The Mc Callie School - History

History

Brothers Spencer Jarnigan and James Park McCallie founded a school in 1905 because, as Park would later explain, they recognized that "education in the South desperately needed every help it could get." Both McCallie brothers had backgrounds in education. Park had taught for two years at Culver Academy after receiving a doctorate from The University of Virginia. Spencer had taught science at Chattanooga High School and had served for two years as the superintendent of public schools in Cleveland, Tennessee before he pursued graduate work at The University of Chicago. The brothers wrote that they wanted to establish a "first class University school," and they began it with 40 acres (160,000 m2) of farm land, 2 houses, and a $2000 grant from their father. The brothers, however, eschewed an exclusively academic model for education. They believed that moral and physical education should accompany academics, and since they could not finance this vision outright, they laid the foundation of a 30 by 60-foot (18 m) gymnasium with their own hands. The school opened on September 21, 1905 and by the end of the first term, enrollment had grown from 42 boys to 58. Tuition was $50 a semester, and teachers and headmaster alike earned $50 a month. By the school's 15th anniversary in 1919 the student body had grown to 280 students.

Other highlights of McCallie's history include: the 1906 adoption of the Honor System, the 1918 adoption of a military training program, the 1937 reorganization of the school as a non-profit educational corporation, the 1970 elimination of the military training program, the 1998 introduction of the merit-based Honors Scholars Program, and the 1999 addition of a 6th grade class.