[2] In January 1817, the legislature of the Missouri Territory voted to create a board of trustees to manage all land and property designated to be used for schools in St.

[6] Starting in 1817, the board of trustees began leasing its lands to provide income for future schools.

[6] In 1833, the Missouri General Assembly established a second governing body for St. Louis schools, which first met on April 18 of that year.

[7] This body, known as the Board of Education, continued to lease vacant land to provide income, although some of this money was mismanaged due to inaccurate boundary lines.

[10] In 1836, the people of St. Louis voted to sell the city's common land and to appropriate 10 percent of the proceeds from the sale toward the establishment of a public school district.

[10][22] In December, the board met to purchase supplies and to interview potential teachers, and by March 1838, they had selected two candidates, David Armstrong and Miss M.H.

[27] Courses offered included higher arithmetic, grammar and composition, basic and advanced algebra, geometry, trigonometry, surveying, navigation, and the Latin and German languages.

[29] In 1848 William Greenleaf Eliot, the Unitarian clergyman in Saint Louis, was elected chair of the school board.

Only weeks after the St. Louis Fire of 1849, St. Louis voters approved a 1/10 percent property tax to support the district, and three years later, the Missouri General Assembly passed a school tax, which set aside 25 percent of state funds for education and provided schools with money depending on their enrollment.

[30] School closed six weeks early in 1861 due to a lack of operating funds and the outbreak of the Civil War.

The 1956 film A City Decides looked at efforts to desegregate schools in St. Louis,[33] and was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Documentary Short.

This decision was made due to the poor standardized test scores, graduation rates, leadership, and mismanagement of money.

The district had a 72 percent graduation rate, over $19 million surplus, and continually improving test scores.

[40] On March 23, 2007, the Missouri State Board of Education ended its accreditation of the St. Louis Public Schools and simultaneously created a new management structure for the district.