Growing
Pains
Background: Balance sheet from 1929.
1920 -1940
In 1922, after long careers as teachers and administrators, Mabel Slade Vickery
and R.P. Bates announced their plans to retire.
There is some indication that their
decision may have been partly financial, as
running the school was becoming increasingly
costly. In preparation for their departure,
Miss Vickery and Mr. Bates hoped to lay a
foundation that would allow Chicago Latin
School to continue without them.
Miss Vickery approached a group of
parents about taking over the two schools and
registering for non-profit status, following
what private schools in the East were doing.
There was still no commitment from the
parent group three years later, and in 1925,
Miss Vickery and Mr. Bates sold the property
at 18-20 E. Division to the American
Hospital Association, which agreed to lease
to Latin through the spring of 1926. (Latin
School financial archives)
In 1926, after 32 years, Mr. Bates retired.
With the lease on the property at 18-20 E.
Division running out and the boys school
in imminent danger of disbanding, a parent
group stepped in calling itself the Latin School
Association. The Latin School Association
secured non-profit status for the boys school
and formed a board of trustees. Urgently
needing a location to hold classes in the fall,
the newly formed board assigned a building
committee that included Board of Trustees
President Frank A. Porter, Vice President
Kersey Coates Reed, Edward I. Cudahy,
Charles D. Frey and Mrs. Leonard A. Busby.
The first board
of trustees was
formed in 1926.
Girls in their athletic gear in 1920.
LATI N SCHOOL OF CHI CA GO
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