Ursinus School of Theology (Philadelphia, PA)

Ursinus College was founded in 1869 and named after 16th century European religious reformer Zacharias Ursinus. It began as a result of the controversy between High and Low Church advocates of the period. The High Church advocates included the Reformed Church seminary and Franklin and Marshall College. The Rev. John Henry Augustus Bomberger, a Low Church advocate, together with other like-minded ministers, bought the buildings of a defunct boys' preparatory school called Freeland Seminary in Collegeville, Pennsylvania. Its first class graduated in 1873. When Pennsyvania Female College closed in 1880, Ursinus invited the women to enroll, making it coeducational. Also late in the century, a peace commission brought the two sides of the split into a friendly relationship.