1400 Block of Newhouse Avenue, Hyde Park, Revisited

I walked down this stretch of Newhouse Avenue back in January of 2018 so after looking at the damage at the old Friedens Sunday School Hall, I thought I would take a look at how the block was doing. There had been continued abandonment and deterioration. The building below hasn’t seemed to have changed at…

More of New Harmony, Indiana

We saw some other interesting buildings in New Harmony, including the Working Man’s Institute, founded by William Maclure in 1838. The current building is from 1894 and is still open to the public. Besides serving as a library, it also contains a museum of artifacts from the earliest period of New Harmony, as well as…

Meramec Elementary School

Meramec Elementary School is another example of an earlier building, built when Dutchtown was well out in the exurbs of St. Louis, was replaced by a later commission. In this case it was William Ittner in 1911, having adopted his famous mature style of a central portal and two matching wings with some asymmetry. And…

Peabody Elementary School

Peabody Elementary School is another institution with a long history in the neighborhood just south of downtown that can be traced back to at least the 1870s if not earlier. At one point it became known as Clinton-Peabody, and as some readers might remember, it shared the name of the housing projects nearby. A new…

Ames Elementary School

The original Ames School was built in 1873, at the northeast corner of Hebert and 14th streets. It received an addition in the later Nineteenth Century to the east which has now been torn down. The new Ames Elementary School moved over to Hadley Street, just north of St. Louis Avenue and east of Interstate…

Cafe Florentine and Other Sights, Downtown, Birmingham, Alabama

Much like St. Louis and its Woolworth Building in Grand Center, Birmingham also has a two story base that was designed with the intention of later having an upper office building added. The Florentine, which is not surprisingly in the Renaissance Revival Style, was built in 1925-27 according to designs by the architect, David O….

Alabama Avenue Between Holly Hills Avenue and Iron Street

Crossing Holly Hills Avenue, we near the end of our trip up Alabama Avenue in Carondelet, as the interstate will stop us from proceeding further. There continues to be a mix of styles, showing the slow development of the neighborhood. This is the last house, at Iron Street, where the interstate cuts through and ends…

Alabama Avenue Between Loughborough Avenue and Haven Street

Just like one block over on Vermont Avenue, like yesterday, the houses are older and brick on Alabama Avenue, and they’re quite nice. Even the houses look similar, such as the one below. This was clearly the more different part of Carondelet. There are still many working class houses. But brick predominates. Note the house…

North Up Blair Avenue, Hyde Park, May 2026, Part Four

I always enjoy the moment when Blair starts heading up the hill towards the Bissell Stand Pipe and the houses sit high up on elevated earthen plinths on the left and right sides of the street. I’ve always liked this extremely old wood frame house below. I still love the Bissell tower, which is one…