Public History
The Steranko Institute originally opened its doors in 1889, as the Steranko Finishing School for Girls. Feeling that the youth along the East Coast US, especially young girls, needed to be refined and proper, proprietor Lady Simone Steranko (late of England) used her inheritance to open the school within Cove City, MD. The School was originally small, due to the number of clientele who were both interested and could afford it, so the facility was able to afford a modest campus and clean facilities.
Eventually, with the passing of Lady Steranko without issue in 1911, ownership and control of the Finishing School fell to the administrators, passing through various hands, and degenerated into disorganization and a dwindling student body, eventually closing its doors in 1914.
Since the building itself, while abandoned, was still sound, its doors were eventually reopened in 1917, but by the wealthy philanthropist Malcolm Wainwright and rechristened The Xeon Society. Where the building was once a finishing school, it was now an old boy's club where old money could sit around, drinking expensive brandies and brag about their latest hunting expedition.
At least, that was what it appeared to be. Once Prohibition kicked in in 1920, the Xeon Society was rumored to have a major hand in the rum-running trade, and might have been the site of an impromptu speakeasy or two during the Twenties. The truth was never really discovered, since in early 1931, an enemy of the mob, the costumed Adventurer known as the Fog, raided the Society house.
Rumors abound of what happened that night, among those rumors are those of the Fog's experimental 'ghost fog' device. What historians are certain of is that the entire Xeon Society House disappeared, a sphere of matter just vanishing, even stretching ten feet into the ground underneath the House. The edges of the dirt was smooth as glass, but crumbled under the touch as normal dirt does, almost as if it were cut with a knife.
Still, no one knows what happened to the Xeon Society, and no one had seen the Fog since that night. Scientists' studies came up inconclusive, and the property was left alone, almost a forbidden zone, for decades…
Until 1998, when the property was purchased and rebuilt as the Steranko Institute by Kevin Callahan, Jr. Callahan remained as Headmaster for the school for two years, until retiring at the turn of the century.