The last decade or so has been rough on nursing homes in St. Louis. While readers at first might find the link tenuous to history, they must be reminded that many are in historic buildings, and likewise, neighborhoods are kept healthy when members of society are able to “age in place,” meaning they do not…
Tag: Post-Modernism
Washington, At Night
I was giving a lecture out in Washington, Missouri, and I had some time to kill so I walked around the downtown, taking some pictures of the historic architecture. Above is St. Peter’s United Church of Christ which was founded in 1844. Below is the City Hall. I wandered down some of the other streets…
Down By The River and the South Side, Peoria, August 2023
The public housing down by the river, which I first spotted way back in December of 2008, are finally being demolished. I had discovered they were built when Peoria demolished the red light district where Richard Pryor had grown up. The new buildings going up are nice, and they even feature the latest navy blue…
The Terminal Tower, Cleveland
I want you to just take a look at the historic photograph above for a few minutes and just absorb what you’re seeing. In the background, Irish Bend and the Flats spread out in the distance, the engine house of the industrial heart of the city at its height can be seen, while in the…
Downtown, Part Two, Cleveland
Moving along through downtown Cleveland, we reach the “Beaux-Arts” or “City Beautiful” portion of the city, which every metropolitan area seemed to have dabbled with in the early Twentieth Century to better or adverse effect. Below is the Cuyahoga County Courthouse, completed in 1913. Moving along, we spot the 1922 Public Auditorium, which sits along…
Down by the River, Detroit
Let’s walk from the Campus Martius, named after the famous field in ancient Rome where soldiers trained (it later filled up with temples such as the Pantheon), and part of the original Woodward plan of Detroit and walk down the street of the same name towards the Detroit River. It’s here that I spot some…
Grosse Pointe, Park, Shores, Woods and Farms
Ah, Grosse Pointe! Where you can watch twelve-year-olds ride by on their bikes and listen to them swear like sailors! Grosse Pointe is actually a series of different suburbs, with the Grosse Pointe being one, and then there are a series of other independent communities with an additional modifier such as Farms or Shores. There…
Celtic Meadows, Nearing Completion
I’ve looked at the former John F. Kennedy High School before, then during demolition, and then last year as initial site grading had begun. We were surprised that by mid 2023 that the subdivision was largely completed. I’m intrigued by the conversion of large institutional parcels being subdivided into smaller plots of land. Certainly many…
The Missouri Bluffs
Do you find the natural contours of the earth boring? If so, I have found the perfect subdivision for you! Following the disgraceful sale of forested bluff land along the Missouri River by the University of Missouri for a quick buck, the developers have moved in, building absurd roadways through what could be best described…
Indiana Avenue Between Lynch and Pestalozzi, West Side
Turning around at Pestalozzi and heading north, we see that originally the west side of Indiana Avenue was fully built up like the east side, if not as densely. It’s also interesting to see that already in 1876, towards the north end of the block, a substantial portion of a hill had to be cut…