I forgot how interesting the stone houses of Main Street in St. Charles are. They remind me of the earliest houses of Carondelet, and how people built houses before the brick industry began to thrive in the St. Louis region. It’s also fascinating to see this almost completely intact row of houses in what I generally call the “Federalist” style, a holdover from its name on the East Coast where I lived for many years. If you look closely, the first house clearly once had the same roof line as the rest, but received a more fashionable Mansard roof later on.