In 1908, the Rev. Patrick J. Mahoney was assigned to establish a parish in Washington Heights to relieve overcrowding at St. Elizabeth's and St. Rose of Lima Parishes. The new parish was christened Incarnation.
To meet the new challenge, Father Mahoney rented a store at 1253 St. Nicholas Avenue between 172nd and 173rd Street and used it as a temporary chapel with the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass being offered there for the first time on Sunday, September 6, 1908.
On November 1, 1908, he relocated his temporary chapel to the corner of St. Nicholas Avenue and 171st Street. By the end of the year, Incarnation had purchased eight lots at the corner of St. Nicholas Avenue and 175th Street for $78,000.
The first step of establishing the center of the Parish, the altar about which all parish activity would revolve, had been accomplished. Three months after the opening of the chapel, Father Mahoney instituted a regular Sunday School program, with a priest, two Sisters of Charity, and a number of lay teachers, to respond to the challenge of providing religious instructions for the children. His next task was to organize the Senior and Junior Holy Name Societies, the Children of Mary, the Sacred Heart Society, two young people's clubs, the Incarnation Lyceum for young men, and a Young Women's Club. To assist Father Mahoney in carrying out his emerging program, the Reverend Walter D. Slattery was assigned priest of Incarnation. In the following year, 1909, an additional priest, Reverend Alexander McCarthy, was appointed to the parish.
Father Mahoney, well aware that the neighborhood continued to grow rapidly, determined that a complete school should be built.
Father Mahoney relocated the chapel to the newly constructed school auditorium and on February 6, 1910, the first Mass in the new chapel was offered. Incarnation School opened on September 12, 1910, with two Sisters of Charity from Mount Saint Vincent, Sister M. Auxilium, Principal and Second Grade Teacher, and Sister Mercedes, First Grade Teacher, comprising its staff. The school enrolled 103 children in its first year of operation, but this number quickly grew, almost doubling by 1912. Attendant upon the opening of the school was the founding of the Saint Aloysius Society for Boys and the Angels Society for Girls under the direction of Sister Auxilium.
The school in 2014.
As enrollment rose, so did the associated challenge of providing a convent for the larger staff of teaching sisters that would soon be necessary. In the school's first years, the sisters lived at Saint Paul's Convent in Harlem and commuted to Washington Heights every day. However, on October 15, 1915, Incarnation alleviated the Sisters burden by establishing the school's first convent located at 515 West 173rd Street.
The first graduation exercise was held on June 29, 1916. The school had established a firm and enduring place in the Washington Heights community.
In 1918, Incarnation Parish eclipsed 3,000 parishioners. An ever-swelling student body resulted in the school adding two additional floors, which were completed in 1925.
As the school expanded to better serve the larger student body, the church, which had been holding Mass in the school auditorium since 1910, also began feeling the strain its parishioners were putting on the small auditorium. The parishioners recognized a need for increased space and a more dignified atmosphere for religious services. Under the guidance of Monsignor Delaney, funds were raised for a new church and on October 28, 1928, the corner stone for the new church was laid. The church was opened and dedicated by Patrick Cardinal Hayes on June 1, 1930.
By 1937, the parish had over 10,000 parishioners, 7,000 more than twenty years before. Three-quarters were of Irish ancestry.
Approximately 1,400 students attended the school in 1937. The additional two floors added to the building ten years prior was not enough to alleviate classroom overcrowding and the stress of teachers trying to educate classes crammed with students.
The school introduced a triple session thus allowing an 800 pupil school to accommodate 1,400 children. An increase in classes required a proportionate increase in staff and the old convent had already been over-crowded for some years. Monsignor Delaney knew that Incarnation must build again. He initiated a fundraising drive to realize the funds for a new convent. Property was purchased, construction began and the new convent was ready for occupancy in October 1940.
Hundreds of young men and women from Incarnation School served in World War II. The school participated in the war-time drives of collecting tin goods, fabric, and other items.
By 1945, 1,600 children were registered in the school. Monsignor Casey, in an effort to tackle the problems facing adolescent boys, invited the Christian Brothers to instruct the boys in the school's upper grades. To house the Brothers, Monsignor Casey became a builder like his predecessors. He acquired two houses on 173rd Street and united them into one residence. The Brothers' visible and effective influence was exercised throughout the school day and well into the night with daily and wide-ranging athletic programs.
With the addition of the Brothers, Casey never relegated to Sisters any position of lesser importance. Casey was appointed by the cardinal as Assistant Vicar for Religious.
Always a neighborhood of immigrants, the postwar years saw an increase of Spanish-speaking parishioners from Puerto Rico. Economic and political factors led to an influx of Cubans, Dominicans and families from Central and South America as well.
Monsignor Waterson accepted the challenge to integrate the newest residents into parish activities and encouraged families to enroll their children into the school.
In the 1970s, the school returned to single session. Incarnation experienced an increase in the number of dedicated lay teachers as the Christian Brothers departed.
During the 1980s, Sister Maureen Dunn, S.C., was leader. School enrollment hovered around 630 students and there were 19 full-time academic classroom teachers. Incarnation offered gym, art and music classes for each grade and students took advantage of a full-time guidance program.
Students participated in many diverse extracurricular activities, including yearbook, newspaper, Altar Boy Society, choral group, cheerleading, spelling bee, foreign mission activities, a school service program, art contest, talent show, author's day, and the production of an instructional television program.
The school also offered a sports program under the direction of future principal Ted Staniecki. Students in the 3rd through 8th grades participated in intramural basketball, boys and girls junior and varsity basketball teams, track competitions and baseball teams.
In 1996, the school took forty 7th and 8th grade students to Fukuoka, Japan for a ten-day educational excursion, repeated in 1998 and 2002.
Incarnation expanded its technological resources with Internet-based lessons, access to laptop computers, educational software, and wireless networking. A science lab was set up.
Art programs
Acting Club – builds and refines students' poise and public-speaking skills
Attic Salt Theater Company – coaches third-grade students to write and perform their own plays
Ballroom Dancing – introduces fifth-grade students to the joy of dancing while instilling greater confidence and self-esteem; the American Ballroom Theater Company teaches the class
Classroom Inc – places older students in the virtual shoes of a business manager responsible for supervising a company and addressing the needs of the community
Friends of Nick – brings eighth-grade students, parents and teachers together to discuss and commit to building integrity, perseverance, compassion and courage in students and families
Kinderdance – teaches the youngest students motor development, gymnastics, fitness and academic readiness skills
Piano Classes – introduces and refine third- through seventh-grade students musical ability
Photography Club – allows older students to explore the world through a camera lens
Recycling Club – educates students and faculty about the benefits of reduce, reuse and recycle
Yearbook Club – provides select eighth&grade students with the opportunity to manage the process of creating a yearbook for the school
Sports
Basketball – Boys and girls may participate in the competitive Catholic Youth Organization basketball league beginning in fifth grade with the Tyros and Debs teams. Students in seventh and eighth grades may move on to the two varsity teams.
Soccer – the school has a soccer program. Through COSA (Carlos Oliveira Soccer Academy), students in grades three through six participate weekly in basic soccer skills. The goal is to enter a team in the CYO sports league.
Track – Students in third through eighth grades train twice a week at the National Track & Field Hall of Fame Armory Track. Track is organized through the Archdiocesan Citytrack program
Sports Explorers Program – extracurricular opportunities for the younger grades.
Notable alumni
This article's list of alumni may not follow Wikipedia's verifiability policy. Please improve this article by removing names that do not have independent reliable sources showing they merit inclusion in this article AND are alumni, or by incorporating the relevant publications into the body of the article through appropriate citations.(December 2022)
Theodore McCarrick – laicized bishop and former cardinal, Catholic Church
Benet Academy is a co-educational, college-preparatory, Benedictine high school in Lisle, Illinois, United States, overseen by the Diocese of Joliet. Founded in 1886, the school was initially established in Chicago as the all-boys St. Procopius College and Academy by Benedictine monks, who also operated the St. Joseph Bohemian Orphanage. In 1898, the orphanage moved to Lisle, about 25 miles (40 km) west of Chicago, to be joined by St. Procopius three years later. In 1926, Benedictine nuns constructed the all-girls Sacred Heart Academy near the orphanage and school in Lisle. The orphanage closed in 1956 to make room for St. Procopius Academy, which separated from the college in 1969. Due to rising costs and waning enrollment, Sacred Heart merged with St. Procopius Academy in 1967 to form Benet Academy on the St. Procopius campus. Since then, numerous building projects have been undertaken to expand Benet's athletics, music, and science programs.
The Church of the Holy Rosary was a Roman Catholic parish church under the authority of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New York, located at 444 East 119th Street, East Harlem, Manhattan, New York City.
Norwood School is an independent co-educational day school in Bethesda, Maryland for students in pre-kindergarten through eighth grade from 49 zip codes in Maryland, Virginia, and Washington, D.C. Norwood was founded in 1952. The school is located within the Potomac census-designated place, and it has a "Bethesda, Maryland" mailing address. The current head of school is Matthew A. Gould.
St. Joseph Elementary and High School, in Plaucheville, Louisiana, is the only Catholic high school within the civil parish of Avoyelles. It is located in the Roman Catholic Diocese of Alexandria in Louisiana.
Paco Catholic School is a co-institutional private school. The school is located in the district of Paco in the City of Manila, Philippines. Paco Catholic school started in 1912 as an informal class for a handful of young boys inside the chapel in the Peñafrancia section of the district by Raymond Esquenet. It is the largest parochial school in the Philippines and now serving approximately 5,000 students.
Sacred Heart of Jesus Catholic School is a private, Roman Catholic school, serving students pre-K through 12th grade, located on the old Fort McClellan Army Base in McClellan, Alabama. It is a part of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Birmingham in Alabama.
Sacred Heart School is a private, Catholic high school in East Grand Forks, Minnesota. It is located in the Roman Catholic Diocese of Crookston.
Alverno Heights Academy is an independent progressive Catholic TK-8th grade elementary and middle school for girls and boys. Alverno provides a safe, empowering and nurturing environment, preparing students for high school and beyond. Students thrive under the care and guidance provided by master teachers and teaching assistants.
St. Anne's High School is located in Pali Hill area of Bandra, Mumbai, India, under the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Mumbai.
St. Jerome Croatian Catholic Church is an historic church that belongs to the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Chicago. It is located in the Armour Square neighborhood on the city's South Side, at 2823 South Princeton Street. The church currently performs services in both Croatian and English.
St. Catherine of Siena is a Catholic church and elementary school located on Sherman Way in Reseda, California, in the city of Los Angeles. The parish, which is now more than 50 percent Latino, has a membership of more than 1,300 families.
St. Brendan School was a Roman Catholic, coeducational, college preparatory school in Riverside, Rhode Island, United States.
Sacred Heart of Jesus School is a co-educational Catholic elementary school established in 1892 as part of Sacred Heart of Jesus Parish in the Archdiocese of New York. The present school building was dedicated in 1896 and is located at 456 West 52nd Street in New York's Hell's Kitchen. The faculty of the school consists of laypersons.
The Church of St. Barnabas is a Roman Catholic parish church under the authority of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New York, located at Martha Avenue near East 241st Street in Woodlawn Heights, The Bronx, New York City. The parish was established in July 1910 by the Rev. Michael A. Reilly, separated from the Bronx parish of St. Frances of Rome. It is one of the largest parishes in the Archdiocese.
The Church of St. John is a parish church under the authority of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New York, located at 3021 Kingsbridge Avenue, Bronx, New York City. The parish was established in 1877 and has had long ties with the Religious of Jesus and Mary as their main base in New York.
St. Mary Church is a Roman Catholic church, part of Annunciation Parish, located in Newington, Connecticut. St. Mary School closed in 2016. A new pastor, Fr Shawn Daly was appointed in 2016 to oversee the restructuring of the new Annunciation Parish, combining St. Mary Church with Holy Spirit Church in Newington.
Mary Immaculate Church is a heritage-listed Roman Catholic church located on the corner of Ipswich Road and Ferndale Street, Annerley, a suburb of Brisbane, Queensland, Australia. Mary Immaculate Church is located in the Archdiocese of Brisbane and is under the care of the Brisbane Oratory in Formation, a Congregation of the Oratory of St. Philip Neri.
Church of St. John the Baptist situated in Parnell, New Zealand is registered by Heritage New Zealand as a Category 1 historic building. Designed by the architect Edward Mahoney, the church was opened in 1861 by Bishop Jean Francois Baptiste Pompallier, the founder of the Catholic Church in New Zealand. Historically it has supported a convent for the Sisters of Mercy and a school and as of 2021 continues as a functioning parish in the Roman Catholic Diocese of Auckland.
Sacred Heart Church is a parish church of the Diocese of Columbus in the Italian Village neighborhood of Columbus, Ohio. The parish was founded in 1875, making it the third-oldest parish in the diocese. The current Tudor Gothic church was completed in 1923.
Sacred Heart School is a private, Catholic school located in the Hubbard Woods neighborhood of Winnetka, Illinois and the village's oldest operating K-8 school, having been established in 1902. It serves approximately 200 students from pre-kindergarten through eighth grade. In addition to Winnetka, the school draws from the surrounding communities of Glencoe, Northfield, Wilmette and Highland Park.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.
