Leicester Academy was founded on March 23, 1784, when the Act of Incorporation for Leicester Academy was passed by the Massachusetts General Court

Massachusetts General Court

The Massachusetts General Court is the state legislature of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. The name "General Court" is a hold-over from the Colonial Era, when this body also sat in judgment of judicial appeals cases...

 as a private, state chartered institution. The charter issued to the Academy bears the bold signature of John Hancock

John Hancock

John Hancock was a merchant, statesman, and prominent Patriot of the American Revolution. He served as president of the Second Continental Congress and was the first and third Governor of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts...

, Governor of Massachusetts; and Samuel Adams

Samuel Adams

Samuel Adams was an American statesman, political philosopher, and one of the Founding Fathers of the United States. As a politician in colonial Massachusetts, Adams was a leader of the movement that became the American Revolution, and was one of the architects of the principles of American...

, President of the Senate. The Academy opened on June 7, 1784 on land donated by Jewish merchant Aaron Lopez

Aaron Lopez

Aaron Lopez , born Duarte Lopez, was a Jewish merchant and philanthropist. He became the wealthiest person in Newport, Rhode Island, in British America. In 1761 and 1762, Lopez unsuccessfully sued the Colony of Rhode Island for citizenship....

 in Leicester, Massachusetts

Leicester, Massachusetts

Leicester is a town in Worcester County, Massachusetts, United States. The population was 10,970 at the 2010 census.-History:Leicester was first settled in 1713 and was officially incorporated in 1714....

. The purpose of Leicester Academy was to promote piety and virtue; and for the education of youth in the English, Latin, Greek, and French languages, together with writing, arithmetic and the art of speaking.

The first faculty consisted of two teachers—a principal and an English preceptor. When the school opened, there were three students, two from Sturbridge

Sturbridge, Massachusetts

Sturbridge is a town in Worcester County, Massachusetts, United States. It is home to Old Sturbridge Village living history museum and other sites of historical interest such as Tantiusques.The population was 9,268 at the 2010 census...

 and one from Leicester. By the end of the school year, the number increased to twenty, and within two years, there were seventy-five students. Shortly after it was founded, Leicester Academy became coeducational, a very unusual situation during those times. Prior to his entering law school and election to Congress, William Whitney Rice

William W. Rice

William Whitney Rice was a U.S. Representative from Massachusetts.Born in Deerfield, Massachusetts, Rice attended Gorham Academy, Maine, and graduated from Bowdoin College in Brunswick, Maine, in 1846. He served as the preceptor of Leicester Academy, Leicester, Massachusetts from 1847 to 1851...

 served as an English preceptor at the Academy. Because of its excellent academics, Leicester Academy attracted students from all over Massachusetts and from several other states as well. Many of its early graduates became nationally known. Among them were Samuel Crafts, who was a Congressman and Governor of Vermont; Eli Whitney

Eli Whitney

Eli Whitney was an American inventor best known for inventing the cotton gin. This was one of the key inventions of the Industrial Revolution and shaped the economy of the Antebellum South...

, the famous inventor; Navy Secretary David Henshaw

David Henshaw

David Henshaw was the 14th United States Secretary of the Navy.Henshaw was born in Leicester, Massachusetts in 1791 and educated at Leicester Academy. Trained as a druggist, he achieved notable success in that field, then expanded his energies into banking, transportation and politics...

, and others representing every walk of life.

In 1856, a compulsory education law was passed in Massachusetts, which caused Leicester and other surrounding towns to establish a public high school. This caused such a decrease in the academy's enrollment such that, in 1867, the town's high school was combined with Leicester Academy and town funds were used to support the institution.

At the fourth Constitutional Convention of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts in 1917, an anti-aid amendment prohibited public funding of any privately owned school or college. After this amendment was ratified by vote the people, the trustees of Leicester Academy gave up the academy and leased a building to the Town of Leicester for the high school. In 1921, the Leicester Academy became the Leicester High School because of increased costs requiring financial assistance from the town of Leicester, thus making it a full public secondary school.