(Farmington-AP, Oct. 4, 2000 10:00 AM) _ Miss Porter's School has received a $6.1 million gift, by far the largest gift in the 157-year-old private school's history. "It's extremely exciting," M. Burch Tracy Ford, head of the school for girls said. "It's an eye to the future. It helps to ensure the future of the school" The unrestricted gift comes from the estate of William D. Hacker, a businessman who lived in California. His wife, the late Barbara Lang Hacker, graduated from Miss Porter's in 1929.