Chattanooga City College was founded in 1947 by a group of local ministers and lay persons as a school focused on religious and adult education. Founded with the original name of Zion College, classes were held in the basement of Highland Park Baptist Church. In 1949 the institution was chartered as a two-year junior college by the State of Tennessee and moved to a location on the 1000 block of East Ninth Street (known today as East Martin Luther King Boulevard).

The school continued to grow, and by 1952 Zion College purchased two additional buildings on East Ninth Street. That same year, the school's charter was revised, granting it the status of senior college and the ability to offer four-year liberal arts educational programming. With this change, church-related and adult education studies were discontinued.

In 1959, Reverend Horace Traylor, the first graduate of Zion College, became the school's third president. During his administration, Zion College reorganized again to become a two year junior college. In 1961, the College purchased the property of the former Bright School location in Fort Wood, adjacent to the University of Chattanooga's campus, and was operating there by 1964. To reflect this change, the Board of Trustees officially changed the name of the institution to Chattanooga City College.

As talks of a merger between the University of Tennessee and the University of Chattanooga developed, Chattanooga City College was also included as part of the newly created University of Tennessee at Chattanooga, which was finalized in 1969.