St. Louis voters recently overwhelmingly passed Prop S, which will allow the St. Louis Public Schools to issue bonds for much needed improvements to buildings, most of which are now over one hundred years old, though as anyone who will admit it, are extremely well built and will last for centuries if properly maintained. The…
Tag: Walnut Park
A Tour of the Sites Mentioned in the Federal Indictment
Update: As of August 26, 2022, all three former aldermen plead guilty to the allegations made by federal prosecutors and have been sentenced by a judge. The text of the following post has been updated to reflect the changes from allegations at the time of the original writing to guilty pleas. By now I’m sure…
Union Boulevard, Walnut Park, Revisited
Starting at the corner of West Florissant Avenue and Union Boulevard, we discover the southwest corner once held a beautiful Italianate mansion, now long gone. I am curious about the inordinate number of children spilling out of the front porch. I’ve looked at Union Boulevard between West Florissant and I-70 before, back in July of…
Former St. Adalbert’s Roman Catholic Church
At the corner of Woodland and Wren is the former Polish Roman Catholic Church of St. Adalbert’s in the Walnut Park neighborhood, now owned by Oakgrove Missionary Baptist. It is obvious, particularly because there is a formerly vacant lot, now filled with new in-fill on Woodland, that this is the second sanctuary of that church….
4,500th Post
A long time ago, perhaps 3,000 posts ago, I realized that if I wasn’t careful, I could make a really nice neighborhood look like a complete disaster, or conversely, with just a few strategic photographs, make a totally desolate street with only a couple of houses left look like it was completely intact. As an…
Former Nativity of Our Lord Roman Catholic Church
What is now the Celestial Temple of Peace at 5513 Oriole Avenue at the corner of Harney was originally Nativity of Our Lord Roman Catholic Church in Walnut Park. It was opened in 1904, and closed in 1982, its congregation processing to St. Adalbert’s at 5720 Woodlawn, which itself would later close and merge with…
Former St. Mary’s Orphan Home
Now missing its central cupola and no longer functioning in its original purpose, St. Mary’s Orphan Home or Asylum stands on Emerson Avenue in the Walnut Park neighborhood. Originally it was probably out in the exurbs, built in 1909, but the City caught up with it and the campus is now surrounded by bungalows. It…
Former St. Philip Neri Roman Catholic Church
I discovered the former St. Philip Neri Roman Catholic Church somehow in the Walnut Park neighborhood, so I went by to take some pictures. Founded in 1919, It’s based off Lombard Romanesque architecture, which I saw in Milan in churches such as Saint Ambrose. But really there are all sorts of hulking piles of monumental…
Mark Twain Elementary School
Update: The school had further deteriorated when I checked up on it in August of 2022. Mark Twain Elementary School is so trashed, that it is not even listed on the St. Louis Public Schools’ surplus property page (feel free to look and see if you can find it–I couldn’t). This school was paid for…
Walbridge Elementary School
Walbridge Elementary, in Walnut Park, has some pesky trees in the way that make taking clear shots of its entire front facade difficult. Luckily a photograph from the 1950s shows just what a beautiful composition the school is. It was designed by Rockwell Milligan and opened in 1922. It continues the Ittner/Milligan firm’s tradition of…