The Montgomery Academy is a non-sectarian independent day school located in Montgomery, Alabama. The Lower School accommodates kindergarten through fifth grade and the Upper School sixth through twelfth. The school's current total enrollment is just under 900, of which approximately 300 are in the Upper School. Montgomery Academy was founded in 1959 as a segregation academy. The city of Montgomery was, in the 2010 census, 56% African American, while at the Academy 90% of the students were white. History Background In December 1958 the Montgomery Improvement Association (MIA) sued the city of Montgomery to force an end to racial segregation in the city's public parks. Rather than accede to this demand the city closed down all of its parks, including the Montgomery Zoo, effective on January 1, 1959. In response to this, Martin Luther King Jr. on behalf of the MIA, announced that the Association would attempt to end racial segregation in Montgomery public schools by having large numbers of black children apply for admission to white schools in order to provide test cases which might allow a judge to declare the Alabama Pupil Placement Act unconstitutional. Governor John Patterson threatened to shut down the public schools to prevent their integration and the Ku Klux Klan leader Robert Shelton promised that the Klan was prepared to prevent integration by violent means if necessary. Founding It was against this backdrop that the Montgomery Academy was founded in 1959 as a segregation academy by Robert Schoenhof Weil, Montgomery physician Hugh MacGuire, and a "group of white social leaders" for "boys and girls of white parentage." It was reported that "desegregation was one of the issues discussed in" the Academy's "formation in the mid-50s", although it was not possible to determine if that was the only factor that led to its founding. The first classes were held in the former governor's mansion on the corner of South Perry Street & South Street (now demolished). Initially, students were in "forms" (grades) 1 through 6. The initial 1959-60 "6th Form" constituted the first graduating class in 1966. Although most segregation academies had markedly deficient curricula, the Montgomery Academy was one of a small number with accreditation, "complete academic programs," and "competent staffs." For instance, already by 1961 the Montgomery Academy's René Lévêque was chairman of the examination committee for the French I section of the National French Contest, sponsored since 1936 by the American Association