Thanks to a tip, I learned that Rock Alva’s last central portion (the majority of the estate had already been sold off) was recently sold and subdivided off into a small housing development. The only building to survive is the stable, where the Griesediecks used to skeet shoot. I do not know what its future…
Tag: South County
Flora Terrace, Affton
Only a week before the infamous Stock Market Crash of 1929, a new subdivision was being advertised down Gravois Road, boasting of its quick drive to its intersection of Grand Boulevard. Flora Terrace soon saw the development of the standard architectural styles of the 1930s and 40s, with some later styles thrown in later. I…
Oakland House, Revisited at Twilight
I first looked at Oakland House way back in October of 2008, and I found myself there in early December again. Constructed by the Benoist Family in 1853 according to designs by the great George I. Barnett, it was one of a whole garland of Italianate villas that once graced the outskirts of St. Louis,…
Grant’s Farm, Mid-June 2023
The Busch Family Ownership Group (minus Billy and Adolphus IV) welcomes you to Grant’s Farm! We paid an evening visit to the Busch family estate recently. I learned the structure below was the ice skating building. This was part of the original holdings of the Dent Family, and the Hardscrabble log cabin is one of…
Former Mount Saint Rose Sanitorium
Always question why there’s an old stone wall along a major roadway in St. Louis! I was doing some research on a gentleman whose death was recorded in the “Deaths Outside of St. Louis,” but yet he was buried in Bellefontaine Cemetery the next day. He clearly did not die very far away from the…
Royale Orleans
Either you’ve experienced the St. Louis tradition of the Royale Orleans and its mostaccioli, or you haven’t. Perhaps you’ve even been there numerous times over the decades. One time after a wedding the caterer told us we could take the ice sculpture off the banquet table. That was a really dumb idea and we ended…
St. John Paul II, Formerly St. George, Roman Catholic Church
Dominating the commanding hill at the intersection of Gravois and Heege roads, the relatively new parish of St. John Paul II Roman Catholic Church in Affton was created by combining St. Dominic Savio and St. George in 2018, using the latter’s building. I looked at this church way off in the distance in the past…
Alswel, January 2022
I also decided to head down the Meramec River and see how the view of Alswel, which was William Lemp, Jr.’s house that overlooks the Butler Lakes, was doing. His death certificate actually says he was a resident of the Chase Hotel in 1922 at the time of his suicide in the Lemp Mansion.
St. John’s United Church of Christ, Mehlville
I always figured St. John Church Road, just off Lindbergh Boulevard in the Mehlville area went to a church, and I finally went up and investigated. A short drive up the road, and there’s this nice English Gothic Revival church with a lot of history. Now a member of the United Church of Christ, this…