History
The school was founded in 1889 by Captain Robert Stringfellow Walker, who had been a member of the 43rd Battalion Virginia Cavalry (Mosby's Rangers) during the American Civil War. The school occupies approximately 1,200 acres (4.9 km2) in Madison, Virginia. The campus is bounded on one side by the Rapidan River. It was originally the estate of William Madison, brother of President James Madison. The headmaster's residence is taken entirely from an architectural design by Thomas Jefferson. The property eventually passed to the Walker family. The school was founded when Walker hired a tutor to teach his six sons and other local children because of the lack of adequate schooling in the surrounding area.
J. Carter Walker, son of Captain Walker, and a graduate of the school, graduated from the University of Virginia in 1897. According to Elizabeth Copeland Norfleet in A Venture in Faith, a history of the school's early years, his plans to go on to law school were interrupted by his father's request that he serve as "head teacher." Carter Walker later explained his decision to his brother thus, "I always did what Father and Mother told me to."
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