CBHS 1871-2021

Milestones in the 150-year history of Christian Brothers High School

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If it weren’t for two seemingly unrelated events — the Great Chicago Fire and the demise of the Memphis Female Academy — Christian Brothers High School would not be celebrating its 150th anniversary this year. In its long history, the faculty and students at the school have been linked to the Chicago World’s Fair, the Industrial Exposition in New Orleans, the national tour of the Liberty Bell, and other major events. On these pages, limited space prevents a detailed history of the oldest all-boy high school in Memphis, but we focus on the key activities that, once stitched together, show how a tiny school evolved into the first-rate facility it is today.

In his book The Christian Brothers in Memphis: A Chronicle of the First 100 Years, W.J. Battersby writes, “As we look back over that stretch of time, we see those who founded the college involved in endless financial difficulties, disastrous epidemics of yellow fever, a small student body, and wonder if each successive year would be the last.”

It’s hard to imagine the bleak conditions the founders of CBHS encountered. During the Civil War, Memphis was more fortunate than other cities. Union forces burned Atlanta to the ground and imposed a crushing martial law on New Orleans. Our city’s main involvement was a 90-minute battle between gunboats on the Mississippi River. In the years afterwards, though, Memphis languished behind other Southern cities trying to rebuild.

By 1871, the Bluff City lacked a sanitation department, sewer lines, and a source of clean drinking water. Most streets, even those in the business district, were little more than dirt roads, some paved with wooden blocks that quickly settled and rotted. The story goes that one day a mule tumbled into such a deep pothole on Madison that it drowned. Memphis lacked any kind of organized educational system — public or private. Families hired tutors for their children or sent them to private schools that rarely endured for more than a few years.

And then the Christian Brothers came to town. Established in France in 1681 by St. John Baptist De La Salle, the Brothers’ primary mission was education, and they eventually opened hundreds of schools and colleges throughout Europe and North America.

Starting one of their schools in Memphis — and keeping it open — was a challenge. To the founders, celebrating its 150th anniversary would probably seem, in those early days, nothing short of a miracle.

1865   As the Civil War drew to a close, a local merchant, Michael Gavin, purchases an empty lot on Wellington Avenue for a new school. He is friends with the pastor of St. Peter’s Church, who tries to persuade a religious order in Chicago, known simply as the Christian Brothers, to send a teacher for the facility, but no one is available. The property is sold.

1871   The Memphis Female Academy, founded in 1854 and housed in an impressive four-story brick building on Adams, closes due to “adverse circumstances.” Owners of the property begin a search for a new tenant. Father Patrick A. Feehan, the Bishop of Nashville, contacts the Christian Brothers and offers them this property, which local business leaders had purchased for $35,000 — an enormous sum at the time. The Brothers again reply that no teachers are available.

1871   The Great Chicago Fire leaves businesses, homes, hospitals, and schools in ruins. This tragedy for the Windy City is a lucky one for Memphis, because three teachers no longer have a school, and are transfered here: Brother Anthony of Rome, Brother Clement Bernard, and Brother Luperius. The Order summons Brother Maurelian from Pass Christian, Mississippi, to serve as president of the new school. In his journals, the new school leader notes, “Although the terms of the sale were deemed excessive … the Christian Brothers took possession on November 17, 1871.”

1871   Following a grand parade, the new school opens with only four students, to be called Christian Brothers College although it includes a high school division. Finances are very limited. The school resorts to special events — a public lecture at the Grand Opera House, a Grand Union Picnic held at James Park — to raise funds. By the end of the year, attendance at CBC increases to 87 students.

1872   Music professor Paul Schneider forms the college band, who will perform at such events as the dedication of the fountain in Court Square, the yearly parades of St. Peter’s Church, and a visit to Memphis by Tennessee Governor John Brown.

1875   Christian Brothers College presents its first Bachelor of Arts degree to two graduates, Raphael Semmes and Richard Odlum. High school senior James F. Curtis receives a “commercial diploma,” making him the first graduate of Christian Brothers High School.

1877   The school’s financial situation is so dire that Brother Maurelian sets out on a “begging tour” of Europe, hoping to raise funds by selling artwork produced by the students and giving lectures.

1878   Yellow fever sweeps over the city. Memphis had fallen to this epidemic before, which hit especially hard in 1873, but this wave is devastating. Businesses close, thousands flee the city, and Memphis becomes a ghost town. The epidemic begins when school is not in session, but Brother Maurelian postpones the opening until November, when the fever finally subsides. In the meantime, the Brothers help victims at aid camps set up outside the city limits.

1881   In his history, Battersby writes, “The College now entered upon a period of relative prosperity. After the difficulties of the first ten years, resulting from epidemics and financial panics, this was a gratifying situation.”

1884   Christian Brothers takes part in the World’s Industrial and Cotton Centennial Exhibition in New Orleans. Battersby writes, “This afforded the opportunity of showing the general public what the Brothers were doing in the sphere of education, not only in the United States, but throughout the world.” The New Orleans Times praises “the most complete exhibit, consisting of class work in the ancient languages, English literature, mathematics, natural sciences, and the commercial course.”

1890   Christian Brothers sets up a Catholic Educational Exhibit at the Columbian Exhibition — better known as the Chicago World’s Fair. The fair director says the CBC display “may be regarded as one of the marked successes of the Exposition.”

1892   Memphis crosses the Mississippi River with the longest railroad bridge in North America, and the CBC Band performs at the opening events, boarding the steamer Kate Adams to entertain visitors during the day-long ceremony.

1897   Christian Brothers College celebrates 25 years in Memphis with a Silver Jubilee. The Catholic Journal comments that the school’s “magnificent buildings and grounds on Adams Avenue are only the exterior indications of its real greatness. … It stands without peer among the institutions of learning in Tennessee or adjoining states.”

1914   Faced with dwindling enrollment, administrators close the college, keeping the high school. CBC’s last commencement — for some years — takes place at the Lyceum and only seven students receive degrees. Battersby writes, “It was a dreary ceremony.”

1914   High school students travel to New Orleans to view the Liberty Bell, mounted on a railroad car for a national tour. The Commercial Appeal reports, “Christian Brothers won first prize in the recent Liberty Bell Parade for best drilled student boys in line.”

1922   Brother Maurelian, first president of CBC and associated with the school for more than 50 years, dies at St. Joseph Hospital. The Commercial Appeal calls him “a potent force for good citizenship.”

1922   The 1921-22 baseball team wins the city championship, repeating that honor in 1923 and 1924. Commercial Appeal sports editor Early Maxwell names five Brothers to the All-Memphis team for 1925. The following year, the team defeats Southside to win the Interscholastic Conference title — the start of a winning tradition for the Brothers that endures to this day.

1929   Christian Brothers wins the city championships in baseball, football, basketball, wrestling, swimming, and boxing.

1931   The CBC Band, now 40 members strong, takes the Armistice Day Trophy for their role in the annual parade down Main Street. In 1933, the group is named the official Cotton Carnival Band.

1940   Even without the collegiate division, Christian Brothers outgrows its cramped quarters on Adams. Bishop Adrian declares the present location “unsafe and wholly inadequate” and authorizes the sale to the city’s board of education. School officials purchase land at East Parkway and Central, originally part of the Barron Collier estate, who had made his fortune with streetcar advertising. Groundbreaking takes place on June 9, 1940.

1940   Christian Brothers opens a junior college at the East Parkway location. “For 25 years, CBC had been merely a high school,” writes Battersby. “Now it was hoped that it would return to its former status as a degree-granting institution.” When the “new” school opens in the fall, attendance is 280 students in the high school and 27 in the junior college.

1943   The Second World War has a great impact on enrollment. When only 14 students sign up for junior classes, school administrators decide to close the college until the end of the war. Meanwhile, attendance grows at the high school, with 386 students enrolled.

1945   The war is over, and CBC is named the “Outstanding Band in Shelby County” at the Armistice Day Parade.

1947   The first building to open on the East Parkway campus is Kenrick Hall. Other structures house classrooms and laboratories. A major expansion begins, and groundbreaking for the impressive new Administration Building takes place on April 17, 1949.

1948   The CBHS baseball team beats Central 5-3 to win the Tennessee State Championship. With 12 other titles to come, the school holds more state baseball championships than any other high school in Tennessee.

1950   The CBC Band continues to earn accolades, now under the direction of Ralph Hale, who would lead the band for a half-century. The Tennessee Band Festival gives it a “Superior” rating, and the group tours with South.

1951   De La Salle Gymnasium, one of the major buildings on the campus, is dedicated on December 30, 1951. Another important improvement takes place — the removal of the Louisville and Nashville railroad overpass at Central and East Parkway, along with the tracks that cut through the heart of the campus.

1961   In the school publication The Bell Tower, Brother Thomas Matthews, now president, reveals plans for a new high school: “It is quite obvious that there is a need for a new high school. We feel it should be built on a new campus since there is not sufficient room to house a college the size that CBC is tending to become.”

1961   School officials pay $135,000 to purchase 27.5 acres of farmland on Walnut Grove, close to the new expressway.

1962   For the first time, Christian Brothers College and Christian Brothers High School hold separate graduation ceremonies. The number of graduates almost matches: 117 from the school, and 116 from the college.

1962   Construction begins on an ultra-modern high school campus projected to cost $1.1 million.

1963   A milestone in Memphis education takes place, under the leadership of Brother Terence McLaughlin, president of CBC. “No school in Memphis, public or private, had been integrated prior to August 1963,” writes Battersby, in his history, “when CBC accepted the application of Jesse Turner, Jr.” He will graduate as co-salutatorian of his class.

1965   Christian Brothers High School moves to its new campus on Walnut Grove. Although a busy location today, at the time it stood alone in that area. Baptist Hospital and Shelby Farms are years in the future.

1977   The CBHS Purple Wave — the team name adopted when the school moved to Walnut Grove — defeats Chattanooga’s Baylor School 22-19 to win the Tennessee State Championship in football.

1985   Heffernan Hall opens as the school’s first cafeteria. That’s only one component of an ongoing campus plan that includes a new library, auditorium, classrooms, memorial garden, bell tower, parking, and other additions.

1987   CBHS beats Dyersburg 71-70 to win the school’s only state championship in basketball, with current head coach Bubba Luckett serving as assistant coach.

1990   CBHS defeats Hendersonville High School to win the state title in soccer. Ten other Tennessee championships in that sport will follow over the next three decades, the most recent title in 2021.

1996   The 4,000-seat Tom Nix Stadium, named after the school’s longtime coach and athletic director, opens on the campus, making CBHS one of the few Memphis schools to have an on-campus football stadium. Combined with a soccer complex and the Giacosa baseball field, Christian Brothers can claim athletic facilities that are the envy of many colleges.

2014   CBHS launches its Momentum for Our Future capital campaign, which goes on to fund new facilities for STEMM and business electives, student support services, athletics, and physical wellness.

2020   The old physical education complex is demolished. Construction begins on the new McNeill Family Fieldhouse, scheduled to open in 2021.

From humble beginnings, Christian Brothers High School has emerged as a landmark of Memphis education. What began in an abandoned women’s academy Downtown has evolved into an ultra-modern campus, filled with classrooms, laboratories, research departments, sports facilities, band rooms, and offices.

When the school opened in 1871, the faculty/student ratio was ideal at 1:1 — four teachers, four students. Now, nearly 720 boys are taught annually, by scholars from almost every discipline, and enjoying campus facilities that rival that of some colleges. The early days were dark and uncertain, but the future looks bright for the Brothers’ Boys of Christian Brothers High School. 

Sources: The Christian Brothers in Memphis: A Chronicle of One Hundred Years, 1871-1971, by W.J. Battersby, and Christian Brothers College High School in Memphis, Tennessee: The First 150 Years, by Brother Joel McGraw.