Update: The house above was renovated and sold for a very high price in the spring of 2022. The renovation of the house in the fourth photo below was also completed. See them both in this post from May of 2022.

Last summer I had taken photographs of the old Cave and Washington streets of George Schneider’s Addition in Benton Park, and I came back to photograph some of the narrow streets of the neighborhood south of Arsenal Street. There are many extremely old houses in the area, such as the one above, which can be seen in Compton and Dry’s Pictorial St. Louis, published in 1876, and also the wood frame one below, which has been beautifully restored.

The house below, which is very small, strangely does not seem to appear on Compton and Dry. It is a half flounder of sorts, in a shotgun configuration.

This wood frame house, now in the process of renovation, does however seem to possibly appear on Compton and Dry. I think these wood frame houses are very cool, definitely historic, and I’m glad to see that people are recognizing the value of them, and not simply demolishing them. I chatted briefly about six months ago with the young man renovating the house below, and assured his father he was doing the right thing! The pile of stones is actually from the original foundation; wisely, they replaced the rubble wall construction with a poured concrete foundation to give the house a better basement and durable base. They plan on reusing the stone and old growth wood on the restoration, and I look forward to seeing it when it’s done.