English: St. John's College, Agra, was established in 1850 by the Church Missionary Society of England through the efforts of the Agra C. M. S. Association which came into being in 1840. The first Principal of the College The Rev. Thomas Valpy French, a distinguished fellow of University College, Oxford, was a man of great vision and missionary zeal. At it's inception the college formulated its own curriculum and conducted its own examination. The college got affiliated to Calcutta University in 1860 and from 1891 to Allahabad University. In 1927 with the formation of the Agra University, the then Principal of the College Dr. A. W. Davies became its first Vice-Chancellor and the College was affiliated to the Agra University. The College from its beginning strived for extension of education keeping dispensation of social justice through education and upliftment of the down-trodden as one of its major concerns. The first scheduled caste student of College was admitted as early as 1892 notwithstanding considerable opposition from many influential quarters of those years. The College became a First Grade College in 1891 with B.A. and LL..B. classes, and affiliation was granted in 1893 for postgraduate classes thus it has the rare distinction of being a postgraduate institution of more than a century's standing. An extract from the College report of 1897 highlights the type of education the College strived for. "too long have the Universities of India been content to turn out effeminate book-worms by providing purely intellectual courses, and paying no attention to the physical and out of classroom life of the student... in St. John's College all students are expected to take part in games , and not lounge or moon over books all day long when lectures are over". This is the aspiration of the college even to-day. It was the dream of the founding fathers and the earnest desire The college can boast of having one of the most beautiful buildings in Agra, built in red sandstone in Indo-Saracenic architecture. The foundation stone of the Centenary Wing was laid by Bharat Ratna Sarvapalli Radhakrishnan former president of india in 1957 and was opened by Bharat Ratna Pt. Jawaharlal Nehru, the former prime Minister of India in 1959 with the words "I have come to pay tribute to this temple of learning". The college has ample facilities and infrastructure in the form of Workshops ,well established Library and Hostel accomodation.Labs are fully developed to meet the requirements of different disciplines not only upto final year but also for higher studies. Sophisticated and modern equipments have been added to facilitate Research and Development work .