Christian Brothers College High School


Christian Brothers College High School is a Lasallian Catholic college-preparatory school for young men in Town and Country, Missouri, a suburb of St. Louis. It is located in the Archdiocese of St. Louis and is owned and operated by the De La Salle Brothers. It is the second oldest Lasallian school in the United States.

History

Early years (1850–1916)

The school was founded in 1850 under the name "St. Joseph's Academy" by three French-speaking Christian Brothers who had come to St. Louis the previous year from Montreal, Canada. In 1851, the school moved from its original location at 16th and Market Street to 8th and Cerre Street in downtown St. Louis, and the name changed to the "Academy of the Christian Brothers." In December 1855, the school was granted a college charter, becoming the Brothers' first U.S. institution to operate at the collegiate level.
In 1882, due to lack of space, the school moved to the "Cote Brilliante" campus in north St. Louis on the northeast corner of Easton Avenue and North Kingshighway, where it served as a primary, secondary, and college boarding school for boys.
file:Christian Brothers College.jpg|thumb|left|230px|Facade of the school in the early 20th century
The Summer Olympic Games were held in St. Louis in 1904, the first Olympics to feature a competitive soccer tournament and to award medals in the sport. Concerns regarding team travel from Europe, and a lack of amateur players of the sport, were addressed when the Cadets of Christian Brothers College were invited to represent the United States in the association football tournament of the 1904 Summer Olympic Games. The only other entrant in the competition were the then-champions of Canada, from Galt, Ontario. The tournament was held in Francis Olympic Field in mid-November. The Canadians easily won the gold medal, but Christian Brothers College came in second, and each member of the team was awarded a silver medal. Those remain the only Olympic medals awarded to a school or college. The second-place finish remains the best result achieved by a United States men's soccer team at the Olympic Games. The 11 members of the school team included three brothers, John, Thomas, and Charles January, and the youngest of the siblings was just 16 years old at the time. Charles, the last surviving member of the team, died in 1970.
On October 5, 1916, a fire destroyed the school, killing seven firemen, two sick Brothers, and a nurse. Washington University in St. Louis allowed CBC to use the former Smith Academy building for the rest of the academic year.

Clayton Campus (1922–2003)

For several years, the brothers taught in parochial schools until a new "Christian Brothers College High School" was built at University Lane and Clayton Road in Clayton, Missouri. The school building was opened in 1922 and expanded several times over the following decades to accommodate increasing enrollment.
CBC long hosted an Army JROTC program; students were required to participate. Later, it became a voluntary program, and was disbanded in 1993.
In 1998, the CBC Board of Directors announced the school would move eight miles westward to a new campus in West St. Louis County, Missouri.

West County Campus (2003–present)

The current campus is located near the northwest corner at the interchange of Interstate 64 in Missouri and Interstate 270. The first academic year at the new location was 2003–04. In January 2006, CBC announced plans to begin drug testing all students during the 2007–08 academic year. The school became the first private school in the West St. Louis area to implement such testing, and the proposal received widespread press coverage.

Athletics

Team name

The team name from the inception of inter-collegiate athletics at CBC until 1916 was the Collegians. The team was known as the Hi-Pointers during the early years on Clayton Road through the 1950s; the name derives from the Hi-Pointe neighborhood near Clayton, where CBC was located from 1922 to 2003. The team was unofficially renamed the "Cadets" by the students when CBC began mandatory JROTC training in the 1930s. The name became official in 1958 and the Cadets logo was created in 1993 by Jason Buford.

Athletic grounds

A. Spinelli 86' Field at W. Michael Ross '66 Stadium

Prominently viewed off of I-64, on the Town and Country campus, is W. Michael Ross Stadium, a 3,000 seat multi-purpose stadium hosting football, soccer, lacrosse, and ultimate. Carved into the southern hill of the campus, Ross Stadium is known for its dusk time shadows and sun rays during early season football games. It also prominently features a rock "CBC" on the grandstand hillside, similar to the University of Missouri "M". Spinelli Field in 2012 became a "Championship Field". The turf that was used to replace the original surface is from the Mercedes-Benz Superdome and hosted the BCS National Championship and several bowl games.

Metro Catholic Conference

CBC is a charter member of the Metro Catholic Conference. The MCC, sometimes known as "The Big 5", was formed in 1992 and includes Chaminade College Preparatory School, De Smet Jesuit High School, St. John Vianney High School, and SLUH.

Championships

National collegiate champions

  • Soccer: 1890, 1891, 1892, 1893, 1894, 1895, 1896, 1897, 1898, 1899, 1900, 1901, 1902, 1903, 1904, 1905

    Team state champions

  • Baseball: 2010, 2015
  • Basketball: 1933, 1959, 1960, 1963, 1997, 2014, 2022
  • Football: 2014, 2017, 2018, 2021, 2022
  • Ice hockey: 1983, 1987, 1988, 1993, 2001, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2012, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2021
  • Soccer: 1969, 1983, 1984, 1988, 2004, 2005, 2009, 2012, 2016, 2018
  • Inline hockey: 2001, 2004, 2005, 2011, 2016
  • Lacrosse: 2007, 2013
  • Track and field: 1935, 1941
  • Indoor track and field: 1940
  • Racquetball: 1965, 1990, 1991, 1992, 1993, 1994, 2007, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024
  • Wrestling: 2018, 2019
  • Bowling: 1998, 2004
  • Cross country: one individual state champion
  • Wrestling: nine individual state champions, most recently in 2018 at 113, 126, 132, 182 weight classes
The CBC hockey team won 130 straight games from 2002–03 to the 2006 season final.
CBC football has had three consecutive undefeated seasons, in 1961, 1962, and 1963, before the state title in Missouri was established.

Collegiate level

  • Football: 1900
  • Soccer: 1901, 1901

    1904 Summer Olympic Games">Football at the 1904 Summer Olympics">1904 Summer Olympic Games

  • Association football : silver medal

    Performing arts

The Cerre Players, headed by Peter Banholzer, are noted for performance-plays and musicals that have included High School Musical On Stage!, A Few Good Men, Urinetown, Les Miserables, Footloose, Jesus Christ Superstar, Beauty and the Beast, Crazy for You, How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying, Oklahoma!, and Sweeney Todd. Murray completed his 100th production at CBC with Little Shop of Horrors.
The new theatre, Gundaker Theater, opened in 2003 when CBC moved to the West County campus.
The CBC Music Program, informally called the "Band of Brothers", primarily plays jazz and rock-style music. The choral groups include "The Cadet Chorus" and the premier group "Brothers in Harmony". The CBC Drum-line is noted for novelty cadences like "Canosaurus" and "High Voltage". The Band of Brothers, Brothers in Harmony, and the Drum-line are CBC's primary performing and touring groups. CBC also offers classes in Piano, Guitar, Music Practicum and a Beginning Band.

Notable alumni

Arts