Update: The remaining two buildings were rehabbed and saved from destruction in 2017.

I was always intrigued by this storefront and attached rowhouse on Bremen Avenue, just northeast of Hyde Park in the eponymous neighborhood.  It seemed clear that the row was probably much longer, and the trees once obscured the neighbors of more houses.  It is a truly unique building, as while it’s in the Second Empire style, it curiously inserts a break in the roofline for two additional windows–almost a dormer in some ways, but not exactly.  I suspect these were once upscale houses for the professional inhabitants of the area.

It sits vacant, perhaps longing for its nine missing rowmates that were demolished for vacant lots.

And as I suspected, the Compton and Dry view reveal that the houses are much older than the city database that lists 1890. Perhaps that’s the year the corner was converted to a store, because it looks vaguely like the end of the row was once a house as well.  Otherwise, it was clearly built before 1876, when the prints were published.  The big front yards are typical of earlier homes of the North Side, and the backyards are actually smaller.

Update: An eagle-eyed reader realized that photographs of the row, in a state of severe dilapidation, but still standing, are posted at Built St. Louis. I was given permission to repost the photos here.