Relationship with Concordia Seminary
During these early years of Lutheran secondary education, Concordia Seminary and the high school had a special collaborative relationship. Many students had field workers helping in their congregations. Professor Richard Caemmerer and wife Dorothy served on the faculty, while Rev. Dr. Arthur Repp, Sr., was one of several who served on the Board. Instructor John Hoyer’s father Theodore and brother George were professors at the Sem. The track team practiced on the cinder oval just north of the KFUO facility and, as Lutheran High enrollment grew to 820 students in 1957, the tennis team used the Seminary courts.
After the Girls’ Glee Club helped dedicate Concordia Field House, Lutheran High held an annual Sports Festival in Clayton. The Fall Festival had long been a fixture on the Lutheran High campus with boosters raising funds for school needs. It continued as an “open house,” but organizers moved the spring activity to the Seminary facility that had abundant parking and seating. It was during these years that Crusader “home” basketball games were held at the Seminary gym as preliminary games to the Preachers’ games. The “Sem” became the unofficial headquarters of local Lutheran basketball excitement. It annually hosted a Lutheran elementary basketball tournament involving as many as sixty teams from the bi-state area. Many of the participating students later played on the field house floor as part of the Crusader/Lancer “Sem Game” series that started in the ‘60s.