Calumet College of St. Joseph

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Calumet College of St. Joseph is a private college affiliated with the Roman Catholic Church through the Missionaries of the Precious Blood. Its main campus is in Whiting, Indiana, with additional campuses located in Chicago, Illinois, and Merrillville, Indiana. The college was founded in 1951 as an extension of Saint Joseph's College in Rensselaer, Indiana and currently enrolls 1,262 students.HistoryIn 1951, St. Joseph's College of Rensselaer, Indiana opened an extension in Lake County, Indiana. It was known as the Calumet Center. Most of its courses were taught in borrowed classrooms provided by Bishop Noll Institute in Hammond and St. John the Baptist Church in Whiting. In 1960, the Board of Control authorized the expansion of this two-year extension into a full four-year, degree-granting college. In doing so, the institution became the first college in the Calumet Region to offer baccalaureate degrees. At that time, St. Joseph’s College Calumet Campus moved into a new home, a former furniture store in East Chicago. Classes and administrative work were conducted in this building, which served the College well for 15 years and later became the Administration Building. The East Chicago Campus continued to grow throughout the 1960s. Buildings were donated or acquired on Indianapolis Boulevard and Olcott Avenue to provide classroom and office space, a Library, laboratories, a theater, a communications center, and student recreational facilities. In the Summer of 1971, the College was renamed St. Joseph Calumet College. It officially separated from St. Joseph's College on November 15, 1973, when Articles of Incorporation were filed with the State of Indiana. On December 31, 1973, the American Oil Company deeded its research and development facilities and 256acre of land to Calumet College. The College moved into its new facilities in January 1976 and is now using the largest of the 23 buildings on the site.