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The United States Military Academy at West Point is famously tough to get into, both literally due to its high security profile and also in terms of actually gaining admission as a student. Candidates for admission must apply directly to the academy and receive a nomination, usually from a member of Congress. In the case of Franklin's Jill Hamilton, recently admitted to the class of 2030 at USMA, the official push came from Congressman Jake Auchincloss.
Jill started her high school career at Franklin High School and then transferred to The Brooks School, a college preparatory boarding school in North Andover.
But while she is about to graduate from Brooks at the end of the month, a formative aspect of her life -- her passion for Rugby -- began while she was still a student at FHS when a friend shared with Jill her excitement at being part of a rugby team. It sounded intriguing to Jill and an invitation to join a practice with the Barbarians -- a youth rugby group based in Wrentham -- followed. Jill was hooked on the spot.
"I love that rugby is really fast-paced, the play is continuous, it doesn't stop when someone is tackled," she said.
According to the group, Barbarians Youth Rugby is a community-focused sports organization dedicated to teaching the fundamentals of rugby to youth (GradesS K-12) in Wrentham and the surrounding areas. Through coaching and competition, the club aims to develop skilled athletes and responsible young citizens guided by the core values of rugby.
Jill's coach, Brendan Foley, said that the club was originally founded around 2013 by a "rugby nomad" named Chip Walker, who simply wanted to introduce the sport to his 10 year old son and began taking him to matches in Roxbury. Eventually Chip brought the sport closer to home and started coaching an informal gathering of kids at the Cracker Barrel Fairgrounds in Wrentham. The King Philip Black Caps were born!
Since then, noted Foley, especially with Kristi Kirshe and the US Women's team winning Olympic Bronze, there has been an explosion of interest. Gradually, over the years, the program has expanded to support players from grades K-12. At the high school level, it was initially a coed team "but now we are able to field an entire team of rugby girls, which is one of the fastest growing areas of the game," Foley explained.
"Jill hasS enjoyed playing coed but excels at whatever she does," Foley noted. "Over the years, you could see her at tournaments pinging between girls' teams and boys' teams," he added. Today, she only plays on the girls' side, with the rugby season just beginning, there's still time to catch Jill and her teammates in action On Saturday, July 27th, the William A. Rice Recreation Complex in Wrentham plays host to the Bay State Games, where the Barbarians will compete on home turf.
Jill will be taking that 'ready-for-anything' attitude and love of rugby to West Point, where she has been recruited to play on the school's squad. And she is ready academically, too. Although she has no immediate family in the military, she said she had always been interested, even as a young child. "I always liked the idea of the challenges service in the military represented," she explained.
Later in her schooling, she hopes to major in environmental science.
And, of course, she noted, she will then be bringing her talents to the US Army for a minimum of five years of active duty and another three years in the reserves.
