The Annual Ashley Hall Oyster Roast
Friday, January 31, 2025 | 7–9:00 p.m.
Ashley Hall Sports Court
(Please enter the event via the Smith Street Gate.)
This adult-only event is open to the Charleston community, so bring your friends. We look forward to seeing you there!
Tickets are $60 when purchased online by Thursday, January 30.
Tickets are $45 for young Ashley Hall alumnae, Classes 2010–2020, when purchased online by Thursday, January 30.
Tickets are $65 when purchased the evening of the event.
The 2024 Ashley Hall Christmas Play
From trimming the tree to baking cookies, holiday traditions powerfully unite us during this special season. At Ashley Hall, our school family’s most cherished (and long-standing) tradition is the annual Christmas Play. On Dec. 12, 2024, 160 Ashley Hall students of all ages gathered in the historic and ethereal St. Matthew’s Church to perform this beloved production for the 100th time.
First presented in 1924 under the direction of school founder Mary Vardrine McBee, Ashley Hall’s annual Christmas Play has brought the medieval Chester Mystery Plays to life with our student’s creativity, passion, and artistic excellence.
From the dancing jesters to the angelic Red Choir, this beautiful retelling of the Nativity story has remained a cornerstone of the Ashley Hall experience for generations of students, families, alumnae, faculty, and the greater Charleston community.
Thank you to everyone who joined us for this unforgettable evening. Your support makes this timeless tradition possible. And, of course, bravo to our hard-working students who shone brightly on and off stage. We’re grateful to have shared this special moment with all who could join us.
Relive the Centennial Performance of The Christmas Play
– 37 seniors were part of a class that excelled in all aspects of school and community life
– 57 colleges and universities extended acceptances to class members
We are proud of these graduates and all they have accomplished at Ashley Hall. Click on the button below to see the full list of this year’s college acceptances!
On Friday, Ashley Hall recognized its 2018 graduates during “The Spiral Walk,” a campus procession through each division that celebrates not only the wonderful young women the graduates have become but also the bright future that awaits them. A new tradition established last year, “The Spiral Walk” began at the Shell House, where each senior received a small conch shell with her graduation year written inside as a symbol of both the spiral curriculum and the conch shells on the Shell House. “I was walking across senior lawn last spring and looked to my right and saw first and second grade girls walking to the Ingram Arts Center,” said Upper School faculty member Chris Hughes, who created “The Spiral Walk.” “I then looked to my left and saw seniors hanging out on senior lawn—where else can you see who you were and who you will become in one glance? I started thinking about how the girls move through the buildings on campus by starting with the Early Education Center (EEC) and ending in the Upper School.”
After Head of School Jill Muti read aloud the poem “The Chambered Nautilus” by Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr., those seniors who started in the EEC initiated the walk and stopped at each division to pick up their classmates where they had commenced their Ashley Hall journey. Girls in each division sang a special song to honor the seniors, and as the entire senior class entered Davies Auditorium, the rest of the Upper School stood and greeted them with the song “Oh Ashley Hall.” “I think this is a meaningful walk because it gives all the younger girls the opportunity to not only pay homage to the seniors but also to get a glimpse into who they will become as Ashley Hall girls,” said Chris. “For the seniors, it is a trip down memory lane and a visual reminder to reflect on their time spent here and the wonderful teachers they had along the way. It is a circle of endings and beginnings.”
In honor of Miss McBee’s 138th birthday, we wanted to share this incredible excerpt found in the 1949 annual titled: “History of Ashley Hall and Miss McBee” written by her niece, Corina “Nena” McBee ’49.
History of Ashley Hall and Miss McBee
“During the year of 1909, an ambitious young woman came to Charleston with an idea. The young woman was Miss Mary Vardrine McBee, and the idea was to start a school for young ladies. Miss McBee realized that the South lacked a school which gave the necessary college requirements to Southern girls, and so, on a day in late September, in the year 1909, Ashley Hall began. The idea was not new to Miss McBee. It had come to her several years earlier when she entered Smith College. A young girl from Fairmont, Tennessee, Miss McBee had been out of school for four years when she made application to take the college entrance examinations. For three long days she wrote away and passed all except two exams. In order to be admitted she had to make up one of these two. Immediately she sat down and took the algebra examination. And so it was that on a cold rainy Fall day in 1902, a joyful sub-Freshman, who had just passed her algebra entrance examination, picked up her heavy long skirts and hurried behind Dr. Brady, the Latin Professor, across the campus toward the administration building. She fixed her eyes on Dr. Brady’s old-fashion high boots and saw water fly out in every direction with each step he took. It was in this atmosphere created by the sight of the stern old gentleman wading through the water that the idea, the dream of Ashley Hall was born. Miss McBee was then, still, a very young lady but despite this she had the determination and strength of purpose to last her through four years of college and many hard years after that until her dream was completed.
As we all know this dream culminated on a day in September of 1909 when forty-five students came to the old Witte house which has since become Ashley Hall and began the first day of school. The first enrolled day student was Josephine Pinckney and the first enrolled boarder was Pauline Sanders. These girls, this class of forty-five students, became the first members of a school which has grown and improved to become one of the outstanding preparatory schools in the country. The first year there were no graduates. But in 1911 three girls: Lucille Lebby, Katherine Paul and Ethel Thrower, were the first graduates, and in 1912 and industrious young student, Mary Howden, took the college entrance examinations and gained for Ashley Hall the prominence it needed to become a certified school. And so three years after its beginning Ashley Hall was well on its way to success.
Of the school itself much can be said. The classes which at first could be held in the main building soon required new buildings that extended for a block. The students, originally forty-five girls, have increased to two hundred and forty young ladies. The teachers have been an impressive group of intelligent, thoughtful and if not famous, certainly well equipped ladies and gentlemen.
Such foresight, perseverance and good natured kindness have gone into developing the cultural tradition of the school–a tradition which through the years has been increased and tempered with the utmost care, and which we regard as our backbone for the work of later life.”
Written by Corina “Nena” Louise McBee ’49, niece of Miss Mary Vardrine McBee (founder of Ashley Hall)
The Class of 2017 has officially taken their place as the newest members of the Ashley Hall Alumnae sisterhood.
With a class totaling 54, nearly half of our seniors accepted merit scholarships for academics. Many more students earned scholarships but chose to attend other institutions offering a better fit, substantial needs-based aid or instate tuition.
Cumulatively, the class garnered more than $2.6 million in merit scholarships to colleges and universities around the country.
Our graduates are attending 29 different colleges and universities.
Class members were accepted into 5 Honors Programs: College of Charleston, Clemson University, The University of Georgia, University of North Carolina at Wilmington Honors and University of South Carolina.
Congratulations to the Class of 2017. We could not be more proud of these young women and all they have accomplished at Ashley Hall. Look out world, here they come. Click on the button below to see the full list of this year’s college acceptances!
Ashley Hall is a K-12 independent school for girls, with a co-ed preschool, committed to a talented and diverse student population. We consider for admission students of any race, color, religion, and national or ethnic origin.
