The Parish of St. Albert the Great was born on Monday, February 14, 1949. On that day, the Archdiocesan Chancery Office commissioned a probe into the possibility of a mission attached to St. Gerald Church in Oak Lawn. This probe was in response to request sent to Samuel Cardinal Stritch, Archbishop of Chicago, from 150 Catholic families of South Stickney Township. These families requested a parish of their own, to serve their needs and enrich their lives. Father Loras J. Welsh, Pastor of St. Geralds Parish at 94th and Central Avenue, said the first mass in the area on the Second Sunday of Lent, March 13, 1949, in the old Tobin Branch School. Father Welsh then delegated his assistant, Fr. Joseph A. Phelan, to tend the embryo mission flock and celebrate Mass every Sunday thereafter. A meeting of all interested Catholics living north of 87th Street and west of Cicero was held on May 9, 1949. At this meeting it was decided to construct a new church. St. Albert’s was on its way!

Ground was broken for the new church on September 17, 1949. The first service held in the new church took place on Christmas Eve, 1949, when Midnight Mass was celebrated just three months and eight days after construction began. The official dedication of the church took place on April 29, 1951, when Samuel Cardinal Strich formally blessed the new church building and named Fr. Joseph Phelan the founding pastor of the parish.

Since its humble beginnings, St. Albert Parish has undergone remarkable growth. The new church was constructed in 1964-65, and was blessed and dedicated by Archbishop John Cody on October 3, 1966. Currently St. Albert is one of the largest parishes in the Archdiocese, with over 3600 registered families.

In the years following the birth of St. Albert the Great Parish, the number of young families in the area grew tremendously. By the end of 1952, there were over 600 registered families in the parish, and the outcry for a parish school became deafening. Thus, construction of a new school began on April 8, 1953 on what is now the northern half of our school. The cornerstone was blessed and laid on June 14, by Msgr. William P. Long, Pastor of St. Thomas Aquinas Church on Washington Boulevard in Chicago. On August 11 of that year the first of the Dominican Sisters arrived from Adrian, Michigan. On September 9, 1953, the new St. Albert the Great School opened its doors for the first time. In that first year, there were 200 students enrolled, taught in four classrooms by a staff of three sisters and one lay teacher. Throughout the years our school has grown and prospered.