Update: See Rene Beauvais’s original property in Soulard in this post.
Beauvais Manor, sitting across the street from Tower Grove Park, is another fascinating relic of the area’s rural past. As can be seen below, it was once a country house built by Rene Beauvais in 1867.
Perhaps what is most interesting to me is that the Compton and Dry view reveals that the grand Corinthian column front porch was original, and not a later addition.
The tower (whose purpose eludes me) and the side wings were in fact later additions when the house became a retirement home as early as 1882, as it still is to this day.
The giant columns show off the wealth of the Beauvais family, and are still the most striking features of this grand old country house in the heart of the city.
I live close to Beauvais Manor and I never knew that its origins or that it was so old. Thanks for bringing my attention to this relic from the early days of the city.
I took my granddaughter to visit this mansion after my mother stayed at the facility for rehab, after she was released, was sometime in the early part of 2013, March or April I believe. Was a wonderful mansion! But a strange thing happened while I was there, the tour guide, I believe I recall her name being Connie (this name just now popped into my head!) she and my granddaughter and I were going up the first set of stairs to the second floor, I was telling her this was not the only mansion and mentioned Lemp when as we got to the top of the stairs she turned to me and asked if you can tell a place is haunted if it has a “sewer smell.” Well, you could have knocked me over with a feather when she said this! The reason is, because when my husband and I stayed there in early 2000 we had the entire mansion to ourselves (they gave us the key and left!) and we smelled this horrible smell of sewer that he first noticed and it eventually permeated throughout the mansion, getting so bad as we sat in the bar that we decided to go outside! So I found this a very unusual question, she then told me that she had gone to some state for a funeral and stayed at a bed and breakfast and when they opened the door a horrendous smell of “sewer” gushed in their faces and they could not stay in the room and had to take another room. When I went home later that day I found it so strange that she just happened to bring this up to me. Oh sure, we were talking about Lemp and that brought up “hauntings,” but except for my husband and I experiencing this phenomena I have never heard about it or read about it so I found it rather coincidental that she mentioned an experience she had that was the exact same exact experience ( phenomena _ that I once experienced, and it made me wonder How did she know I had an experience of “sewer smell?” As if something read our minds and caused us to bring the subject up (sounds crazy I know!) But I just found it extremely “odd!”and it made me wonder if Beavais might not have “something” unseen residing there, that has the same ability, knowledge as that “something” at Lemp. If you get what I mean. I know this sounds crazy, but I lived in a haunted apt for 12 years and took me forever to “accept” that the phenomena was really happening!