Down Ecoff Avenue, an anonymous street just south of Manchester Avenue almost to the city limits, you then turn right onto Balson Avenue, and there you will find one of the most quiet streets in St. Louis, delineated in red below in an aerial photo from 1937. Originally part of a triangular addition called the…
Tag: Dogtown
Outlet of the River des Peres, Revisited
I’m endlessly fascinated by one of the largest public works projects in St. Louis history, which is the “harnessing,” for lack of a better word, of the River des Peres. While today, we would consider it to be a horrible ecological disaster, I think it is important to realize at the time and place in…
St. James the Greater Roman Catholic Church
Sitting on a dramatic hill on some of the highest ground in Dogtown, St. James the Greater is the Irish parish of St. Louis. Many other churches have held that title over the centuries: St. Patrick, St. Bridget of Erin, St. Leo, St. Lawrence O’Toole, St. Columbkille–but now we are left with St. James the…
Macklind Avenue Between Oakland and Manchester Avenues
I found myself wandering up Macklind Avenue north of Manchester Avenue, and there’s a unique group of post-World War II light industrial buildings. I’d love to know the story behind the two anachronistic doorways that flank the two sides of this first building. This building obviously dates earlier, probably to the 1930s. This, of course,…
Hi-Pointe Theater
The Hi-Pointe Theater would never be built today; the corporation would require a giant parking lot, and it would never be located so close to the street. But it was built, and it is still a landmark after all of these years. Read more about the history of the theater here.
Oakland Avenue, Dogtown
Oakland Avenue, before Highway 40 was built, must have been a beautiful, slightly more middle-class version of Lindell on the north side of Forest Park. But alas, the highway came crashing through, and the roar of the automobile now pervades what must have once been a beautiful part of Forest Park. I don’t think those…
Houses, Dogtown
Red brick, at least on the front of houses, was certainly out of style by the early Twentieth Century. Rich red, almost brown brick predominates houses west of Kingshighway. Flat roofs, which dominated St. Louis for a century, are replaced by pitched roofs, with the red clay tiles so common in Spanish and Mediterranean architecture….
Four Family Apartment Buildings, Dogtown
Four-family flats, if properly maintained and owned, can still be desirable, and properly dense places for people to enjoy the benefits of an urban neighborhood. Dogtown has an eclectic mix, often capped with red clay tile roofs.
Tract Housing
I love these houses, set on double lots, that again probably reflected a more rural, early Twentieth Century environment, west of the city and south of Forest Park. Each house is slightly different, but they remind me of houses more common in Chicago. Interestingly, tucked in between two of these houses is an obvious Modernist…