Today, Walden Theatre has become a multi-faceted institution that serves 200 students in the Conservatory Program, and thousands more through the Outreach Program.

Our continuing success is built on respect for young people's ability to achieve and recognize excellence, and our respect for serious theater as a mirror on the world.


Walden Theatre founded by Nancy Niles Sexton in an abandoned log cabin in eastern Jefferson County.


Walden Theatre produces Kentucky's first Shakespeare Festival by and for young people with a production of A Midsummer Night's Dream.


Walden Theatre premieres My Days as a Youngling, an original work by Nancy Niles Sexton based on Kentucky history. The award-winning play was shown on KET and published by Anchorage Press.


Walden Theatre moves to St. Thomas Episcopal Church.


Walden Theatre moves to 233 West Broadway in downtown Louisville.


Recognizing the need for young people to learn to write plays from their own experience, the Young Playwrights program is born.


Dramatic Publishing Company publishes the first of six compilations of Young Playwrights scripts.


Walden Theatre becomes a member of the Louisville Fund for the Arts.


Walden Theatre begins touring history plays by Nancy Niles Sexton to local schools. The plays include The Wings of Heroes: Tuskegee Airmen of World War II, Inventing the Century, Flood 1937!, and Eternal Love: Young Mary Todd Lincoln.


An Outreach Program is established to take theatre education directly into area schools. This program now serves over 6000 students in schools and community centers across ten states each year.


Walden Theatre purchases and moves into a permanent home, the former St. Aloysius School at 1123 Payne Street.