DUANE
Duane's take
Here's how the official marker tells it, and I'll do my best to do it justice. St. Thomas High School — Harris County, Houston, Texas.
Pull over if you need to, because this one's got some miles on it. We're talkin' over a century of boys becoming men, and it started, like so many good Texas stories, with a building that had already lived a whole other life. The year was 1900.
A former Franciscan monastery — built back in 1861, mind you, nearly four decades before — was standin' at Franklin Avenue and Caroline Street, and the Basilian fathers decided that was just the place to open St. Thomas College. Now the Basilians were no small outfit.
Their order originated in France in 1822, spread into Canada in 1850, and when Reverend Nicholas Roche and two other Basilian fathers set up shop in Houston, they became the first Basilians in all of Texas. First. In the whole state.
Worth lettin' that settle a moment. But Texas weather has never cared much about historic firsts. A hurricane came along and damaged the original school, and the fathers relocated to Capitol and Main — which is the kind of thing you do when you're determined, not defeated.
Then in 1903, Father Roche did something that changed the trajectory of the whole institution. He bought a block of land at Austin and Hadley and constructed Houston's first college preparatory school for boys. Houston's first.
That's the kind of permanency that doesn't wash away in a storm. Years passed, Houston grew, and the school grew with it — until a native Texan stepped up and pointed toward the future. The Reverend T.
P. O'Rourke — educator, author, Basilian father — had the foresight to move St. Thomas High School in 1940 to this very site, right on the bank of Buffalo Bayou.
Father A. L. Higgins then directed the buildin' of the new plant, which has kept on expandin' in the years since.
And all through Houston's twentieth-century rise into a focus of world culture, St. Thomas High School has been quietly doing its work — turning out statesmen, churchmen, artists, historians, athletes, civic and business leaders, industrial pioneers, winners of national and international fame. Citizens of many talents.
Started in a monastery built before the Civil War, survived a hurricane, moved twice, and still standin' on the bayou. That's not luck, friend. That's conviction.
What the marker says
Established 1900 as St. Thomas College, and housed that year in a former Franciscan monastery built in 1861 at Franklin Avenue and Caroline Street. The founders were the Rev. Nicholas Roche, C. S. B., and two other Basilian fathers. (Their order originated in France in 1822 and expanded into Canada in 1850; the Basilians in Houston were the first in Texas.) When original school suffered hurricane damage, the fathers relocated at Capitol and Main. In 1903 permanency was assured when Father Roche bought a block of land at Austin and Hadley and constructed Houston's first college preparatory school for boys. Thanks to the foresight of a native Texan, the Rev. T. P. O'Rourke, C. S. B., educator and author, St. Thomas High School in 1940 moved to this site on the bank of Buffalo Bayou. Father A. L. Higgins directed the building of the new plant, which has expanded in later years. During Houston's 20th century growth into a focus of world culture, St. Thomas High School has trained men of vision and responsibility, winners of national and international fame: statesmen, churchmen, artists, historians, athletes, civic and business leaders, industrial pioneers, and citizens of many talents.