C.T. Aubin also published an early fire insurance map for the downtown area of St. Louis; the city had already spread outside of the area shown, but what is show is probably close to 99% gone.  So these maps, and the cool key on the front page showing what each building would look like ideally, provides us with a wealth of information.

Below, the Old Cathedral sits amongst hundreds of buildings; there is little open space and every building sits right next to each other.

The Old Courthouse, shown as being made of stone, sits amongst not just a couple of bland skyscrapers, but amongst dozens of row buildings.

I love this one, since if you look closely you can see the approaches to the Eads Bridge on the left side.  Amazingly, what is now just a strip of grass between the bridge and Washington Avenue once included one building width of warehouses.

I found the courtyard, at upper left, with the 88 superimposed on it an interesting relic; what was it used for?