasn’t your typical transition. It was more of a crash landing. “The freedom of public school did not sit well with me or my father. So, when he found out I was in a remedial reading class, he said, ‘Well, that’s the end of that,’ and we headed to CM.” Newly arrived, Curley quickly found that rigor was the school’s key to success. “They taught me how to study, how to be in a lecture room and how to take notes. I mean, they literally taught, ‘I’m going to give you a lecture. And you’re going to take notes, and your notes are going to look just like this. I don’t want your notes to look like that. They’re going to look exactly like this.’ Right away, I knew I was not in Needham anymore.” By his own admission, he “barely survived” the first two semesters. But by the second half of the year, Curley made the honor roll and stayed there.
His best memory of those years was of Brother Ryan. “He used to smoke cigarettes in one of those long cigarette holders. At the end of junior year, he calls my mother and says, ‘I see a lot of potential in Billy. You should let me spend August with him, teaching him math and how to take tests because there’s a disconnect between his PSAT scores and how he performs in the classroom.’” On his first day, Curley went in and got his pencil and paper only to hear Brother Ryan say, “No pencils, no papers. You’re going to learn how to do all these essay questions in your head.” By the end of August, Curley’s essays went up a hundred points. “He didn’t have to do that. He reached out to my mother and said this is what I think, and I’m happy to do it. That gesture completely changed my direction.”
LIFE AFTER SCHOOL
Graduating and going to Fairfield University, the potential that Br. Ryan saw in the young Curley led him to New York City and Wall Street – with no plan. What he did have, however, was a list from his college career placement officer, “I asked for the 10 most successful guys that went to Fairfield who worked on Wall Street,” and some advice from his father, “Don’t ever ask anybody for a job, just ask them to tell you how they got their job.” Armed with this, Curley set up five-minute meetings with each alum. “On the seventh meeting, I met Larry Rafferty,” recalls Curley. Rafferty asked him to come back and spend an afternoon, which he did, doing a series of “crazy mundane stuff.” At the end of it, Rafferty called him into his office and said, “I don’t think this is a good fit. I just want someone to make me pancakes in the morning, get me a hamburger for lunch, send faxes, and make copies.” “I just looked at him and was thinking, I don’t even know what to say to that,” laughs Curley. “I left the room, went to the elevator and was about to hit the down button when I walked back to his office and said, ‘I can make the best you-know-what pancakes on the planet. I can make copies, I can send faxes, nobody’s going to send a fax better than me.’ And he looked at me and said, ‘I’ll see you Monday morning.’”
Nine months later, Curley and Rafferty left to start their own company. Twenty years later, and with a hundred employees working for them, they sold to Lehman Brothers. “I always tell people that doors are going to open. You just have to have the brains to walk through them. If Brother Ryan didn’t call my mother, I wouldn’t have gotten into Fairfield. If I didn’t get into Fairfield. I wouldn’t have met Larry Rafferty. And if I didn’t meet Larry Rafferty, we wouldn’t have started our company.”
RETURN TO CM
The road back to CM was a more conscious than random path. Curley and his wife take their philanthropy seriously, and it began 20 years ago as part of the culture he learned from his old company and people he met there over the years. “I do things for institutions that give kids a chance,” notes Curley. Looking back at his CM years, the need wasn’t so much evident as it was a reality. It’s still the same today. “You look at boys going through the corridors, and they all look the same. But there are kids with stories that are really heart-wrenching. They come to school, either hungry, or their dad’s not around because of one thing or another. These kids are living on the edge. And whilst you see them in jackets and ties, you peel back one layer, and it’s pretty desperate,” he says. Curley’s service to his high-school and his connection has meant serving 12 years on CM’s board, attending an evening speaker series in the Perry Gym from time to time, as well as his financial support of many school initiatives.