Short answers, pulled from the story.
Episcopal High School was founded in 1839 by the Episcopal Diocese of Virginia as the first high school in Virginia. The Rev. William N. Pendleton was appointed the first principal, and the school opened on the 15th of October that year with 35 boys.
Episcopal closed immediately after Union Army forces occupied Alexandria in 1861. For the next five years, the school's buildings served as a Union hospital. About 500 students served as soldiers in the war, the majority on the Confederate side, and the poet Walt Whitman worked as a nurse in the hospital. The school reopened in 1866.
Notable alumni include Senator John McCain (class of 1954), who was the 2008 Republican presidential nominee; Newton D. Baker, Secretary of War (1916-1921) and founder of Baker Hostetler; Pulitzer Prize-winner Virginius Dabney; and financiers Julian Robertson and Louis Bacon of the Forbes 400. Quentin Roosevelt, youngest son of President Theodore Roosevelt, also attended.
For the 2025-26 school year, the comprehensive tuition fee is $74,900, which covers tuition, room and board, and other expenses. Over 36 percent of students received financial aid in 2024-25, with approximately $8 million awarded annually and an average grant of about $54,619.
Episcopal was named an official FIFA World Cup training site in 2025 and will serve as the base camp for the Croatia national football team during the 2026 FIFA World Cup. The school's soccer facilities have a reputation for world-class pitches and have previously hosted the US women's national soccer team before the 2016 Summer Olympics and Al Ain FC during the 2025 FIFA Club World Cup.
Episcopal began admitting women in 1991, enrolling its first 48 girls, a cohort known as "The First 48." The first coeducational class graduated in 1993. By the 2025-26 school year, roughly half the student body was female.