St. Augustine Parochial School
Laredo, Webb County, Texas
Marker Inscription
The arrival of the railroad in Laredo in 1881, along with the influx of exiles into the city after the Mexican Revolution, contributed to an increase in the city's population and the need for another Catholic school. In 1922, the Oblate fathers were placed in charge of the parish of San Agustín and began plans for a parochial co-educational school. Under the leadership of the Rev. Jesús Prieto, who arrived as parish priest at San Agustín in 1925, funds were raised and property obtained to make the school a reality. San Antonio architect Luis Fuessel designed this school building, incorporating elements of the Gothic Revival style in its pointed arch windows. Despite severe flooding in the spring of 1927, local contractors Mc. W. Ryan and his apprentice, Alfonso Leyendecker, completed the second floor of the building in time for school to open on Sept. 12, 1927. Sister Philomena Hayes served as first principal of St. Augustine School. She and the other sisters of the Order of Divine Providence resided on the third floor of this building until 1948, when that floor was converted for classrooms and a new library. Over the years, the sisters and lay teachers educated students from both Laredo and Nuevo Laredo and produced outstanding graduates. In the 1976-77 school year, St. Augustine School relocated to the former campus of Ursuline Academy. The original 1927 school building remains in use as meeting and religious education space for San Agustín parish. Recorded Texas Historic Landmark - 2000
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
The railroad's 1881 arrival and the influx of exiles fleeing the Mexican Revolution swelled Laredo and strained its Catholic schools. In 1922 the Oblate fathers of San Agustín parish planned a new co-educational school, and under Rev. Jesús Prieto they raised funds and land to build it. Designed with Gothic Revival touches and finished despite severe 1927 flooding, the school opened that September under principal Sister Philomena Hayes, educating students from both Laredo and Nuevo Laredo for half a century.
Why it matters
The school reflects how railroads and revolution-era migration reshaped a border community, and how the Catholic Church met the educational needs of that growing binational population.
The story behind this marker
AI contextThe era
Laredo changed sharply after 1881, when the railroad reached the city. Rail lines pulled people and commerce toward the towns they served, and Laredo's population climbed as it became a real hub on the border rather than a remote river settlement. Growth like that puts pressure on everything a city provides — housing, work, and, not least, schools.
The pressure grew again in the years around the Mexican Revolution. As upheaval swept Mexico, exiles crossed north into cities like Laredo, and the population swelled with families who had left everything behind. A border city became, more than ever, a binational one, its schools now serving children from both sides of the river.
For a heavily Catholic community, meeting that need often fell to the church. By the early 1920s the parish of San Agustín faced a plain shortage: it needed another Catholic school, and it needed one large enough for the growing, changing city around it.
People & events
In 1922 the Oblate fathers took charge of San Agustín parish and began planning a co-educational parochial school. The effort found its driving force in the Rev. Jesús Prieto, who arrived as parish priest in 1925 and set about raising the funds and securing the property that would turn a plan into a building.
The work itself reads like a small local epic. San Antonio architect Luis Fuessel designed the school with touches of Gothic Revival style, most visibly in its pointed-arch windows. Then, in the spring of 1927, severe flooding struck — the kind of setback that could have stalled the project for a year — yet local contractor Mc. W. Ryan and his apprentice, Alfonso Leyendecker, pressed on and finished the second floor in time for the doors to open on September 12, 1927.
Sister Philomena Hayes became the school's first principal. She and the other sisters of the Order of Divine Providence lived on the third floor until 1948, when that space was converted into classrooms and a new library — a small sign of how quickly the school filled. For half a century the sisters and lay teachers taught children from both Laredo and Nuevo Laredo, and sent out graduates the parish took pride in.
Its place in the American story
The forces that built this school — a railroad and a revolution — were remaking communities across the American Southwest in the same era. Rail transformed where Americans lived and worked, while migration driven by the Mexican Revolution reshaped the border, and Laredo felt both at once. A schoolhouse is where those large national currents come to rest in something you can walk into.
The school also shows the Catholic Church doing what it did in immigrant and border communities throughout the country: stepping in to educate children the growing city could not yet serve on its own. Religious orders like the Oblates and the Sisters of Divine Providence built and staffed the institutions that turned newcomers' children into a community's future.
Most telling is who sat in the classrooms. That students came from both Laredo and Nuevo Laredo makes the school a concrete emblem of the border as a place people live across, not merely along. Educating a binational student body was, in its quiet way, part of the larger American work of absorbing and lifting new arrivals.
If you visit
Look first at the windows. The pointed arches are the clearest survivor of Fuessel's Gothic Revival design, and once your eye catches them the whole character of the 1927 building comes into focus. Reading a structure through its details this way is the pleasure of an architectural landmark.
As you take it in, remember what the fabric survived. This is the second floor that went up despite the floods of 1927 and the third floor where the sisters once lived before it was given over to classrooms — a building whose very rooms record how a school grew and adapted.
The original schoolhouse still serves San Agustín parish as meeting and religious-education space rather than as a museum, so treat it as the living parish property it is. It stands in Laredo's historic heart near the river, and if you are exploring the old city, it rewards a thoughtful pause as a place where faith, migration, and education built something that has lasted.
Written by AI to add context, grounded in the marker’s inscription and the historical record. The inscription above is the original, unaltered text.
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Related people
- · Rev. Jesús Prieto
- · Sister Philomena Hayes
- · Luis Fuessel
Related events
- · Mexican Revolution
Themes & tags
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