Holy Cross and Christ the King — the Congregation’s Own Parishes

Holy Cross School established 1929 — Christ the King School from 1953

Holy Cross School: Holy Cross School, at 1020 Wilber Street, was established in 1929, and the school was the parish’s first building, housing the original church — the school-first pattern of St. Anthony’s and St. Casimir’s repeated a generation later. It is the Congregation of Holy Cross’s own parish school in the city, and its staffing record is the fullest single count in this web: 173 Holy Cross sisters taught at Holy Cross School between 1929 and 1984, by the school’s own published account. Since the sisters’ teaching years ended, the school has been lay-led under the Congregation’s parish, and it stands in November 2026 among the largest of the city’s Catholic grade schools, at 378 students in the 2026–27 school directories. A directory claim that Holy Cross is “one of the oldest Catholic elementary schools in Indiana” is carried by its own site; the stronger aggregator version of the claim was set aside in the banked Schools pass against St. Joseph Grade School’s founding of 1854, and it is not repeated here.

Christ the King School: Christ the King, the north-side parish, began its school in buildings moved from downtown South Bend, where they had been used for wartime housing: in 1953 twenty-seven first graders learned in them, in Today’s Catholic’s account of the school. The new school building opened two years later, in 1955; by 1958 grades one through eight were offered, with six Holy Cross sisters among the teaching staff; an addition opened in 2001 joining the school to the church. The school’s own 2008 Blue Ribbon application states “Established in 1950” and an enrollment of 513 in that year — the 1950 and 1953 datings stand in the record side by side, the diocesan paper’s dated account of the 1953 first graders and the school’s own application, and they are printed here as the conflict they are rather than resolved. The school stands in 2026–27 at about 520 students in the directories, the largest Catholic grade school in the city on those counts.

Sources:

1. Holy Cross School, the school’s own site, holycrosscrusaders.org — the school established in 1929 as the parish’s first building, and 173 Holy Cross sisters teaching there between 1929 and 1984.
2. Today’s Catholic, the Christ the King parish visit — the twenty-seven first graders of 1953 in the moved wartime-housing buildings, the 1955 school building, grades one through eight by 1958 with six Holy Cross sisters teaching, and the 2001 addition.
3. Christ the King School, National Blue Ribbon Schools application (2008) — “Established in 1950,” 513 students.
4. Private School Review, St. Joseph County and South Bend directories, 2026–27 — Holy Cross at 378 students and Christ the King at about 520, as the directories carry them.