The Lloydsboro Seminary
Known as “Lloydsborough Seminary” in the “Little Colonel” books, the Kentucky College for Young Ladies was a private, nondenominational day and boarding school that operated on Ash Avenue from 1873 until August 28, 1900, when fire destroyed the main building. It was originally located at 111 and 115 Ash Avenue. The school then moved to the first floor of the Villa Ridge Inn and became the Villa Ridge Academy. That building was purchased in 1902 by the Commonwealth of Kentucky for the Confederate Home. In 1903, the Villa Ridge School was re-opened by Miss Fannie Craig in a clapboard building behind Edgewood. Holly House, one of the Craftsman-style homes on the college’s original site, was built by Mary T. Cleland, daughter of Louise Cleland, who once taught music at the Kentucky College for Young Ladies, and inspired two characters in the “Little Colonel” stories, Mrs. Clelling and Mrs.Bisbee.
The Lloydsboro Seminary is the setting for “The Little Colonel at Boarding School”. This view is of the original “Kentucky College for Young Ladies” (sketch from The Oldham Index, August 22, 1890). It was a private, non-denominational school, located in Pewee Valley on Ash Avenue just behind Clovercroft, and the building dated from the late 1870s. The first president was A. E. Sloan. Annie Craig (the real-life mother of “Miss Allison” and “Mrs. Walton,” grandmother to the “Two Little Knights of Kentucky”) was one of the many original supporters of the school. Fannie Craig (“Miss Allison”) was one of its teachers after graduating from the school in 1877.
The school was a boarding college for young ladies, two girls in each of its forty rooms. The girls all wore uniforms, and by the 1890s, boys were also allowed for day classes only.
However, by the time of “The Little Colonel at Boarding School” (published 1903) the school was already only a nostalgic memory. A fire in the late 1890s destroyed the main building, and the school was moved to the Villa Ridge Inn and its name changed to the Villa Ridge Academy. That building was in turn purchased in 1902 by the State of Kentucky to serve as the Confederate Home.
By 1903, when the Little Colonel at Boarding School was introduced, the school was re-opened by Fannie Craig in a new location in a building behind Edgewood, The Craig residence.
original college catalogs and materials
another view with enlargement