Xavier University - Ateneo de Cagayan

Xavier University – Ateneo de Cagayan is a private, Catholic university run by the Society of Jesus in Cagayan de Oro, Philippines. Founded in 1933 as the Ateneo de Cagayan, it became a university in 1958, when it was given its present name in honor of the Jesuit missionary St. Francis Xavier.HistoryBeginningsXavier University – Ateneo de Cagayan was founded on June 7, 1933 as the Ateneo de Cagayan by an American Jesuit missionary, Fr. James T. G. Hayes, S.J., who later became the first Bishop and Archbishop of Cagayan de Oro. It was first located at Burgos Street, where the former St. Augustine Parochial School was also located, and began with 17 first-year high school students. Cagayan de Oro, then Cagayan de Misamis, with a population of around 50,000, had the finest port in Mindanao and was a fast-growing town. The school grew with the community and opened college courses in June 1938 and Grades 5 to 7 in June 1940, to accommodate requests from parents throughout Mindanao and Visayas.World War IIAteneo de Cagayan moved to its present location on Corrales Avenue and grew into a college, offering courses in Liberal Arts, Education, and Commerce. On December 9, 1941, with only 614 students, the school closed down and on May 2, 1942, became the headquarters of the Imperial Japanese Army in Mindanao. On September 9, 1944, planes from the United States Air Force bombed most of Cagayan de Misamis into piles of rubble, including the school. Fr. Edward J. Haggerty, S.J., then Rector and Military Vicar to the United States Armed Forces from Borneo to Okinawa, wrote in his diary: