What we now call LaSalle Park, part of what I call the greater Frenchtown neighborhood, was originally just part of the greater urban fabric of what we now celebrate as historic Soulard. (Note that Rutger and Morrison were once named… Continue Reading
I’m still fascinated with some of the wood frame survivors in the College Hill neighborhood, especially the house above, which I’ve looked at several times over the last decade. It’s a rare half flounder, and it’s been holding on through… Continue Reading
Speaking of the Bissell Mansion Dinner Theater, while I was photographing the other side of the street, I couldn’t help but notice that the famous house, which is given the title of oldest brick home in the City of St.… Continue Reading
The weather was nice and sunny and I was up visiting Piekutowski’s Sausages in Hyde Park, so I thought I would swing by Randall Place, an exceptional collection of houses near the Bissell Mansion. It seems like the first house… Continue Reading
They sure had all sorts of great ideas in the 1960s about how they were going to revitalize downtown, and pretty much none of them worked. They’re either demolished, abandoned, bought out in corporate mergers or forgotten. Just look at… Continue Reading
Moving along to the west past Taylor Avenue, we see more Renaissance and Beaux-Arts mansions mixed in with Romanesque Revival houses, which were rapidly going out of style by the time this street was being developed. And garages have become… Continue Reading
Geyer Avenue through McKinley Heights is an interesting street, as it was platted early, but as the subdivisions on the south side of Lafayette Square were built, it found itself getting turned into the backside of that more prominent neighborhood.… Continue Reading
Always remember, they wanted to completely demolish Soulard, and put in a totally forgettable suburban style neighborhood that probably would have been torn down by now, too. But just because buildings are abandoned, or missing a pillar, doesn’t mean they… Continue Reading
I found a couple of old photos from about a decade ago of two corner storefronts in Gravois Park, a neighborhood that has undergone rapid and major changes in the last twenty years. Older residents have told me it had… Continue Reading
The former Most Blessed Sacrament Roman Catholic Church is sadly abandoned, and increasingly open to the elements. There was another congregation in the building after the parish closed, but it is gone now, too. The old school, to the north… Continue Reading