St. Luke’s was founded in 1913 to serve the medical needs of the women and children whose male relatives were inmates in the state penitentiary. In 1920, St. Luke’s relocated to its present site and continued serving as a clinic until 1996, when TennCare cuts forced the agency to terminate these services. Since that time, St. Luke’s has continued to evolve and is now the only major social service agency in the area offering a variety of programs including childcare, mobile meals, emergency food, home repairs, tax assistance, toy store, adult computer classes, summer camp and health assessments. 

St. Luke’s is a United Way Family Resource Center (FRC) providing 34 programs to the residents of Old West Nashville. FRC's are assets-based in the services that they provide with a focus on community input. The services offered are holistic in their approach, bringing in numerous community agency partners to provide specialty services. The overall goal is to empower residents to improve their lives and their community by involving them in the process of determining the community's needs while eliminating the duplication of services. 
The St. Luke’s Community is characterized by the following statistics:

• 19% of population is foreign born
• 11% of households have members who do not speak English well
• Median annual family income of children enrolled in our childcare program is $18,000
• 46% of adults have not obtained a high school diploma
• Nearly 90% of children qualify for free or reduced lunch in schools
• High School drop-out rate is over 40%
• Adult education level averages 6^th grade
• Over 35% of seniors we serve live on less than $600 monthly
• In one elementary school only 24% of the 4^th graders tested at or above the median percentile in reading
• Over ¼ of our children in childcare are from ethnic cultures outside the U.S., including Vietnam, South America, and Africa.