The Agassiz School was named for Professor Louis Agassiz, a Swiss-American naturalist. Agassiz came to Cambridge to assume the professorship of natural history in the Lawrence Scientific School of Harvard University. He was instrumental in helping Harvard grow from a small college training clergymen to a full-fledged university. In 1860, Agassiz founded the Museum of Comparative Zoology at Harvard. He and his wife established a private school for girls (called the Agassiz School) in their home on Quincy Street in 1855, which closed during the Civil War. In 1882, Mrs. Agassiz was involved in the establishment of the Society for the Collegiate Instruction of Women, which later became Radcliffe College.

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