The Athenaeum of Ohio – Mount St. Mary's Seminary of the West, originally St. Francis Xavier Seminary, is the third-oldest Roman Catholic seminary in the United States and is currently located at 6616 Beechmont Avenue in the Cincinnati, Ohio neighborhood of Mt. Washington, in the former Saint Gregory Seminary buildings. It was established by Bishop Edward D. Fenwick, the first Bishop of Cincinnati, on May 18, 1829 along with The Athenaeum, which opened in 1831, in downtown Cincinnati. On October 2, 1851 a new seminary building was dedicated by Archbishop John Baptist Purcell in Price Hill, Cincinnati and the seminary was renamed Mount St. Mary's of the West to avoid confusion with The Athenaeum which had become St. Xavier College in 1840. The new name was selected in honor of Mount St. Mary’s of the East in Emmitsburg, Md., where Archbishop Purcell had been rector. In 1879, the seminary closed for eight years due to financial difficulty. When it reopened, the Archbishop decided to create a separate preparatory school, St. Gregory’s Seminary, which was opened in Mount Washington in 1890. In 1906, Archbishop Henry K.