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 The Historic District of Baltimore
Our Beginnings and Proud Legacy
John McMullin was a young man with strong faith but frail health. In 1845, he was but seventeen years of age when he returned from the Christian Brothers' novitiate in Montreal to his hometown of Baltimore. Now known as Brother Francis, he and another Brother, Edward Whitty, began classes for a hundred or so students in the school that would become Calvert Hall College. Sadly, young Brother Francis would die only three years later, but his legacy as the first American Brother and the founder of this country's oldest Lasallian school endures.
In the course of the next several decades, the vision of St. John Baptist De La Salle was borne with great zeal by the Brothers who sought to serve the immigrant Church in America. Before and during the Civil War, outstanding schools were founded in Washington, DC (St. John's) and Philadelphia (La Salle College and High School). Not long after the turn of the last century, the Brothers ventured to Western Maryland and established a school in Cumberland (La Salle). At roughly the same time, fine works on behalf of orphans and troubled youth were begun at St. Francis in Eddington and at the Philadelphia Catholic Protectory.
In the 19th century and the early part of the 20th, some of the Brothers' most important work was done in parish elementary schools, particularly in the archdioceses of Baltimore, Philadelphia, and Newark. But in the 1920s, the Brothers responded in faith to the need to establish more secondary schools, and so began the proud traditions of West Catholic in Philadelphia and Central Catholic in Pittsburgh. Wheeling, Augusta, Rock Castle, Scranton, Miami, Canton, and Shiremanstown are some of the places where the Brothers once served but now do so no longer. Such has been the ebb and flow of our apostolic endeavors!
At the dawn of a new millennium, the Lasallians of the Baltimore District-Brothers and lay partners-continue to manifest faith and zeal in so many important and effective ways. Our traditional secondary schools-Calvert Hall College High School, St. John's College High School, La Salle College High School, Central Catholic High School, West Philadelphia Catholic High School and Hudson Regional Catholic High School continue to excel; the Bishop Walsh school adapted to the needs of the community and became the only Pre K-12 in the District and continues its excellent service to Western Maryland and beyond; our university, La Salle, is among the very best Catholic institutions of higher learning; and our childcare agencies throughout the St. Gabriel's System continue to reach out with compassion to those most in need. Ocean Rest at the Jersey shore continues to provide our educators a place of respite and retreat as well as space for a summer educational program. The close of the 20th century introduced new venues of association for Lasallians in three special places: St. Frances Academy and the Cardinal Gibbons School in Baltimore, and the San Miguel School in Camden. The new millennium brought forth two new San Miguel Model Schools the San Miguel Middle School in Washington, DC and La Salle Academy which brought the District back to the St. Michael’s Parish where the Brothers first served the community of Philadelphia. Also, in Philadelphia’s Manyunk neighborhood the new Christian Brothers Spiritual Center for young adult ministries opened its doors. These combined with the heroic efforts of the Brothers serving in overseas missions in Africa, Asia, and Latin America provides the reader with but a glimpse into the apostolic life of the Baltimore District.
As one surveys the noble history and fine work of the Brothers and lay partners, one cannot help but reflect how proud Brother Francis McMullin must be. What a tremendous legacy this courageous young man left behind!
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