I might have mentioned this before, but if you ever wonder why there are a bunch of houses that are in way better shape and a couple of decades older in the blocks to the northeast of the intersection of North Grand Boulevard and St. Louis Avenue, I can explain. In 1893, Julius Pitzman was…
Category: North
Posts about North St. Louis
Knapp, North Nineteenth, Helen and Benton Streets, St. Louis Place
I was wandering around St. Louis Place when I caught these survivors on one block stretches in between Mullanphy/Howard streets and Madison Avenue. The two buildings above and below are on Knapp Street. Below are the two survivors left on North Nineteenth. Helene Street has much more left, including a bunch of wonderful Second Empire…
North Taylor Avenue Between Margaretta and Kossuth Avenues
North Taylor Avenue is a long street, and it serves as a secondary artery for much of the North Side. So it’s incredibly annoying when all of the sudden at Natural Bridge Avenue, it is one way to the south. I went and detoured around the one way streets and before I knew it, I…
Obear Avenue Between Kossuth and Lee Avenues
I came across this short block of Obear Avenue in the Fairgrounds neighborhood. It’s a good example of a street that has been battered by abandonment and demolition. But there are several houses left standing that are occupied.
Former Christian Hospital, Abandoned
I looked at the former Christian Hospital back in October of 2021 when it had turned into the Prince Hall Senior Services building, and it looked perfectly fine. But now it’s abandoned and totally trashed! What the heck happened?
Bryan Hill Elementary School
Opened in 1911, Bryan Hill Elementary School serves the College Park neighborhood. Designed by William Ittner, it is squeezed into a narrow parcel of land, making photographs of the building difficult. Named after Dr. John Gano Bryan, a famous educator in the late Nineteenth Century, that appellation still does not explain the “Hill” portion. Perhaps…
Ames Elementary School
The original Ames School was built in 1873, at the northeast corner of Hebert and 14th streets. It received an addition in the later Nineteenth Century to the east which has now been torn down. The new Ames Elementary School moved over to Hadley Street, just north of St. Louis Avenue and east of Interstate…
Jefferson Elementary School
We’ll start looking at the schools slated for potential closure in order of age and working out from downtown, more or less. That means we’ll begin with Jefferson Elementary School, which as evidenced from these historic photos, has a long and rich pedigree in St. Louis. Judging from the two photographs above, I suspect the…
Enright Avenue and Delmar Boulevard, June 2026
I wandered around Enright Avenue and Delmar Boulevard west of Vandeventer and took in some of the sights. There’s an old fires station that looks to have been converted into a house. There are a lot of original buildings but there’s also a lot in-fill from the early Twenty-First Century, such as the houses below….
End of Spring 2026 Odds and Ends
It’s that time of year, so it’s time for odds and ends! Above is a spandrel from a storefront in downtown Belleville, looking suspiciously like something Louis Sullivan would design. Below is just another house we found while driving around town. Cleveland High School is looking really, really bad compared to earlier visits; I first…