St. Vincent's School for Boys

The founders on the bronze arrived on a deadline. Timothy Murphy, dying of a burst appendix in January 1853, left the land to the church on condition that a school open within two years. In the first week of January 1855 Sister Frances McEnnis sent Sister Corsina McKay across the Golden Gate with two laywomen and four orphans to secure it, believing her superiors had agreed. They had not, and the Sisters withdrew before the year was out. Boys from the city's orphanage followed; by the 1880s more than five hundred lived here.

What the plaque says

St. Vincent's School for Boys In 1853, Timothy Murphy, Irish born pioneer of Marin County, gave 317 acres of land to Archbishop Alemany for educational purposes. Here the Sisters of Charity in 1855 founded a school, now called St. Vincent's School for Boys, it has been maintained and enlarged by successive archbishops of San Francisco. California Registered Historical Landmark No. 630 Plaque placed by the California State Park Commission in cooperation with the Marin Committee on History and Landmarks of the Native Sons and Native Daughters of the Golden West, October 19, 1958.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Muir Woods National Monument — 10 mi
  A redwood canyon saved from a reservoir by a gift, and named for a man who had been there once.
• Muir Beach Overlook — 12 mi
  A cliff edge on Highway 1, and the concrete dugouts where two-man crews watched the sea after Pearl Harbor.
• Earthquake Trail — 15 mi
  A short loop along the San Andreas, where a broken fence shows how far Point Reyes moved in under a minute in 1906.
• Kule Loklo — 15 mi
  A Coast Miwok village built in the 1970s to honour a people its builders were told had died out. They had not.

More markers nearby

• Marin County Civic Center — 2.6 mi
• China Camp — 4.2 mi
• Mission San Rafael Arcángel — 4.2 mi
• Home of Lord Charles Snowden Fairfax — 4.6 mi