Category Archives: History

Sometime in the eighties, my brother Evan and I, together with some others, started something we called the Free Academy of Foundations. This was actually the precursor to New St. Andrews, and it was basically a reading list of great books—Dante, Augustine, Calvin, et al. This was not a list of books we had read, but was rather aspirational instead—books we thought we ought to read. I think I made it through the list, but if not, I read a bunch of those books at the time. That is where my real education started.

Shortly after that, we started offering classes at Evan’s house. These were basically community enrichment classes. They did not go anywhere, and non-matriculation was the name of the game. I remember teaching a logic course there, and Nancy also taught a course in English grammar. But this is where the name New St. Andrews was first applied. I think it was Evan who suggested the St. Andrews, and I thought we should attach the New. After I became a Calvinist in 1988, Evan and I parted company in such joint ventures, and we agreed that I could keep the name New St. Andrews. We began offering the kind of classes that would culminate in a degree in 1994.

Doug Wilson

I find it fascinating to trace the headwaters of the institutions that have shaped me (Logos School, NSA, etc.). It’s good to remember their small beginnings—for example, as community enrichment classes that went nowhere. Until they did.