Anargyrios - Korgialenios School

The founder of the Foundation was Sotirios Anargyros, a Greek marine merchant, who at the end of the 19th century immi­grated to USA, worked hard at a tobacco-plant and due to his skills, he inherited the childless owner and his great fortune. He then moved back to his homeland, Spetses, and made as his lifetime goal to develop the island. He decided to focus on two areas of development, tourism and education, which he thought would be ideal for that place and time. To support the first goal he built the famous POSEIDONION hotel and then bought half of the island, which had been deforested in order to support the many famous shipyards of the island, and planted it with pine-trees (Spetses, or Pityousa in ancient Greek, means the “pine-island”), in order to develop hunting tourism, which was very fashionable among the high class at the beginning of the 20th century.

Regarding education, supported by the great Greek prime-minister Eleftherios Venizelos, who envisioned the establishment of an educational institution that would educate the leaders for the nascent Greek society, a vision which Anargyros endorsed, he built in the 1920’s, together with another benefactor, Marinos Korgialeneios, the “Anargyreios and Korgialeneios School of Spetses – AKSS” to emulate the famous British schools Eton and Harrow. Anargyros died in 1928, some short weeks after the establishment of the ANARGYREIOS & KORGIALENEIOS SCHOOL OF SPETSES Foundation.

Source and for more information: www.spetsesschool.gr