It’s hard to believe sometimes that the JeffVanderLou neighborhood once held around 20,000 people considering that it is now one of the most decimated areas of the city. But here and there are houses that show the density of what once was. Wild, unkempt lots sit next to well-maintained, owner-occupied homes. And then, there are…
Tag: JeffVanderLou
Checking Up on McKee Land
Little has changed where Paul McKee owns vast swaths of real estate since I went by this area last year. There are still abandoned and fire-gutted buildings. Update: By July of 2022, the ruins below were finally torn down. The large apartment building on St. Louis Avenue is still sitting as a burned out shell….
Laflin Street, JeffVanderLou, Early Fall 2021
Update: I went back in the winter of 2022. I checked in on Laflin Street, which once had far more houses, including two more to the north of the one above. You can see them in this post from September of 2017 (third photo down). A year later, it became a dumping ground for a…
Mullanphy Hospital
Recently I was looking for another hospital at the Missouri History Museum when I spotted the photo below, labeled the Mullanphy Hospital. I thought for certain it was mislabeled, and captured a pre-cupola image of the St. Louis Psychiatric Rehabilitation Center on Arsenal Street. I was wrong–it is in fact a hospital that once sat…
Beaumont High School, Revisited
I looked at Beaumont High School back in October of 2013 when I was looking at other Natural Bridge Avenue institutions. I took more photos this time in the early morning sun of the late summer.
Fifth Missionary Baptist Church, Former Sixth Church of Christ, Scientist
I looked at Fifth Missionary Baptist way back in October of 2013 on a cloudy day, and I went back on a sunny Saturday morning to take another look. As should be obvious, this is the former Sixth Church of Christ, Scientist, which as we saw just last week, continues the Beaux-Arts style that its…
Two Buildings Along North Grand Boulevard
The Speedwa School was a small business school that taught bookkeeping and accounting for both men and women, publishing its own books. Recently, the building has been the home of a couple of clubs on the first floor. Next door is a chop suey restaurant that has been in the neighborhood for years. The next…
Elliott and Leffingwell Avenues, JeffVanderLou, Late Summer 2021, Part Two
Continuing south on Leffingwell Avenue, retracing my steps from my visit in May of 2020, I saw more green overgrowth and abandonment. The house on the left is actually a half-flounder, with a hipped roof. Its front facade was altered sometime in the mid-Twentieth Century. Down on the northeast corner, I went by the house…
Elliott and Leffingwell Avenues, JeffVanderLou, Late Summer 2021, Part One
Back in May of 2020, I went and documented the houses to the west of the new NGA in the JeffVanderLou neighborhood, one of the most heavily damaged in the city. But I have met many proud, hardworking people in this community, and the result of decades of bad policy needs to be shown. So…
Outtakes, Spring 2021
They’re cleaning up the ruins of the John Loler House relatively quickly, though I was a little worried to see workers standing on the wood floors now loaded up with the debris of bricks and limestone as they stacked pallets. I had some leftover photographs from when I visited Dunbar Elementary this winter. I’ve always…