BEAUMONT SCHOOL traces its roots to the Ursuline Academy, founded in 1850 (inc. 1854) when four URSULINE SISTERS from France arrived in Cleveland, at Bp. AMADEUS RAPPE's request, to staff a school for girls. The academy (grades 1-12) opened with an enrollment of 300 girls at 50 Euclid St. (the south side of EUCLID AVE., near Erie (E. 9th) St.). In Sept. 1893 a new building opened, designed by CHAS. F. SCHWEINFURTH, at Scovill and Willson (E. 55th St.) avenues. Fueled by a need for a larger facility and the federal government's desire to expand the Outhwaite public housing project, the Ursulines sold the academy building and attached motherhouse in 1941 and held no classes that school year. The motherhouse relocated to Villa Angela and the order then acquired the Kenyon V. Painter estate at Lee and Fairmount in CLEVELAND HTS. The school reopened in Sept. 1942 with 100 students as the Beaumont School for Girls, named in honor of the first Ursuline superior, Mother Mary of the Annunciation Beaumont, in Cleveland. As Beaumont added former estate buildings, enrollment grew to 400 by 1944. Despite mid-1950s plans to triple in size, this figure remained constant. Beaumont has continually emphasized college preparation in a single-sex Catholic setting, with almost all of the students (about 20% of whom are non-Catholic) going on to college. Enrollment for 1995 stood at 420 students.
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