Archbishop Quigley Preparatory Seminary - Early History

Early History

Archbishop James E. Quigley began plans for a minor seminary in Chicago in July 1903, shortly after his installation. Only 417 diocesan and 149 order priests then served Chicago's 252 parishes, with a city population nearing 1.7 million, and with the archdiocese's then boundaries extending across northern Illinois. Quigley recruited Rev. Francis Andrew Purcell to head the new minor seminary, and dispatched him to the College Propaganda Fide in Rome to earn a doctorate in divinity.

The site of the new seminary at Wabash, then Cass Avenue and Superior Street, was opened on 2 October 1905, upon Purcell's return, and named Cathedral College of the Sacred Heart. Following the European seminary practice of being sited in the midst of the city center of ministry, it also followed the practice of school on Saturday, with Thursday off. No tuition was charged for the first 52 freshmen recruited and admitted upon the nomination of their pastor. Nine other priests, all with either Irish or German surnames, served as the faculty. It became the established tradition of Chicago's minor seminaries that financial want should not prevent a seminarian from attending.

Quigley purchased land on the far West Side of Chicago, in today's Austin neighborhood, for a future major seminary, and a site at Addison Street and Sheridan Road for a larger minor seminary, since Cathedral College had quickly grown to encompass three buildings. Chicago's rapid expansion made the Austin site unsuitable for a major seminary, and Quigley sold the property to the city for its present use as a portion of the beautiful Columbus Park, later designed by the noted landscape architect Jens Jensen. Quigley's health failed before he could put his plan of seminary development in motion, but at an ecclesiastical event in the Eastern United States prior to his death, Quigley providentially spent an afternoon with George Mundelein, then auxiliary bishop of Brooklyn, describing his plans in detail. Quigley died on 10 July 1915, but his successor Mundelein expanded upon Quigley's vision and put it into action. Upon his being named Archbishop, Mundelein boarded a train on 7 February 1916, with a delegation from his new archdiocese, and headed to Chicago, where he was installed as archbishop two days later.

Within a few weeks, on "the feast of the Holy Apostles Phillip and James, 1916," Mundelein wrote to the priests of Chicago:

"It is for this reason that in several of the dioceses of the country, the bishops have established the more modern form of the preparatory seminary, where the young boy selected from among his companions by the pastor or confessor, who discerns in him the probable signs of a vocation, the piety, application and intelligence which is required for the candidate for the holy priesthood, even while remaining in the sacred circle of the home and under the watchful eye of a pious mother, is placed apart and educated with those who only look forward to that same great work in life, the priestly field of labor, keeping daily before his mind the sublime vocation of the priesthood, preserving him pure and pious by constant exhortation, by daily assistance at the Holy Sacrifice and by frequent reception of the sacraments."

"The buildings are to be in the early French Gothic style of architecture and by reason of the distinct individuality and prominent location, will form a place of interest, not only to visitors, but to all lovers of the City Beautiful. The group will be composed of a main college building, and two ornate wings will be one the chapel, the other the library and gymnasium."

Earlier in 1916, Mundelein had purchased a half block of land on Rush Street from Pearson to Chestnut Streets, and later sold the Addison and Sheridan property for $600,000, with a profit of $160,000, in April 1917, with the profit going to build the new Quigley Seminary, and the principal being reserved for the planned new major seminary. With the ground broken in November 1916 and a cornerstone laid at the corner of Pearson and Rush on 16 September 1917, classes were first held at school's current location in September 1918.

Carrying on a precedent established in 1905 in Cathedral College under rector Rev. Francis Andrew "Doc" Purcell (Msgr. in 1922), also Quigley Seminary's first rector, the new "Quigley Memorial Preparatory Seminary" was established with a five-year program of study (which continued until 1961), but like Cathedral College as a day school, so that Quigley students "would never lose contact with their heritage, their families, their Church."

By 1922, Quigley Seminary was already overcrowded, with over 600 students in a building designed to hold 500. A west wing of the building, this time in the Flemish-Gothic style, was begun in March 1925 and completed amazingly by December 1925, increasing the capacity of the school another 500."

Msgr. Purcell established the school newspaper, The Candle, its yearbook, Le Petit Seminaire, the Cathedral Choristers (a boys' choir which sang at Sunday Masses at Holy Name Cathedral), catechists (who served at parishes), the Beadsmen (who gathered after school and at breaks to pray the Rosary), and the primacy of basketball among Quigley Seminary's intramural and interscholastic sports. By the end of his tenure as rector in 1931, Quigley faculty had grown from ten at Cathedral College in 1905 to forty-two, and the student body had grown from fifty-two in 1905 to 1,030. Quigley's priest faculty were expected to live in the parishes of the Archdiocese, so as to keep a parish and priestly connection.

Msgr. Purcell was succeeded as rector in 1931 by Msgr. Philip Francis Mahoney, who according to the Archdiocesan history, changed little established by Purcell, and whose poor health led to his resignation during the 1934-35 academic year. Mundelein then met with the Quigley faculty and asked for their prayerful individual and confidential recommendations for the rector's position. During the next faculty meeting, Cardinal Mundelein named as Quigley's third rector the faculty choice, Rev. Malachy P. Foley. Msgr. Foley urged Quigley faculty to earn graduate degrees, regularly met personally with students both to praise and correct, expected classroom professionalism, and, according to Archdiocesan historian Msgr. Harry Koenig's account, "maintained Quigley as a seminary that saw itself as second to no other high school."