Abington Friends School was founded in March 1697, when John Barnes, a wealthy tailor who belonged to the Abington Monthly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends, donated 120 acres of his estate “for and towards erecting a meetinghouse for Friends and toward the maintenance of a school under the direction of Friends.” The School has been continuously operated on the same plot of land since its founding in that year, making it the oldest school in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania with such a claim. AFS operates under the care of Abington Monthly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends.