History
GSL's Preschool at Historic Miss Lee's Celebrates 100 Years!
In 2024, GSL celebrates the centennial anniversary of its Preschool campus, which had its origin as Miss Lee’s School of Childhood in 1924. Located at 1760 Peabody Avenue in the heart of Central Gardens, the historic Miss Lee’s was originally opened by Memphis teacher Eva Lee with a school curriculum focused on the “three R’s” – as well as music, the arts, and manners – for girls and boys in kindergarten through sixth grade.
Miss Lee’s thrived for some 50 years, until declining enrollment ultimately led to its closing in 1986. That year, it was acquired and reopened by Grace-St. Luke’s Episcopal School to meet demand for the school’s then-new pre-kindergarten program. Subsequent renovations allowed GSL’s Preschool to continue to grow. This year, GSL added an 18- to 23-month-old grade level and now serves more than 100 students on the Miss Lee’s campus.
As part of the centennial celebrations, Miss Lee’s was featured on this year’s Central Gardens Home & Garden Tour on September 8 and Grace-St. Luke’s School hosted a 100-Minute Birthday Bash for families and neighbors following the tour on Anchor Hill. Display boards commemorating Miss Lee's history were created for the event. The school also solicited the submission of Miss Lee’s memorabilia for its permanent archives from any former students and teachers associated with the original Miss Lee’s (prior to GSL’s acquisition in 1986).
The Daily Memphian covered this historic milestone and GSL's celebration; click here to read the article.
GSL's Beginnings
Grace-St. Luke’s Episcopal School is a coed, independent school located in the heart of Midtown’s beautiful and historic Central Gardens neighborhood. Its earliest origins on the site actually date to 1919, when the Rev. Bartow B. Ramage, rector of St. Luke's Church, began a small parochial school for the neighborhood in the red clapboard parish house adjacent to the church. His wife was the teacher, and their daughter would join them on staff in 1923, but after Rev. Ramage's retirement the following year, the school closed in 1924.
The beginnings of GSL as we have come to know it today started in 1947, when former St. Mary's kindergarten teacher Lorena Webber Walker asked the Reverend Dr. Charles Stuart Hale, rector of the newly-merged Grace-St. Luke's Episcopal Church, if she could rent space to begin operating a kindergarten. A scholarly man himself and firm believer in the importance of a Christian education, he agreed.
From humble beginnings in the church’s Parish Hall, a thriving day school was formed. Grades were added each year, and the school was issued its first charter in 1959, with groundbreaking on a new Primary Building. The school expanded and grew, adding Morton Hall (1971) for Middle School and higher and Bratton Hall (1973) for senior kindergarten through grade five. By the mid-1970s, GSL was graduating several high school classes. But space constraints led the school to right-size into a kindergarten through ninth-grade configuration in 1979, allowing GSL to focus on developing students in preschool through middle school. This ultimately evolved into the 18-month-old to eighth-grade model the school enjoys today.
Photo: The Saints community in front of GSL Church, circa 1958-59.
Major improvements over the years included the acquisition of Snowden Field (1986), which helped raise the level of the school's Middle School athletic offerings, and Miss Lee’s School of Childhood, whose re-opening as a part of GSL in Fall 1986 allowed the school to expand its preschool offerings.
The school collaborated with the church to link the church, the school administrative offices, the Middle School, and the Saints Gym via an addition known as the Evans Building in 1990. In 2010, the Anchor Center opened on Lemaster between Linden and Peabody, across from Morton Hall and the Church, boasting a new gym, cafeteria, library, music and art rooms, science labs, dedicated space for After School Care, and a greenhouse. In 2013, the Little Lukers program was added, expanding the preschool program to include two-year-old children. GSL was one of the first schools in Memphis to add such a program. In 2024, the Preschool expanded again to add a class for 18- to 23-month-old children.
We are thriving today, excited about the future, and proud of our history on this beautiful corner in Central Gardens!
GSL's 75th!
Grace-St. Luke's Episcopal School recently celebrated the 75th anniversary of its founding in 1947. Events included both a school-wide celebration (August 19, 2022) and a street party (August 20, 2022) for the adult community of Saints, past and present, and all 21 and over alumni from the Classes of 1947-2015.
You can click here to see selected photos from that event. We are so grateful to all who came and celebrated with us that week!