Trinity Lutheran Seminary is an Evangelical Lutheran Church in America seminary located in Columbus, Ohio. In 1830, the German Theological Seminary of the Ohio Synod, later known as the Evangelical Lutheran Theological Seminary, was founded to meet the need for educating pastors in the Ohio region. It began in Canton, Ohio but soon moved to Columbus. In 1974, the decision was made that the Evangelical Lutheran Theological Seminary and Hamma Divinity School should consolidate. Hamma Divinity School dated to 1845 as the Theological department of Wittenberg College, in Springfield, Ohio. Trinity Lutheran Seminary, the merged institution, opened its doors on September 1, 1978. From 1978 until the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America came into being in 1988, Trinity was owned and operated jointly by the American Lutheran Church and the Lutheran Church in America. Trinity Lutheran Seminary is accredited and its degree programs are approved by the Association of Theological Schools in the United States and Canada and by the Commission on Institutions of Higher Education of the North Central Association of Colleges and Schools.