Regiopolis-Notre Dame has had a very prominent role in Catholic education in Kingston - even on a national scale.  As Canada's oldest English Catholic high school, RND has undergone it's fair share of change over the years.  Read along to follow the development of the school we have today from inception over 170 years ago.

Regiopolis College

Regiopolis College

In 1837 he secured from the government of Upper Canada the incorporation of the College of Regiopolis. On June 11, 1839, he laid the cornerstone of the College, a five story stone building which is now Sydenham Street wing of Hotel Dieu Hospital. The Building opened for classes 1842 and functioned as a secondary school, college and seminary until 1869. Several priests, including two later Bishops of Kingston, were ordained from there. In 1886 the government granted university status to Regiopolis.

Financial support for the institution was always in short supply and in 1869 the situation became impossible. An entry in a diary kept by one of the seminarians, Charles McWilliams, after reporting on the year-end graduation exercises on June 23, states: "And thus closed the grand old College of Regiopolis."

It remained for Kingston's first Archbishop, James Vincent Cleary, to bring about the resurrection of Regi. In 1892, under his leadership, it reopened in what had been the Merchant's Bank building on King St., now part of the Empire Life complex. From that time on, it functioned as a secondary school.

Because its facilities were seriously overcrowded, the decision was made under guidance of Archbishop M.J. Spratt to construct a facility on the present Russell St. site. It opened in 1914.

During the regime of the Rev. J.F. Nicholson as Rector, an experiment with a small boarding school was conducted from 1920 to 1924, in temporary quarters. In 1923 the high school course was extended through Upper School (Grade 13). In 1926 a second stone building was constructed to house a larger boarding school. A staff residence called Spratt House was also opened. Up to this time, the College had been staffed almost entirely by diocesan priests,supplemented by a few laymen. But in 1931 the Jesuit Fathers of Upper Canada took over the College and operated it for the next 40 years. They hoped to develop the institution to make use of its university charter; in 1941 and 1942 they graduated six Bachelors of Art.However, small numbers and limited facilities forced them to abandon their project.