St. Mary’s Academy’s vibrant Loretto beginnings
Posted on February 27, 2026, by Regina Drey SL
Photo: Loretto Archives
Excerpts from an article by Regina Drey SL on the school’s 150th anniversary. Click to read the original article as it appeared in Loretto Magazine, fall-winter 2014
Amid tearful farewells and prayers for a safe journey, three travelers left Santa Fe, N.M., on June 22, 1864, for a five-day journey by mail coach that would change dusty Denver City forever. Sisters of Loretto Joanna Walsh, Ignatia Mora and Beatriz Maes-Torres would make history at a time when education was taking hold and Catholic Sisters were an anomaly in the Colorado Territory. They would found St. Mary’s Academy, which has continuously educated Denver students for 150 years [now — in 2026 — 162 years].
“An advertisement in the Rocky Mountain News in 1864 announced a ‘healthy and pleasant’ location and a comprehensive academic curriculum enhanced by piano or guitar, French or Spanish, and drawing, painting, embroidery and other fancy work. … Under the ‘mild and efficient care of the Sisters of Loretto,’ St. Mary’s Academy, like other Loretto schools, welcomed students of all faiths.”
Photo: St. Mary’s Academy
“Through all the years, the moves, the growth and the challenges, generations of children have attended and graduated from St. Mary’s Academy. What started as a dream of a few people in the nascent city of Denver is today a thriving, vibrant school community. What was once a small, two-story ‘White House’ is today five buildings on 24 acres of land south of the original downtown campus.”
Photo: Loretto Archives
“St. Mary’s Academy opened on Aug. 1, 1864, 12 years to the day before Colorado became the 38th state. And its first educational milestone came in 1875. Eleven years after it opened, St. Mary’s Academy awarded the Colorado Territory’s first diploma — high school or college — to Jessie Forshee. Some time after graduation Jessie joined the Sisters of Loretto, taking the name Sister Vitalis. She earned advanced degrees, helped establish a teachers’ college for Sisters, served as dean at Webster College in St. Louis, and taught nearly every academic subject. In later years, her colleagues sometimes referred to her as a ‘walking encyclopedia.’”
Read all of the articles in the winter 2026 issue of Loretto Magazine here.
