I’ve long been fascinated with the long, shotgun wood frame houses scattered throughout all of St. Louis, largely because it seems that they’re sort of forgotten about. And I honestly think they were built as “temporary” houses, built out in the exurbs and country with that Nineteenth Century optimism that the burgeoning metropolis would eventually…
Out of Blood (and Money)
Update: All eighty employees were terminated at the end of February. The hospital surrendered its licenses and will not reopen. Absolutely no one was surprised that the new three bed hospital opened by Paul McKee failed only a short time after it opened, and years, I mean years after it was first proposed. Property taxes,…
Green Board-Ups, JeffVanderLou, Part Two: Dayton Street
As I mentioned yesterday, Missouri Preservation listed the “JeffVanderLou Green Board Buildings” as one of their 2024 Places in Peril. South of Cass Avenue, which I have erroneously included in my Near North Side neighborhood for years, is actually also part of JeffVanderLou, and the following photos are from the well-preserved (for now) 2800 block…
Green Board-Ups, JeffVanderLou, Part One
My friend Paul Hohman, a well known architect who specializes in renovations of historic buildings helped get Missouri Preservation to list the “JeffVanderLou Green Board Buildings” as one of their 2024 Places in Peril. JeffVanderLou, which I’ve featured many times over the years, in one of the more heavily demolished neighborhoods in the City, but…
In Search of Francis Saler and the Old St. Patrick’s
I’d been doing some research lately on the old St. Patrick’s Roman Catholic Church, which was completed around 1845 (the parish was founded in 1843 and closed in 1973), making it the third in St. Louis after the Old Cathedral and St. Mary of Victories, a German language parish. A familiar name came up, the…
Cherokee Cave at the Saint Louis Science Center
If you’re looking to do something fun the day after Christmas with the family, take a trip by the Saint Louis Science Center and check out a cool exhibit from the permanent collections. In addition to some other cool stuff, including pieces from the former Museum of Quackery, there is a whole room dedicated to…
Two Fires
Two notable fires happened in the last week or two, and we’ll start with one in the 2800 block of Cherokee Street. I have to admit I didn’t even realize the building was vacant; it has hosted a rotating cast of different carryout restaurants. It’s a sad turn of events on a major thoroughfare. It…
Cahokia Power Plant, December 2024
Well, the smokestacks have all but disappeared from the venerable Cahokia Power Plant, and the future of the building is looking grim. But on a brighter note, years ago a reader generously shared with me a brochure that Union Electric published about the plant, and I present it to you here on the occasion of…
National City Sanborn Maps
I stumbled across these fascinating Sanborn Fire Insurance Maps of the three major packing houses in National City that surrounded the stockyards. Armour, above, still had a substantial portion of its plant still standing when I first saw it back in 2008, though of course it was gone by 2016. Hunter, which was demolished in…
From the Vault: Hunter Meat Packing Plant, November 2008, Part Five
The roof featured sawtooth clerestory windows, which let natural light down on to the slaughter floor. But the upper floors were offices and the storage of promotional materials, which had been left in giant piles of boxes and reams of papers. As a post script, I think it goes without saying that it’s not a…