“It was totally stripped,” she said. “It was completely empty except for a few old church pews.”

De La Salle is planning a $4 million renovation of the 1950s school next door to accommodate La Salle’s growing enrollment. Also planned is a $2 million activity center on the church site. Brickey said La Salle’s current student count of 92 would grow to about 115 this fall and could eventually reach 300.

The school considered keeping St. Bridget but determined that stabilizing the building could cost $1.3 million and renovating it for school use could cost an additional $1.9 million. Operating costs would be prohibitively expensive, La Salle officials concluded.

Fundraising is underway for the La Salle expansion projects. La Salle plans to renovate most of the former Central Catholic St. Nicholas School this year, then complete the renovation in spring 2017 when it also would open the new activity center.

According to the archdiocese, St. Bridget was built to serve an Irish parish organized in 1853. A girls’ school run by the Sisters of St. Joseph and a boys’ school run by the Christian Brothers began there in 1871. From 1927 to 1936 it served Kenrick Prep Seminary and High School.