I don’t know what it is, but as soon as you cross over North Newstead Avenue into the Fairgrounds neighborhood, the trail drops out from underneath you. The housing stock is older, and that definitely plays a part. But what can I say when I cover a mile and 90% of all I see are…
Tag: Fairgrounds
Memorial Baptist Church, Former Independent Evangelical Congregational Church
This church has an interesting history, having first been the home of a German Evangelical Lutheran congregation that had split off from Holy Ghost, led by the famous Pastor William Picker. His cemetery down on Gravoiss, which was first located at the present site of Roosevelt High School, is now owned by the City of…
Fair Avenue, West Side of Fairgrounds Park
The west side of Fairground Park once held the leafy estates of Italianate and Second Empire country homes, but as the city expanded, and the park itself pushed its boundaries out to what is now Fair Avenue, apartment buildings, churches and smaller houses of streetcar suburbs. Most of the houses are still in great shape,…
Around Rosalie Street and Carter Avenue
At this intersection, Rosalie Street and Carter Avenue begin to diverge, creating at first what are a bunch of triangular and then trapezoidal blocks. Builders didn’t seem to have any problem with that, filling them with urban houses and apartment buildings. The first building was converted into a church, in what looks to be the…
Warne Avenue Between Green Lea Place and West Florissant Avenue
While walking along Warne Avenue, I took a closer look at the ornate bowling alley building on the northwest side of the street just to the southwest of West Florissant Avenue. I had photographed its facade back in September of 2017 (last photo), and it is still vacant. It is interesting to see how commercial…
Green Lea Place Between Clay and Warne Avenues
Green Lea Place east of Clay Avenue is in good shape, with rows of well-maintained houses. There are more wood frame houses, which probably date back to just after the Civil War, and more small brick bungalows from the early Twentieth Century.
Clay Avenue Between Lee Avenue and Green Lea Place
Heading north up Clay Avenue from Lee Avenue, there are mostly wood frame houses, many of them with jerkinhead roofs. But there are also many vacant lots. There are many of the small brick bungalows like we saw on the long east-west thoroughfares of the Greater Ville, as well.
Lee Avenue Between Fair and Clay Avenues
Update: I returned in the summer of 2023. Lee Avenue is extra wide as it used to have a streetcar track down the middle of it (the rails are probably still buried under multiple layers of asphalt). It is a heavily abandoned and demolished street, but there are some nice houses along it, including one…
Fair Avenue and Green Lea Place, Fairgrounds
I drove by Harrison School years ago, and it’s deeply depressing to see how bad of shape it is in nowadays. In other words, it is totally trashed, and just about all of its windows are knocked out (protective fencing on some windows gives the appearance that some glass is intact). It’s a nice stout…
Harris Avenue Between Green Lea Place and Penrose Street
I have long said that this website is about giving an honest picture of all of St. Louis, showing that much of the City is unfairly stigmatized and stereotyped. I stand by that. Occasionally, however, I come across an isolated corner of the region where I am deeply distressed by what I see. One such…