The Rev. James Vanderholt, a priest for many years in Port Arthur, said at the height of parochial schools’ popularity from the 1940s to 1960s, there were more parochial students in Port Arthur than students attending public schools in surrounding communities of Nederland, Port Neches and Groves.

“Every church parish had a grammar school,” Vanderholt said. “Port Arthur had four high schools — St. James, St. Mary’s, Sacred Heart and Bishop Byrne. The height of the enrollment was in the early ‘60s. We even had a Catholic nursing school in Beaumont and Port Arthur.”

Now, the city only has a few grammar schools from those glory days. Vanderholt believes a lack of funding, less nuns to work in the schools and less students beginning in grammar school and continuing on led to the decline.

“It was fun being a parish priest with the kids; there was life around the parish,” he said. “In South Louisiana, even tiny parishes have a school. You don’t see that kind of thirst in Texas. But we’re very proud of our schools. We have great teachers.”

Tim Knight is a local historian and a 1958 Bishop Byrne High School graduate. He said there was a great cross-town rivalry between the St. James Redskins and the St. Mary’s Rams until they merged to form Bishop Byrne in 1948. In fact, the Redskins rented a plane and played games all over the country.

The Colleens, Bishop Byrne’s drum and bugle corps, also flew to Ireland to march in the St. Patrick’s Day parade.

“There were some very good athletic teams,” Knight said. “In 1952, Bishop Byrne won the Texas Interscholastic League championship for Catholic schools. They played in the old stadium behind (Christus) St. Mary’s Hospital. Their premier player was Raymond Meyer — number 23 ‘carrying the mail’ he would say.”

Other outstanding alumni that stood out to Knight are Judge Joe Drago, III who resides in the Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex, musician John Preston Courville who had the number one record in the country with “Running Bear” and musician Jivin’ Gene Bourgois with “Breaking Up Is Hard To Do.”

“We had a very positive effect on the community. The nuns and the priests’ word was law,” Knight said. “It was a wonderful time — an innocent time. There were no drugs.”

Vanderholt said the diocese’s goal was to prepare students for citizenship and religious orientation.

Doreen Badeaux of the Port Arthur International Seafarers’ Center was a freshman at Bishop Byrne, then located at Ninth Ave. and Texas 73, when it closed its doors in May 1983. She transferred and finished at Monsignor E.A. Kelly High School in Beaumont.

“It was like a family experience. You knew everybody and you went to church with them, too. It was a great experience. I never knew how much I did know until I compared it to what others didn’t know,” she said.

Badeaux’s father graduated from Bishop Byrne and she dreamed of being a Colleen growing up. When the announcement was made the school was closing, students came to the school, some sobbing while the Beatles’ “Let It Be” played in the background.

“It was horrendous. At my first pep rally at Kelly, I wore green and white (Byrne’s colors). It was like a family member died and they took me away from the family,” Badeaux said.

It wasn’t until her senior year at Kelly that Badeaux began to enjoy the school. She just wouldn’t let anyone else know it.