Lycee Francais de New York
The LFNY was the brainchild of the then French Consul General in New York, the Count Charles de Ferry de Fontnouvelle. He enlisted the help of Forsythe Wicks, a lawyer and businessman who was the president of Alliance Française and Paul Windels, Sr.—the attorney general of the City of New York. The French government has been closely involved with the School from the first. The French ambassadors to the United States of that period, M. André Lefèbvre de Laboulaye and subsequently M. René Doynel de Saint-Quentin were part of the original group of French and American founders of the School. Others who were involved in the founding of the LFNY in the late 1930's include: Dr. Nicholas Murray Butler, the President of Columbia University, M. Hesse Strauss, the American Ambassador to France, and M. Jean Marx, the Director of Cultural Affairs at the Quai d'Orsay.