When I spotted a small enclave of a neighborhood tucked at the bottom of the hills that form the western edge of the Mill Creek Valley in Cincinnati, I knew I had to visit. By poking around, I discovered this area is known as Lower Price Hill, settled early in the history of the region.

The churches aren’t large, as this amazing Carpenter Gothic example shows. Check out these cool one story Italianate workers’ rowhouses below. We have them in St. Louis, too.

I love how Cincinnati has a relatively small core, but then is made up of a bunch of “villages” scattered about in the rugged hills around that central city, linked by winding roads and parkways (and interstates today). It’s such a fascinating city, and neighborhoods such as this one shows why I’m being drawn back. Lower Price Hill received an influx of Appalachian “immigrants,” much like St. Louis received migrants from the Missouri Bootheel–like I said before, I like to make connections between different cities in my examinations of different American cities. Read an article about it here.

I find it interesting that there is a whole website dedicated to Appalachians in Cincinnati, but here in St. Louis, we make little to no effort to study the white migrants who moved to Old North, Hyde Park or Soulard after World War II.

In fact, as the article about Lower Price Hill states, this neighborhood is a microcosm for the whole city, as immigration and gentrification come to once working class areas.