Founded as a high school by members of the Evangelical Lutheran Tennessee Synod in 1878, it added college courses in 1881.

In April 1935, a fire destroyed the main building, and the school closed permanently at the end of the spring semester.

In the 1870s, Catawba County, North Carolina, was a major center of the Evangelical Lutheran Tennessee Synod, with 70 congregations and a total of 10,000 members.

However, a well-attended debate between Methodist minister Daniel May and Lutheran pastor J. M. Smith on the topic "Is Christ's Body Present in the Lord's Supper?"

He had gone to Missouri to serve a group of Lutherans from North Carolina who had migrated there, but returned to his farm near Conover in April 1877 to further the establishment of the school.

He was impressed with that synod's staunch adherence to the Lutheran Book of Concord and their frequent reference to it with the term Concordia.

[1] The first session of Concordia High School began in March 1878, with 19 pupils and R. A. Yoder as the sole teacher.

[4] After encountering difficulties raising the necessary funding, the association appealed to the Tennessee Synod for formal support.

At its annual session in October 1883, the Tennessee Synod agreed to the give its "fostering care, influence, and moral support",[5] although ownership of the college remained with the association.

However, a clause in the faculty contracts required six months advance notice of resignation, so Concordia College was able to remain open, although the last two weeks of the 1891 spring semester, including final exams, had to be cancelled.

[12] The 1893 convention of the English Synod formally took control the college as its own institution and appointed two additional professors, Charles L. Coon and L. Buchheimer, while at the same time urging that the Lutheran congregations in the area call their own pastors rather than relying on Dau and Romoser to fill those duties.

The LCMS was focused on training young men to become pastors, while Lutherans in Catawba County wanted an institution that would also educate their sons and their daughters for secular careers.

[18] Total enrollment, including high school classes, peaked at about 100 students, but began declining due to the Great Depression.

[20] Instead, the synod decided to close the college rather than rebuild it because the LCMS itself was experiencing difficulties placing the pastors coming out of its seminaries with congregations that could afford to pay them.

[22] Concordia College had ten presidents during its existence:[23] ‡Formerly under the English Synod &Extant as a Christian institution, but independent