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College Hill Demolition Fairground North St. Louis O'Fallon

Demolition and Boundaries in North St Louis

by Michael R. Allen

This blog continues to chronicle the loss of north St. Louis building stock. Our goal is to illuminate the repetitive impact of careless demolition policy, and the social impact of individual demolitions. There is a special problem posed by demolitions in neighborhoods that are proximate to parts of the north side that have retained architectural integrity and are already listed or eligible for listing in the National Register of Historic Places.

Aerial photograph of the area around the intersection of Warne and West Florissant avenues. The location of the demolition at 4347-49 College Avenue is marked by the asterisk. O'Fallon's dense blocks are at right, Fairground's depleting density is at bottom right and College Hill's depleted blocks are at top right.

Demolitions across the north side don’t just remove problem properties. They remove housing stock and reduce the voter rolls. Demolitions destabilize neighborhoods. They erode sense of place, which turns owner-occupants away from neighborhoods, or north St. Louis entirely. Demolitions and persistent vacant lots lower land values. Expedient, perhaps. Damaging, for sure. The long-term impact of demolishing vacant buildings is the fulfillment of the “Team Four Plan” mythology: a depleted half-city easy to dismiss and lacking in density needed for truly flourishing urban life.

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Categories
Events

Event: The History of the Delmar Loop Through Architecture

Tuesday, May 29, 2012 at 7:00 pm
Regional Arts Commission
6128 Delmar, 63112

Lecture by Meredith Hawkins Trautt, Archaeological Research Center of St. Louis

The Delmar Loop was named “One of the 10 Great Streets in America” by the American Planning Association. The history of the development of the Delmar Loop neighborhood can be viewed through the district’s unusual blend of high style and vernacular architecture from the Lion Gates in University City down Delmar to DeBaliviere and the Missouri History Museum in St. Louis City’s Forest Park. The Archaeological Research Center of St. Louis (ARC) was commissioned to prepare a study of the Loop’s architectural heritage as part of the Environmental Assessment for the proposed Loop Trolley Project.

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Categories
National Register South St. Louis Southwest Garden

Introducing the Shaw’s Garden Historic District

South city’s newest National Register of Historic Places historic district is the Shaw’s Garden Historic District in Southwest Garden, listed by the National Park Service on April 16. The listing follows the listing of the adjacent Reber Place Historic District on the west side of Kingshighway, and makes a large part of Southwest Garden eligible for historic rehabilitation tax credits. even before listing was completed, developers already starting trying to purchase buildings in the districts for tax credit projects!

The Craftsman style is prevalent in the District, as evinced by these two-family buildings in the 4500 block of Shenandoah Avenue.

The Southwest Garden Neighborhood Association, with Community Development Block Grant funding allocated by Alderman Steve Conway (D-8th), hired Preservation Research Office to prepare both nominations. PRO Director Michael R. Allen and Architectural Historian Lynn Josse prepared the Shaw’s Garden Historic District nomination, which encompasses 18 city blocks and 403 contributing primary buildings.


View Shaw’s Garden Historic District in a larger map

The Shaw’s Garden Historic District represents the fulfillment of the desire of the Missouri Botanical Garden under Director George T. Moore to improve its surroundings through subdivision of property bequeathed to the Garden in the will of Henry Shaw, and the clear vision of suburban development advanced by the Garden’s long-time landscape architect John Noyes. The resulting landscape is a rare realization within the city limits of progressive suburban planning ideals implemented in contemporary landscapes in St. Louis County. An earlier subdivision, the Tower Grove Park Addition (1870), was largely undeveloped when the Garden platted the Shaw’s Vandeventer Avenue Addition north of Shaw Avenue in 1916.

The Tudor Revival-style house at 2605 Alfred Avenue, built in 1923 and designed by Sol Abrahms, faces the Missouri Botanical Garden.
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Categories
Demolition Ladue Mid-Century Modern St. Louis County

Isadore Shank’s Limberg House Demolished

by Michael R. Allen

Fifty-two years ago, Charles Limberg and Suzanne Shapleigh moved into their new home at 22 Fordyce Lane in Ladue. Their two-story home spread out horizontally across a sloping site largely disrupted by construction. Red brick, plate glass and fir provided a rich material palate for a work of modern architecture designed by Isadore Shank (1902-1992), an architect whose work already had included several significant modern buildings in and around St. Louis.

Today, the house is gone, except for elements that have been lovingly salvaged by the architects’ sons Peter and Stephen. The new owners of the Limberg House had it torn down this month. Wrecking equipment destroyed landscape elements that almost concealed the home. The glass shattered, the mortar was ground out for brick salvage and much of the house was smashed and crushed.

The tragic end of the Limberg House is symptomatic of the plight of significant mid-century modern houses in Ladue. Ladue may have the region’s finest collection of significant large modern homes, but it lacks any historic preservation ordinance whatsoever. Owners can demolish homes, no matter how important they are. In 2006, the Louis Zorensky Residence off of Warson Road bit the dust. Two years prior, the neighboring Morton D. May House fell, despite its status as the work of Los Angeles-based modern master Samuel Marx. The architectural heritage of Ladue could very well be temporary, in the absence of dedicated owners. A for-sale sign may well be an early obituary.

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Categories
Missouri Missouri Legislature Public Policy

Missouri Senate Votes to Slash Historic Rehab Tax Credit

From Deb Sheals of the Alliance for Investment, Jobs and Preservation

The Missouri Senate just passed a bill that will cap the historic tax credit program at $75 million per year, with no small deal exemption. This is a drastic cut from the current cap of $140 million. The bill is the Senate Substitute for HB1865, sponsored by Sen. Lembke.

Even though the House has already passed HB1285 to extend sunsets for many social service tax credits due to expire this year, several senators refused to allow those programs to continue unless the historic program was slashed, and the bill was passed out of the Senate with the new cap.

Sens. Keaveny, Schaffer, and Curls were stalwart supporters of the Historic program.

The bill will now go to the House for consideration. We still have strong support in the House and are hopeful that they will not take this up, but this is a hot issue and it’s the end of the session, so about anything goes.

It’s really unfortunate that a few senators feel the need to hold good social programs hostage for this. At a time when unemployment in the construction industry is well above 14%, we need programs that stimulate construction activity, and we all know the historic credit does that quite well. (Stats from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics)

We will be watching this very closely, obviously, and will keep you in the loop.

As always, let your legislators know how you feel about this, especially those in the House of Representatives. Good things come to squeaky wheels.

Categories
Demolition Hyde Park North St. Louis

Hope in Hyde Park?

by Michaela Burwell-Taylor

Photo by Michaela Burwell-Taylor

In August of 2011, I started a personal project of photographing Hyde Park. What I did not expect to get out of this project was a connection between place and one person in particular. The buildings were my initial start, but something was going on in Hyde Park at the time that excluded the buildings. I began to notice multiple demolition sites, piles of ruble and vacant lots. Sure, you see this all over the city — but who has to look out the window everyday at it is the real question.

On this particular day I had the 4×5 camera out. This camera is always a catalyst for conversation and it sparked one of the most touching stories I ever heard. While photographing this hay covered corner lot, I met this woman. She proceeded to tell me that she was the one who put out the hay.

The building at the northwest corner of Bremen and 20th streets stood where a neighbor later put out hay over new grass seed. Photograph by Michael R. Allen.

The simple act of putting out hay on a vacant lot is no big deal, but she did not have to do this. This was not her job. However, she lived down the street from the vacant lot and wanted to see grass grow there.  This was the start of a conversation in which I listened and she told. By the end of our conversation I found out that every day she saw another building being demolished. I could tell that part of her wanted to leave and part of her wanted to stay. All too often citizens on the north side have been given that choice. Keep the hope, or leave. Fight for you community, or move on. Not every citizen has a choice when it comes to what they see out of their window. Here are some of the buildings that she may have seen fall.

Photographs by Michaela Burwell-Taylor

Michaela Burwell-Taylor served as a Preservation Research Office intern from January 2011 through May 2012.

Categories
Grafitti South St. Louis

Painting St. Mary’s: Grafitti, Responsibility and the Building Code

by Michael R. Allen

Badly-executed graffiti recently appeared on St. Mary's Infirmary.

The lonely red brick hospital that looms over the downtown railyards, St. Mary’s Infirmary, has withstood the troubles of time since its earliest section went up in 1887. The recent arrival of a giant white block cipher sprawled across the beautiful facade is an unfortunate attention-grabbing feature that would be horrific if it were not so badly done. The white-paint graffiti seems to be rolled on, and also seems to be an abortive attempt at a message to ScottTrade Center’s patrons. The ending letters could be “OSO”, as in “o so stupid.” The lazy pole and roller artist even dared to mar the front elevation of the eastern building at the hospital, designed by Barnett, Haynes & Barnett, architects of the great Cathedral on Lindell Boulevard.

Yet before one read my words as a screed against hapless philistines, I will note that I bow to the inevitable nature of urban graffiti. So long as there are surfaces unguarded, shall there be painted messages sent to the city. Most graffitti is easily removed, and once a vacant building is returned to productive life, never returns. The larger problem is one of abandonment of buildings as great as St. Mary’s. Yet the “broken window” theory deserves some consideration. A vacant building may gain special notoriety once adorned with a giant dab of hideous art. Special notoriety is never good for historic buildings.

The St. Mary's School of Nursing Building was tagged by "Ed Boxx" four years ago.

St. Mary’s Infirmary has already been hit by large-scale graffiti artists. In 2007, the elusive Ed Boxx (a.k.a Rex Ram) created a colorful mural over the entrance of the School of Nursing Building (1945). While devotees of the architectural firm P.M. O’Meara & Associates had to turn away, some of us found some delight in the admonition to St. Louis — delivered above a faithful rendering of our skyline, complete with crucifix — to “GET UP, GET GOD.”

The cross mimicked a stone cross atop the building, so it was no careless choice. Whether the paint should have been on the building at all is an ethical question that seems interrelated to the owner’s stewardship. Graffiti artists can leave real damage — cheap paint is not often one of them — when they leave windows open, break down secured doors, remove window sash and other acts of vandalism that may aid in the production of a work. All of that activity is an act of cultural vandalism. Those who put the white paint on the old hospital have left sash wide open that were shut before.

Yet the artists don’t bear the ultimate responsibility. Those who don’t break in are exploiting careless maintenance and ownership. Prosecution of young people with spray paint cans won’t do much to save buildings or prevent more graffiti. Enforcement of the building code will.

Categories
Events

National Preservation Month in Full Swing

While 90-degree days come without advance notice, National Preservation Month arrives in May every year without fail. This national celebration of historic architecture reaches a crescendo of sorts mid-month, when house and neighborhood tours pile up into a can’t-get-to-them-all full schedule. While the number of events this coming weekend will preclude most people from doing everything, that’s fine. The soul of historic preservation is composed of neighborhoods where people care, and in St. Louis preservation has a rich and mighty soul. – M.R.A.

 

Chatillon-DeMenil House Used Book Sale
Saturday, May 19 – 10 am-4 pm ($5 preview sale 9-10 am)
Sunday, May 20 – 12 – 4 pm (bag sale and book crafts!)

New community partnerships and untold thousands of books will make this year’s Chatillon-DeMenil House Used Book Sale (May 19-20) the biggest and best ever. Let’s start with the space: our friends at the Lemp Brewery Business Park have offered us space just across from the Mansion at 900 Cherokee Street. If you don’t know them already, then we’re excited to be able to introduce you to the good folks from Perennial on Sunday. From 12-4 during our bag sale, instructors will be on hand to share some crazy DIY book projects, including a cell phone dock (!) and succulent planter(!!). Made from books! A small donation is requested. Details here.
 

Compton Heights House Tour
Saturday, May 19 and Sunday, May 20 – 11:00 a.m. until 5:00 p.m. both days

The event will include many homes that have not recently been on public tour as well as the first floor and bowling alley of the incomparable Magic Chef Mansion. The tour will also feature a beer tasting garden featuring local beer, live music (Saturday), and local food vendors. For an additional $5 charge a cell phone based audio tour may be purchased which will include extra information on the homes open for touring, and architectural and historical information on an additional 12 houses which will not be open to the public (24 houses in all). Shuttle transportation will be provided between homes for those that would prefer it. Check-in for the tour is at 3521 Hawthorne Blvd – the intersection of Grand Ave, Longfellow Blvd and Hawthorne Blvd. details here.
 

Old North St. Louis House and Community Tour
Saturday, May 19 – 10:00 a.m. until 4:00 p.m.

The tour will feature the great diversity of housing styles that make Old North a community where almost everyone can find a place that suits their budget and lifestyle. Stops on the tour will include historically rehabbed houses that once were abandoned shells, at least one LEED-certified home built by Habitat for Humanity, community gardens (including the 13th Street Garden, which grows food for the North City Farmers’ Market and is home to the Old North Chicken Coop), the Old North Grocery Co-op, and new businesses at Crown Square. The HomeGrown Street Festival will show off the cool, public space at Crown Square, along the redeveloped former 14th Street Mall, and will feature a variety of locally produced arts, crafts, and other goods. Details here.
 

Historic Maplewood Tour
Saturday, May 19 – 10:00 a.m.

Esley Hamilton and Doug Houser will lead guests through Maplewood’s historic neighborhoods on Saturday, May 19th starting at 10 a.m. This event is free but an RSVP is required: rsvp@cityofmaplewood.com. Meet at the Sutton Loop (between Hazel and Maple, 2800 Sutton). Details here.

Categories
Central West End National Register

Carriage Factory, to Dealership, to Beer Truck Garage, to Bumper Shop

by Michael R. Allen

The original factory building from 1908 shows masonry details underneath the layers of paint.

As buildings go, the former Scudder Motor Truck Company Building at 3942-62 Laclede Avenue is not particularly lovely, or very well-known. No matter, because the building’s transition from the last days of carriage production to the St. Louis’ early and roaring automobile age has earned it a place in the National Register of Historic Places. The National Park Service listed the Scudder building on April 24. Preservation Research Office prepared the nomination for the building’s owners, F H & C LLC.

The Scudder Motor Truck Company Building significant for its commercial history and association with transitions in the local automobile industry. The building meets the registration requirements for Property Type: Automotive Dealerships and Retail Businesses and for the Property Type: Service Stations established in the Multiple Property Documentation Form (MPDF) Historic Auto-Related Resources of St. Louis, Missouri. (An MPDF allows for buildings that support broader contexts to received National Register listing when they would be ineligible on their own. Such is the case here.) Carriage-related buildings adapted to serve the automobile age are rare in St. Louis, but the nominated building made that transition and continues to be in use by an automobile-related enterprise.

Looking southwest at the building.

In 1908, the Haase-Bohle Carriage Company built a new carriage factory at 3958-62 Laclede Avenue (listed permit address) designed by the architectural firm of Mathews & Clarke. The Haase-Bohle Carriage Company was then located at Eighteenth and Pine streets downtown and the company and its predecessor McCall & Haase Carriage Company had been manufacturing carriages since the 1870s. In 1908, Charles Haase was president and Frank G. Bohle was vice president. The company’s new plant was favorably reported in The Carriage Monthly‘s November 1908 issue. The journal reported that Haase-Bohle would build “a large and modern factory, on an admirable site” and that the building “will have excellent shipping facilities, and all modern conveniences for the handling of goods.”

Advertisement from the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, 1920.

In 1918, the Scudder Motor Truck Company, a dealer of Service brand delivery and fleet trucks moved into the building. The company operated a dealership and repair shop, and lured co-tenants offering related services for both Service and other types of trucks. W.L. Armstrong’s tire shop is shown at this address in a 1919 advertisement, and the Local Auto Paint Company appears at the address in city directories from 1923 through 1933. These businesses occupied the building simultaneously, and may have had financial interconnections. At the least, their services all would have appealed to clients that owned delivery trucks.

The Scudder Motor Truck Company sold and provided repair services to delivery trucks, and frequently took out illustrated advertisements in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. These advertisements feature images of Service delivery trucks and the brand name “Service” emblazoned diagonally. That brand was the trademark of the Service Motor Truck Company of Wabash, Indiana, which manufactured delivery and repair trucks for industrial buyers.

Scudder occupied the building as a truck dealership and service shop, a tire shop and an automobile painting shop through 1937. From that year through 1952, the Falstaff Brewing Company used the building as a garage and maintenance shop for its delivery fleet. The period of significance begins when the Scudder Motor Truck Company opened its dealership in the building and ends in 1952 when the Falstaff garage closed. In 1958, Bumper and Auto Processing of Missouri occupied the building as a shop for processing and re-plating of automobile bumpers. That use, under current tenant United Automotive Products, Inc., continues to this day.

Text adapted from the National Register of Historic Places nomination. Read the full text here.

Categories
Events

The Past, Present and Future of the Clemens House

The James Clemens, Jr. House as it appears today, with its portico removed.

What is going on with James Clemens, Jr. House? Attend a lecture by Michael Allen, Director of the Preservation Research Office and hosted by Landmarks Association on the status of the centerpiece of Paul McKee’s NorthSide development on Thursday, May 10th at 6:00 PM.

The Clemens House, constructed in 1858, is one of the few antebellum Greek Revival mansions in St. Louis and is the centerpiece of Paul McKee’s proposed NorthSide project. However, after removing the cast iron portico from the facade, the status of the project now appears unclear. Michael Allen, Director of the Preservation Research Office, will reprise his lecture “The James Clemens House: Past, Present and Future” which he delivered at Landmarks’ office during Preservation Week 2009. The lecture will include an update on the current status of the Clemens House.

The lecture will be held at Architecture St. Louis located in Landmarks’ office at 911 Washington Avenue, Suite 170. The lecture will begin at 6:00 PM and is free and open to the public.