THE SECRETS OF ST. LOUIS

[Music] just about everything connected with the american past has boomed since world war ii antiques books westerns on television and in philadelphia and other cities old neighborhoods of faded grace and charm have suddenly bloomed to become valuable property georgetown and washington and the vucara in new orleans are other examples well so far this hasn't happened here on any extensive scale but there are neighborhoods in st louis where many people think it should happen and could they are not stopping places on any of the standard guidebook tours in some cases a hundred years or so of time has dealt harshly with them but they seem to represent something that people today like and seek perhaps a sense of all those years perhaps some basic excellence of design that is the real article and not a copy that remains and can revive in any case they're still here for a while at least and they reward a visit as some of the city's most elegant secrets the marquis de lafayette had honored saint louis with a visit the city returned a favor by giving his name to its first park in 1836 formed from land lecleed had set aside 50 years before to be common pasture for the village livestock now the center for lafayette square it was considered well worth framing with ornamental stone with gates and landscaping to match [Music] colonel grimsley's home guards proceeded to make it their drill ground cannons from the british revolutionary war sloop acton raised from charleston harbor were placed in its center st louis had skilled craftsmen and wrought iron and the city voted fifty thousand dollars for an ornamental fence it was appropriate for the stylish new houses of a design brought back by visitors from the paris of napoleon iii these were the work of the city's foremost architects of the 1870s man-sized roofs rounded windows elaborate cornices these were how elegance was defined in the post-civil war years when the neighborhood was one of the handsomest in saint louis off the side streets small residential places appeared and benton place is one of them that retains the style of the times the same narrow man-sided roofs from the french empire high ceilings inside an occasional german baroque the lingering of ornate victorian america much of it preserved some ready for removal or restoration [Music] so a few blocks east around soulard market the neighborhood is from a simpler and earlier time organized originally in rows around the market itself and around the spire of saint peter in saint paul's church european village fashion it was a hard working neighborhood and still is holding on for over a hundred years to the neatness and order of the new coming german families who built it they built and rose right onto the property line in the sidewalk their shutters were for use rather than ornament and still are the doors hinge on both sides like the shutters the city's wrought iron craftsmen supplied them too with balconies as with the people of town they liked the designs and placed them where they seemed appropriate [Music] sometimes between the first row of houses in the alley they placed a second row of back houses identical with the first row the same cornices and balconies and chimney pots with a courtyard in between if it was crowded it could also be congenial and people remember a neighborhood identity in which everyone knew everyone else the architecture is sometimes called federal sometimes colonial here it has survived nearly 100 years preserved by generations of the people of the neighborhood who took pride in it whatever it was called [Music] even earlier row neighborhoods remain around st laborious church on the near north side part of old cary patch were the first irish built and then germans in successive waves north of franklin avenue a part of st louis dating from pre-civil war times [Music] houses like these have become the high rental neighborhoods of washington a few blocks away the wealthier irish builders did james clemons an uncle of mark twain who in 1860 hired the best irish architect he could find in the best cast iron workman they cast classic columns for him with iron capitals and pediments painted white a widower he asked them to cast a cameo of his wife's face for the keystones above the windows so far his house has survived fires and new traffic ways to become historic architecture being put to a living use it is the headquarters of the vincentian foreign mission society the neighborhood around has not been so fortunate george brooks is director of the missouri historical society really start with the people in the neighborhood if they aren't interested in preserving it i think you've you've lost 90 percent of the battle what about developers helping there's always a danger in this too i think of making it kind of a disneyland with gas lights you uh you tend to seek out the quaint and the end picture is not really what it was in the beginning georgetown for example is filled full of pink and blue and yellow and green houses which i'm sure would shock our colonial ancestor you can't preserve a neighborhood just for the sake of preserving a neighborhood though it has to it has to come from the people within the neighborhood who really want to do something about it what about other parts of st louis well i think it is unique in traveling around the country i don't think you'll find a collection of of houses still in the vast majority preserved as as one family residences holding together is an entity the way the west end of st louis does is there any reason why that still has appeal do you think i think probably it's just due to the the period when they were built the the architecture and the the wild variety of styles and the different enjoyments you can have just by looking at at a row of buildings and finding anything to suit your taste they were doing classical roman temples and the kind of thing that we value now for it's uh it's nondescript quality it's victorian it's it's just pure rampant joy in eccentricities built as the century approached its finish st louis's west end has managed to defy descriptive labels to some it is defied simplicity too it spoke greek and roman the renaissance mary england and sometimes egypt and it was like a tour through an architect's textbook it shaped ordinary doors windows and rooftops after all of these fashions and invented new ones of its own it added up to no one's style in all styles it was pure st louis a place where ornament was the rule and where if a man's house was his castle it should look like one and preferably have a pleasure dome too [Music] these are among st louis's comeback neighborhoods i i've often had the feeling that the the west end of st louis is very much like areas of the west end of london architecturally of course it's different but the feel and the atmosphere is very much the same what about the outlook for the area as a neighborhood from the standpoint of quality and and interest and curiosity i think the west end is is going to be the focal point of the city in the future the city has had quite a few focal points in its day lucas place was one only the old camel house on locust street remains from that another took shape out on lower broadway in the middle of the old south it raised one stately mansion and a grove of trees behind cherokee cave as if it rises from a louisiana bayou in st louis it's the last of its kind [Music] the family home of dr nicholas damonel stands on lower broadway among factories and foundries in 1863 it was a country retreat to which he moved as a southern sympathizer the doctor had fashioned his house to match his sympathies he encircled it with new orleans ironwork screened it behind magnolia and tamarind trees and night blooming jasmine to union armies patrolling saint louis and to wandering union soldiers the appearance of the house was probably equivalent to flying the rebel flag the veterans had burned many a house like it in mississippi and it must have seemed inviting but the house survived occasional raids and even later a more stubborn enemy the weather today its ironwork is still intact antique dealers have not rated it it needs paint but it is preserved as the south slowly gave way the doctor added iron bars to his windows behind these he sat in his parlor with a shotgun after sending the ladies to visit relatives [Music] in a house with greek columns in front they had sometimes amused the gentleman with homemade parlor pageants about greek maidens [Music] since the discovery of the elgin marbles a half century before everything greek was enjoying popularity architecture and costume particularly in the south of which this was an outpost in later years he was once more hospitable even to ex-union army officers who crossed his threshold as friends from behind his iron bars he could look out at a different kind of threat factories approaching his rural retreat he always refused to sell though finally surrounded by them and he never took down the iron bars [Music] well actually uh this is about the finest antebellum house remaining in saint louis gerhard kramer an architect past president of landmarks incorporated landmarks like this well the future generation our children and our grandchildren will have nothing really to say the way we live or the way our parents live in the old days to many people this is just one more old ruin how would you describe it actually uh it's uh definitely the greek revival period which was so prevalent in natchez mississippi this type of american architecture just about run its course when the demoneels uh built this piece and consequently you notice the lateness of the period and the details the ironwork and the doorways and things like that well it seems to be deserted now is the headache ball coming toward it the highway department acquired the property and now the landmarks association is trying to acquire is attempting to acquire the property from the highway uh department for what purpose well that's the problem that landmarks has to face right now they have of course got to find some need for it some use for it and at the present time they're attempting to convert it into a prestige type restaurant to find a practical use for it in other words well actually could be quite a lovely place i mean after it was all completely restored unless they're renovated air conditioned and heated and with the uh an elegant patio on the outside the old carriage house alongside could be a play an important part uh with the patio for a debutant parties for really exclusive uh prestige type dinners oh it could be it could be the show spot of st louis with the gateway arch scheduled for completion in 1964 and presumably thousands of tourists due to arrive to help saint louis celebrate its 200th anniversary to clean up the old neighborhoods and make them once more quaint and picturesque to salvage an old mansion like the demonel house these things offer tangible rewards and can be good business if the experience of georgetown and philadelphia and new orleans is any kind of a reliable guide in the meantime they're still there for a while at least to look at and for the time being that's reward enough in a moment you