http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/category.asp?CategoryID=48250 Wed, 22 May 2013 00:00 CST en-us http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1494913&CategoryID=48250 Thu, 28 Jun 2012 00:00 CST
In the summer of 1917, East St. Louis seethed with racial turmoil. Blacks moved here from the South in large numbers in the years before World War I, adding more poor people to a hardscrabble town already crowded with low-wage workers. Embittered union leaders demanded that City Hall "get rid of the migrants." Violence exploded on July 2 after whites poured from a union meeting in the Labor Temple. Mobs attacked the first black people they could find. The official death count was 39 blacks and nine whites, although police estimated a death toll closer to 100.
9 photo(s)
6/28/2012
Album ID: 1494913]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=824804&CategoryID=48250 Thu, 21 Jun 2012 00:00 CST
On Sept. 1, 1894, newspapers carried detailed traffic instructions for carriages approaching 18th and Market streets. No one would get through without a pass. The occasion was the grand opening of Union Station, the monument to St. Louis’ sense of itself as industrial powerhouse and national crossroads. Organizers printed 13,000 invitations, ran out and printed more. About 20,000 men and women, many in tails and gowns, jammed the Grand Hall and strutted the 606-foot-long midway to the tracks.
17 photo(s)
6/21/2012
Album ID: 824804]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1488142&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 15 Jun 2012 00:00 CST
by Tim O'Neil --- It was called the "jewel" of the New York World’s Fair. After the fair’s two-year run, Mayor Alfonso Juan Cervantes snapped up the Spanish Pavilion for St. Louis in 1965, saying the pavilion would add pizzazz to downtown’s comeback, already alive with construction of the Arch, Busch Stadium, new highways and office towers. On June 15, 1970, the Spanish International Pavilion Foundation filed for bankruptcy. The hotel, later a Marriott, now is the Hilton St. Louis at the Ballpark. The pavilion endures as the lobby and main public area.
14 photo(s)
6/15/2012
Album ID: 1488142]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1484333&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 08 Jun 2012 00:00 CST
by Tim O'Neil --- Missouri’s own four-star Gen. Omar Nelson Bradley was honored here on June 11, 1945, with a massive parade downtown and a dinner at the Hotel Jefferson. One month before, he had led the million-man Twelfth Army Group to victory in Germany. Americans were still dying on Okinawa and in the air over Japan, but the homefront deserved a break.
17 photo(s)
6/8/2012
Album ID: 1484333]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1480105&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 01 Jun 2012 00:00 CST
by tim O'Neil --- In 1903, East St. Louis and other industrial cities on the American Bottom relied upon a network of railroad embankments to hold the Mississippi River. The Madison County levee, which ran from the Merchants Bridge near Venice eastward to Mitchell, broke on June 6. By June 10, East St. Louis was nearly surrounded by water.
25 photo(s)
6/1/2012
Album ID: 1480105]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1472259&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 18 May 2012 00:00 CST
The early morning of May 18, 1947, was dark but quiet, the Mississippi River 10 feet below flood stage. The Golden Eagle was bound for Nashville, Tenn., from its St. Louis home via the Ohio and Cumberland rivers. Most of its 91 passengers and crew were asleep when the drifting boat smacked into submerged rocks near Grand Tower Island, opening a gash on its port side.
12 photo(s)
5/18/2012
Album ID: 1472259]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1464058&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 04 May 2012 00:00 CST
by Tim O'Neil --- The veterans of World War I who formed the American Legion first met on American soil in a theater downtown on May 8, 1919. The killing had ended six months before. They adopted a national constitution, promoted employment for veterans and cheered Col. Theodore Roosevelt Jr., a war hero and son of the late former president.
14 photo(s)
5/4/2012
Album ID: 1464058]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1446758&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 06 Apr 2012 00:00 CST
by Tim O'Neil --- The countdown was to 12:01 a.m. Friday, April 7, 1933, when beer would be legal again after 13 long years. At midnight, the Anheuser-Busch brewery whistles were overwhelmed by the roar of happy humans. August A. "Gussie" Busch Jr. spoke to a national radio audience, then went inside to greet his private guests. "Come and get it," he told them.
12 photo(s)
4/6/2012
Album ID: 1446758]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1442290&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 30 Mar 2012 00:00 CST
by Tim O'Neil --- It was called the oldest dwelling in the city. Local tradition claimed the hot dog was invented within its limestone walls. None of that was enough to save the Jean Baptiste Roy home, a crumbling and vacant two-story structure at 615-17 South Second Street that dated to 1829. Despite earnest efforts to preserve it, demolition began March 31, 1947.
5 photo(s)
3/30/2012
Album ID: 1442290]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1438230&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 23 Mar 2012 00:00 CST
by Tim O'Neil --- It was almost quitting time for 142 men working 540 feet below ground in Centralia Coal Co.’s Mine No. 5. In operation since 1908, the mine’s tentacles ran three or more miles from the elevator shaft into the coal seams. At 3:27 p.m. March 25, 1947, coal dust exploded deep inside. Thirty-one survivors all reached surface shortly after the blast, but 111 miners were dead or dying.
26 photo(s)
3/23/2012
Album ID: 1438230]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1431607&CategoryID=48250 Mon, 19 Mar 2012 00:00 CST
by Tim O'Neil --- The fire began in a waste-paper shredding machine. It flashed quickly through old clothing, furniture and other goods stacked inside the Goodwill Industries building at 713 Howard Street. As Fire Chief Joseph W. Morgan stepped along on the second-floor escape platform, the wall collapsed into a jumble of brick, heavy timber and billowing mortar dust. Morgan was, and is, the only St. Louis fire chief to be killed in action since the department was established in 1857.
5 photo(s)
3/19/2012
Album ID: 1431607]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1430015&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 09 Mar 2012 00:00 CST
Medart’s restaurant, at 7036 Clayton Avenue and Skinker Boulevard, glorified the American hamburger and was a hit with the after-theater crowd and college kids. But frustrated by long hours and low pay, Medart’s waitresses went on strike in July 1941, eventually settling on March 16, 1942. They got most of what they wanted.
6 photo(s)
3/9/2012
Album ID: 1430015]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1421406&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 24 Feb 2012 00:00 CST
East Side mob boss Frank "Buster" Wortman and sidekick Elmer "Dutch" Dowling awaited the verdict with stiff-jawed scowls, just like tough guys should. If they were surprised to hear the word "guilty," they didn’t show it. Wortman, Dowling and a third man were found guilty Feb. 26, 1962, of conspiracy to avoid income taxes.
19 photo(s)
2/24/2012
Album ID: 1421406]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1415920&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 17 Feb 2012 00:00 CST
On Feb. 16, 1862, Gen. U.S. Grant’s army of Midwestern soldiers, working closely with new ironclad gunboats that James B. Eads built in Carondelet, forced the surrender of the Confederacy’s Fort Donelson on the Cumberland River, near the Kentucky-Tennessee border. The next day, news of a great victory clacked across the telegraph at Benton Barracks, in today’s Fairground Park. Once a struggling farmer and cordwood dealer in St. Louis County, Gen. Grant had become a Union hero.
7 photo(s)
2/17/2012
Album ID: 1415920]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1414226&CategoryID=48250 Mon, 13 Feb 2012 00:00 CST
On the morning of Feb. 13, 1904, brewery owner William J. Lemp Sr., killed himself with a gunshot to his right temple. He was the first of four in this family to commit suicide, three of them at the family mansion at 3322 South 13th Street (now Demenil Place), next to the Lemp brewery. Restored as the Lemp Mansion Restaurant & Inn, it is a favorite haunt of ghost enthusiasts.
16 photo(s)
2/13/2012
Album ID: 1414226]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1408175&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 03 Feb 2012 00:00 CST
Josephine Baker's show on Feb. 3, 1952, in Kiel Auditorium was noteworthy mainly for occurring at all. Baker, who became a sensation for sultry dances wearing only a few feathers or a skirt of bananas, hadn’t performed in her native city since achieving worldwide fame in Paris in 1925. She had plenty of opportunities, but refused to play for racially segregated audiences.
21 photo(s)
2/3/2012
Album ID: 1408175]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=933973&CategoryID=48250 Tue, 31 Jan 2012 00:00 CST
The nearly 14 inches of snow that fell the night of January 30, 1982, was the third-heaviest snowfall ever recorded in St. Louis, beaten only by 20.4 inches on March 30-31, 1890, and 15.5 inches on Feb. 20, 1912. Hundreds of motorists abandoned vehicles on highways and streets. Buses and heavy trucks got stuck in traffic lanes.
13 photo(s)
1/31/2012
Album ID: 933973]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1403450&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 27 Jan 2012 00:00 CST
by Tim O'Neil --- On Jan. 28, 1981, Marine Corps Sgt. Rodney "Rocky" Sickmann, one of 52 Americans held hostage in Iran for 444 wrenching days, was back in Missouri. "Freedom is everything, and we have it," Sickmann, 23, shouted heartily.
18 photo(s)
1/27/2012
Album ID: 1403450]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1399124&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 20 Jan 2012 00:00 CST
by Tim O'Neil --- Evicted suddenly from the cotton fields, homeless sharecroppers set up ramshackle camps along two major highways in southeast Missouri in January of 1939. Most of the sharecroppers were black. Some were white. Icy drizzle and snow fell upon them all.
22 photo(s)
1/20/2012
Album ID: 1399124]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1394319&CategoryID=48250 Thu, 12 Jan 2012 00:00 CST
Thomas Stearns Eliot returned to St. Louis on Jan. 16, 1933, his first visit home in 19 years to lecture on William Shakespeare at Washington University. Being a famous poet and critic, local reporters jotted his every public utterance. Eliot said he was was surprised by growth west of Forest Park, but otherwise recognized his home town.
4 photo(s)
1/12/2012
Album ID: 1394319]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1391233&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 06 Jan 2012 00:00 CST
Gen. Henry W. Halleck replaced Gen. John C. Fremont, the vain and ambitious local Union commander, in January of 1862. Nicknamed "Old Brains," Halleck was a stern, unlovable lawyer who restored order in St. Louis by publishing numerous heavy-handed edicts and methodically enforcing them.
6 photo(s)
1/6/2012
Album ID: 1391233]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1383251&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 23 Dec 2011 00:00 CST
by Tim O'Neil --- In 1924, area leaders founded the Community Chest (now United Way) and discouraged separate fundraisers by member organizations, such as the Christian Aid Society. Thus was born the St. Louis Christmas Carols Association, headed for the next 31 years by William H. Danforth, president of Ralston-Purina Co., who had formed one of the original groups on his street, Kingsbury Place, with help from fellow members of Pilgrim Congregational Church.
13 photo(s)
12/23/2011
Album ID: 1383251]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1380154&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 16 Dec 2011 00:00 CST
by Tim O'Neil --- Eugene Field’s childhood home at 634 South Broadway was opened during a five-inch snowstorm on Dec. 18, 1936, after a frenzied campaign to save and restore it. The first 50 visitors were students at Eugene Field School, 4466 Olive Street, named after the newspaper columnist who was known, sometimes to his distress, as "the children’s poet."
16 photo(s)
12/16/2011
Album ID: 1380154]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1376529&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 09 Dec 2011 00:00 CST
by Tim O'Neil --- The first passenger train west of the Mississippi River began its portentous jaunt towards the West Coast at 1 p.m. on Dec. 9, 1852, from a station near 14th Street and Chouteau Avenue. The Pacific Railroad Co., St. Louis’ bid to reach the Pacific Ocean by rail, was building its way westward with dreams bigger than progress.
9 photo(s)
12/9/2011
Album ID: 1376529]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1373724&CategoryID=48250 Mon, 05 Dec 2011 00:00 CST
by Tim O'Neil --- The front pages of Sunday morning, Dec. 7, 1941, gave little hint of a surprise attack upon Pearl Harbor that radio broadcasters would report breathlessly at 1:31 p.m. local time. Next morning, hundreds of civilians mobbed recruiting stations downtown. More than 400 applied for the Navy, 40 times the daily average. Outside the federal Custom House (Old Post Office), crowds gathered around a temporary loudspeaker at Eighth and Olive streets to hear President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s war speech to Congress.
13 photo(s)
12/5/2011
Album ID: 1373724]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1367417&CategoryID=48250 Wed, 23 Nov 2011 00:00 CST
by Tim O'Neil --- Before World War II, almost 500 service cars plied St. Louis and its surrounding suburbs, charging five-cent fares. Cabbies and streetcar motormen loathed service cars because they siphoned customers and clogged downtown corners. Bus company executives called them "parasites." The last runs were scheduled for the morning of Nov. 30, 1965.
11 photo(s)
11/23/2011
Album ID: 1367417]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1364471&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 18 Nov 2011 00:00 CST
Nov. 21, 1872, as a national women’s convention opened downtown St. Louis. The Missouri Democrat, a St. Louis newspaper, predicted that the drive to grant voting rights to women would fizzle. It was a common reaction for the times, abetted in part by a schism within suffragist ranks.
6 photo(s)
11/18/2011
Album ID: 1364471]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1360171&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 11 Nov 2011 00:00 CST
by Tim O'Neil --- ST. LOUIS • The courtroom’s cast-iron shutters were slammed shut. Only people with passes were admitted. A phalanx of federal agents surrounded their star witness. For two weeks in November 1924, Ray "the Fox" Renard, one-time wheelman for the notorious gang called Egan’s Rats, broke the gangster code and testified against former cronies.
15 photo(s)
11/11/2011
Album ID: 1360171]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1354371&CategoryID=48250 Tue, 08 Nov 2011 00:00 CST
Alton newspaper editor Elijah P. Lovejoy, known for righteous and unforgiving prose against slavery, was almost 35 when he was killed Nov. 7, 1837. The mob tossed his press into the Mississippi River. It was the fourth press that Lovejoy had lost to people who hated his words. He soon became a martyr to the nation’s small but rising wave of abolitionism.
6 photo(s)
11/8/2011
Album ID: 1354371]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1342345&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 14 Oct 2011 00:00 CST
by Tim O'Neil --- When the $13 million Interregional highway between downtown St. Louis and Gravois opened on Oct. 15, 1955, there was no ribbon-cutting. It took seven years to build the 2.3 mile highway, and everyone was tired of talk. But commuters liked it.
12 photo(s)
10/14/2011
Album ID: 1342345]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1337719&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 07 Oct 2011 00:00 CST
by Tim O'Neil --- The final game of the 1944 World Series was played on a chilly Oct. 9 between the National League's St. Louis Cardinals and the American League's St. Louis Browns at Sportsman's Park. Only 31,630 fans -- almost 3,000 fewer than a full house -- saw the game. The Cardinals won that final game, 3-1, and the series, 4-2.
21 photo(s)
10/7/2011
Album ID: 1337719]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1331573&CategoryID=48250 Sat, 01 Oct 2011 00:00 CST
It rose like a honeycomb of aluminum tubes, slowly curling into a dome high above the flowers. It could save the palm trees and, perhaps, revive the garden. The odd structure was the Climatron, the world’s first geodesic greenhouse and new home for the Missouri Botanical Garden’s orchids, coffee trees and hibuscus. The local architects who designed it were inspired by R. Buckminster Fuller, a Harvard dropout and prolific spinner of big ideas. The unusual shape drew visitors during the year of construction. Shortly before the dedication on Oct. 1, 1960, all 112 interior floodlights were illuminated. Outside, the Climatron glowed like a magic mushroom in a fantasy movie.
14 photo(s)
10/1/2011
Album ID: 1331573]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1318466&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 09 Sep 2011 00:00 CST
by Tim O'Neil --- When the St. the Louis Merchants Exchange building opened in 1875 it was a bustling affair, fitting for the importance of the new building to commerce and society. Grain traders used its vast hall to buy and sell the harvests that poured into St. Louis by steamboat, railroad and horse cart. The following year, the Democratic Party held its national convention there, choosing Samuel J. Tilden as their candidate. Last call was on Sept. 13, 1957, when business moved to a new, forgettably modern brick building at 5100 Oakland Avenue, leaving the old haunt to grain-nibbling pigeons and mice.
23 photo(s)
9/9/2011
Album ID: 1318466]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1314568&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 02 Sep 2011 00:00 CST
by Tim O'Neil --- James B. Eads, salvage king of the Mississippi River, promised President Abraham Lincoln he could build iron-armored gunboats in 65 days. On Aug. 7, 1861, Eads won a contract to build seven burly gunboats from a novel design. At $89,000 apiece, each was to carry 13 heavy cannon, have 2.5 inches of armor and be delivered to Cairo, Ill., in sixty days.
12 photo(s)
9/2/2011
Album ID: 1314568]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1301671&CategoryID=48250 Sat, 27 Aug 2011 00:00 CST
Shortly after the death of boss Anthony "Tony G" Giordano on August 29, 1980, mob leaders recruited John J. Vitale, the old consiglieri to come out of retirement and smooth the transition. The quiet following Giordano’s death lasted 19 days, and the subsequent murder of James A. "Horseshoe Jimmy" Michaels set off St. Louis’ last big-time gang war.
13 photo(s)
8/27/2011
Album ID: 1301671]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1302908&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 19 Aug 2011 00:00 CST
The urban growth of St. Louis made the previously pleasant and meandering River Des Peres become a flood-prone sewer. Its path through Forest Park was encased temporarily in a wooden culvert for the 1904 World�s Fair. On Aug. 19, 1915, remnants of a hurricane reached St. Louis from Texas, and heavy rain dumped 7.4 inches across the area. In 1923, city voters adopted an $87 million bond issue that included $11 million to tame the River Des Peres. Steady work with steam shovels, horse teams and men swinging picks continued for more than a decade. They ran the river underground through the park and into a nine-mile-long open channel to the Mississippi.
18 photo(s)
8/19/2011
Album ID: 1302908]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1301309&CategoryID=48250 Sat, 13 Aug 2011 00:00 CST
By Tim O''Neil --- The first unofficial news bulletin of Japan''s surrender in World War II came by radio at 2:30 a.m. local time on Aug. 14., 1945. Henry Ruggeri rushed to reopen his tavern at Edwards Street and Elizabeth Avenue. "I must celebrate," Ruggeri said. Downtown that morning, office workers filled the air and streets with paperwork from their desks. Teenagers snake-danced down Olive Street. Adults banged washboards and dragged strings of clanging cans across pavement. At 5 p.m., when President Harry Truman confirmed the surrender, the party leaped into overdrive.
16 photo(s)
8/13/2011
Album ID: 1301309]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1298131&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 05 Aug 2011 00:00 CST
by Tim O'Neil --- The heat of July 1936 had been withering and deadly, reaching at least 100 degrees on 18 days. It had killed 332 people by July 30, when cooling breezes soothed raw, sweating faces. The relief didn’t last. A drought that burned the Plains and Midwest restoked itself, pushing the temperature here back to 100 on Aug. 9. On 15 of the next 18 shimmering days, the high would be at least 100. It was 103 or hotter 11 times. On Aug. 18, the high was 106. The summer’s toll was 479 dead of heat, including 29 children.
10 photo(s)
8/5/2011
Album ID: 1298131]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=807474&CategoryID=48250 Mon, 01 Aug 2011 00:00 CST
St. Louis Mayor William Becker and nine others were killed on Aug. 1, 1943, when a World War II glider they were riding in plunged and slammed nose first into the ground near the Lambert Airport runway.
11 photo(s)
8/1/2011
Album ID: 807474]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1293338&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 29 Jul 2011 00:00 CST
Dale Jackson and Forrest O'Brine zoomed onto the front pages in their overloaded aircraft and stayed there for two breathless weeks. After 420 hours and 21 minutes in the air -- 17 1/2 days -- they were cheered as heroes on Aug. 1, 1929 with a ticker-tape parade downtown.
18 photo(s)
7/29/2011
Album ID: 1293338]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1289524&CategoryID=48250 Sat, 23 Jul 2011 00:00 CST
by Tim O'Neil --- Gen. John C. Fremont made his reputation exploring the West, earning the nickname "Pathfinder." The new commander of the Department of the West rode into town July 25, 1861, flanked by his retinue of plumed exiles from European revolutions. He and his wife, Jessie, established headquarters in a mansion at Eighth Street and Chouteau Avenue, but spent most of their time in well-guarded seclusion. Fremont and his 150-man body guard charged through the city like royalty, and after only three months, his command was marked by indecision, aloofness and grand statements that finally exasperated President Abraham Lincoln.
10 photo(s)
7/23/2011
Album ID: 1289524]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1286110&CategoryID=48250 Sun, 17 Jul 2011 00:00 CST
For 66 years, the Forest Park Highlands amusement park had been a popular summertime diversion. Families still jammed the park the afternoon of July 19, 1963, when black smoke began curling from the restaurant. Fire grew quickly with menacing red and yellow flames. Shifting wind pushed it through the old corrugated metal and wood building, creating an inferno, and jumped from carnival ride to ticket booth until most of the park was engulfed.
23 photo(s)
7/17/2011
Album ID: 1286110]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1282308&CategoryID=48250 Sun, 10 Jul 2011 00:00 CST
by Tim O'Neil --- ST. LOUIS: St. Louis, gathering heat pushed the high to 99 on July 7, 1980 and to 101 the next day. It would break 100 degrees on a withering nine of the next 14 days and reach 107 on July 15, the summer's worst. It would be 100 or hotter on 18 days that long, searing summer. The heat wave would kill 153 people in the St. Louis area, most of them elderly, poor and living in stifling rooms without air-conditioning. Many had kept their windows shut, fearing burglars more than swelter.
17 photo(s)
7/10/2011
Album ID: 1282308]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1278371&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 01 Jul 2011 00:00 CST
by Tim O'Neil --- For more than four decades, Tony Faust’s Oyster House and Restaurant was the city’s premier place to eat and be seen. The dedicated clientele included the wealthy and powerful, touring notables, actors, baseball players, boxers and dandies of all sorts. Last call was on June 30, 1916, and the building at Broadway and Elm was demolished in 1933.
12 photo(s)
7/1/2011
Album ID: 1278371]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1273850&CategoryID=48250 Sat, 25 Jun 2011 00:00 CST
by Tim O'Neil: The hijacking of American Airlines Flight 119 out of St. Louis on June 23, 1972 was one of many accomplished easily until the nation’s airlines and airports clamped down on security. Martin J. McNally, yet another copycat of the mysterious D.B. Cooper, demanded $502,500 and five parachutes, and somewhere over northern Indiana he jumped into the darkness from an altitude of 8,000 feet. Three days later, searchers found a money sack and a gun in fields near Peru, Indiana. A fingerprint led to bruised but alive McNally, who had $13 in his pocket.
21 photo(s)
6/25/2011
Album ID: 1273850]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1010352&CategoryID=48250 Mon, 20 Jun 2011 00:00 CST
In 1914, city leaders looked for ways to bridge the social gulf in St. Louis by staging a 4-hour show on the area’s heritage in Forest Park. For four nights from May 28 to June 1, 1914, it played to immense crowds across a wide stage at the foot of Art Hill. Estimates put total attendance at more than 400,000. On opening night, about 75,000 persons showed up. The Pageant and Masque inspired the creation of the Municipal Opera, which opened its 93rd season Monday night in Forest Park.
11 photo(s)
6/20/2011
Album ID: 1010352]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1260604&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 10 Jun 2011 00:00 CST
by Tim O'Neil --- Democrats gathered at the St. Louis Coliseum June 14-16, 1916, to coronate President Woodrow Wilson for nomination to a second term. It was the last of five major national political conventions held here beginning in 1876 (four Democratic, one Republican). The run coincided neatly with St. Louis’ place among the nation’s five biggest cities.
16 photo(s)
6/10/2011
Album ID: 1260604]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1260500&CategoryID=48250 Sat, 04 Jun 2011 00:00 CST
by Tim O'Neil --- The city’s boiling cultural divide at the outbreak of the Civil War erupted in street violence on May 10-11, 1861. Clashes between untrained Union soldiers and pro-Southern citizens killed 44. Shock over bloodshed and more federal troops forced an uneasy calm.
7 photo(s)
6/4/2011
Album ID: 1260500]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1255833&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 27 May 2011 00:00 CST
by Tim O'Neil --- On May 27, 1896, a super tornado called the Great Cyclone killed 255 people as it churned like a turbine through St. Louis and East St. Louis. Its wide path, running roughly along today’s Interstate 44 and across the Mississippi River at the Arch, was a ruin of 7,500 buildings destroyed or damaged, sheared trees and trains tossed from tracks.
21 photo(s)
5/27/2011
Album ID: 1255833]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1250311&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 20 May 2011 00:00 CST
by Tim O'Neil --- The Grand Mississippi Valley Sanitary Fair, a fund-raiser for Union troops in the Civil War, opened on May 17, 1864. The Ladies’ Union Aid Society was the driving force of the Western Sanitary Commission, which sought to fill yawning gaps in Army medical care. Through its closing June 18, the fair raised $550,000 to give Union soldiers hospital care, clean garments and warm meals.
8 photo(s)
5/20/2011
Album ID: 1250311]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1246589&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 13 May 2011 00:00 CST
By Tim O'Neil --- On the night of May 17-18, 1849, a hard wind blew from the northeast across the Mississippi River. It would serve as a bellows for a long, destructive night. St. Louis’ Great Fire destroyed 418 buildings on 15 blocks. Three people were confirmed dead, but more probably perished on the steamboats. At least one burning boat blew up.
8 photo(s)
5/13/2011
Album ID: 1246589]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1242219&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 06 May 2011 00:00 CST
The first of Post-Dispatch reporter Virginia Irwin's stories on the fall of Berlin splashed the front page on May 8, 1945, the day after Germany’s surrender to the allies in World War II. One of the few women reporters overseas, Irwin and Boston newspaperman Andrew Tully were the first American reporters in the German capital.
10 photo(s)
5/6/2011
Album ID: 1242219]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1231661&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 22 Apr 2011 00:00 CST
By Tim O'Neil --- On April 24, 1953, three masked men rushed into the lobby of Southwest Bank, Kingshighway and Southwest Avenue. Swinging a sawed-off shotgun, ringleader Fred Bowerman jumped onto a counter and shouted, "This is a holdup! Everybody stand still!" Police quickly rushed to the scene, and despite 40 gunshots and tear-gas shells, no one other than the robbers was hurt. In 1959, a movie called "the Great St. Louis Bank Robbery" hit the theaters. In the cast was young Steve McQueen.
24 photo(s)
4/22/2011
Album ID: 1231661]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1226632&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 15 Apr 2011 00:00 CST
On April 19, 1878, farmer Ralph Clayton shoved a spade into the earth in unincorporated St. Louis County, and the construction of the St. Louis County Courthouse began. Clayton, a 90-year-old farmer, had donated 100 acres for the $38,000 facility.
19 photo(s)
4/15/2011
Album ID: 1226632]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1209732&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 08 Apr 2011 00:00 CST
By Tim O'Neil --- Thousands jammed downtown St. Louis on April 14, 1934, for the dedication of the city's new Municipal Auditorium and Community Center. Eleven years before, voters had adopted an $87 million bond issue for an ambitious list of projects, and $5 million was allocated towards an auditorium. In 1942 the massive limestone building would be renamed in honor of Mayor Henry W. Kiel.
28 photo(s)
4/8/2011
Album ID: 1209732]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1200097&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 01 Apr 2011 00:00 CST
By Tim O'Neil --- The day after the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was shot by a sniper on April 4, 1968, 75 St. Louis civil-rights leaders met at the Mid-City Community Congress on Delmar to plan a memorial march for Palm Sunday, two days hence. With everyone on edge, militants and moderates shouted at each other. Morris Hatchett, a World War II pilot and head of the local NAACP, stood firm against violence: "We’re all black... This battle of name-calling has got to go." They announced the march together. Although riots erupted across the nation, St. Louis didn’t burn.
11 photo(s)
4/1/2011
Album ID: 1200097]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1199804&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 25 Mar 2011 00:00 CST
By Tim O’Neil --- As the World’s Fair was about to open in 1904, chemists at the St. Louis Water Works tried to fix the decades-old problem of the brown hue of the city’s water supply. Mayor Rolla Wells had promised clear water for the fair, but time was running out.
19 photo(s)
3/25/2011
Album ID: 1199804]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1194208&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 18 Mar 2011 00:00 CST
In January 1861, Claiborne Fox Jackson, Missouri’s new governor and a slaveholder, schemed to push Missouri into the Confederacy. He fished from state files a bill that had failed in the Legislature the year before. It proposed managing the city police with a Board of Police Commissioners, modeled after Baltimore’s supposedly progressive system. Jackson liked the clause that let the governor appoint commissioners in St. Louis, a city that backed Lincoln’s election.
4 photo(s)
3/18/2011
Album ID: 1194208]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1189524&CategoryID=48250 Sun, 13 Mar 2011 00:00 CST
By Tim O'Neil --- On March 17, 1820, a small band of Irish settlers gathered to praise St. Patrick. It was the first recorded observance of St. Patrick’s Day here, although the sparse accounts disagree whether a parade was included. The Irish then were a small part of the city’s 4,400 souls. Marching came later.
21 photo(s)
3/13/2011
Album ID: 1189524]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1184353&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 04 Mar 2011 00:00 CST
by Tim O'Neil --- Just before the Civil War, Missouri delegates gathered at the St. Louis Mercantile Library on March 4, 1861, for a special State Convention. Secessionists in the Legislature hoped the convention would help to push Missouri into the budding Confederate States of America, and Unionists hoped some of the city’s anti-secession feelings might sway the delegates.
6 photo(s)
3/4/2011
Album ID: 1184353]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1170133&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 11 Feb 2011 00:00 CST
St. Louis’ infamous "whiskey ring" trial began Feb. 8, 1876, at the U.S. Post Office and Custom House on Third Street, running for 18 sensational days. The defendant was Orville E. Babcock, President Ulysses S. Grant’s private secretary, who prosecutors said secretly ran interference for a multi-city scheme of payoffs to let liquor distillers avoid taxes.
5 photo(s)
2/11/2011
Album ID: 1170133]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1165522&CategoryID=48250 Sun, 06 Feb 2011 00:00 CST
By Tim O'Neil --- In late January 1936, vicious cold tormented the Midwest. Lows here fell to -10 degrees. On the Mississippi River, large pancakes of drifting ice crunched against bridge piers and boats. The Army Corps of Engineers warned against crossing the rivers on foot. The foolhardy, though, rarely heed such things. T
24 photo(s)
2/6/2011
Album ID: 1165522]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1161173&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 28 Jan 2011 00:00 CST
On Jan. 27, 1961, Pope John XXIII decreed that the Old Cathedral on the riverfront would become the Basilica of St. Louis, King of France. Cardinal Joseph Ritter, didn’t think the time was right for an announcement, kept the hot ecclesiastical news in his pocket. As archbishop of St. Louis, Ritter could do that. There was serious sprucing to finish.
16 photo(s)
1/28/2011
Album ID: 1161173]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1156519&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 21 Jan 2011 00:00 CST
The dispute over biblical doctrine and literal interpretation of the Bible at Concordia Seminary stewed for four years. The school's sponsoring denomination, the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod, suspended the seminary's moderate president, and a student rebellion ignited. On Jan. 21, 1974, the students voted 274 to 92 to boycott classes, pledging to stay out until their church leadership "publicly declares which members of the faculty, if any, are to be considered as false teachers."
18 photo(s)
1/21/2011
Album ID: 1156519]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=931078&CategoryID=48250 Sat, 15 Jan 2011 00:00 CST
On Friday, Pope Benedict XVI set May 1 as the date for John Paul's beatification. On Jan 26, 1999, Pope John Paul II arrived in St. Louis for a whirlwind 31-hour visit. The 78-year-old Polish pontiff managed to take part in a frenetic youth rally in the Savvis (Scottrade) Center, celebrate Mass with 104,000 people in the dome and adjoining halls, took part in an ecumenical service at the New Cathedral and persuade a governor to spare a condemned man.
25 photo(s)
1/15/2011
Album ID: 931078]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1148124&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 07 Jan 2011 00:00 CST
In America’s first century, most libraries were private collections. When St.Louis' new central library opened on Jan. 6, 1912, it was the city’s first free-standing main public library. With 80,000 volumes and spacious reading rooms, it offered a whole new cornucopia of knowledge, free for the browsing and borrowing.
13 photo(s)
1/7/2011
Album ID: 1148124]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1140256&CategoryID=48250 Thu, 23 Dec 2010 00:00 CST
In 1933, newly elected St. Louis Mayor Bernard F. Dickmann, a New Deal Democrat, promised to provide hot holiday food for 25,000 people. The first "Mayor’s Christmas Party" fed 26,773 people Dickmann insisted the event be renamed "The Citizens’ Dinner," but the original stuck. For six lean years of the Depression, the mayor’s Christmas dinners served 260,000 meals.
16 photo(s)
12/23/2010
Album ID: 1140256]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1128346&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 03 Dec 2010 00:00 CST
In the fall of 1982, Times Beach residents learned that oil used to spray the town’s many dirt lanes had been laced with dioxin, a toxin deadly to animals, and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency began taking samples. On Dec. 6, 1982, the Meramec River crested 24 feet above flood stage, and the one-two punch of dioxin and floodwater sealed Times Beach's fate. It was never occupied again.
24 photo(s)
12/3/2010
Album ID: 1128346]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1123757&CategoryID=48250 Thu, 25 Nov 2010 00:00 CST
Phil the gorilla weighed 30 lbs. when he arrived at the St. Louis Zoo on Sept. 10, 1941, and for almost two decades, patrons flocked to his cage hoping to catch some of his antics. Sometimes he’d rip the shirt from his main keeper, Frank Florsek. Other times he’d suddenly bomb his human admirers with a mighty splash from his swimming tank. He died on Dec. 1, 1958, and his stuffed remains now reside at the old Elephant House.
15 photo(s)
11/25/2010
Album ID: 1123757]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1120517&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 19 Nov 2010 00:00 CST
Two days after President John F. Kennedy was murdered, about 30,000 people marched in downtown St. Louis in his memory. The local Conference on Religion and Race had already scheduled a march for that Sunday to promote racial harmony. The group renewed its call for the march, saying the assassination gave the event "new meaning and depth."
11 photo(s)
11/19/2010
Album ID: 1120517]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1107300&CategoryID=48250 Sat, 30 Oct 2010 00:00 CST
st. louis, 1949 • Jane Hadley was a quick-witted, charming widow whose husband had been a prominent railroad lawyer. Alben W. Barkley was a widower 34 years her senior who happened to be Harry Truman’s vice-president. They met at a party in Washington in May 1949. Soon, the VP was making regular commercial airline stops in St. Louis. They were married Nov. 18 at St. John’s Methodist Church, Kingshighway and Washington Boulevard. She wore light blue.
22 photo(s)
10/30/2010
Album ID: 1107300]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1097258&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 15 Oct 2010 00:00 CST
On Oct. 15, 1899, Allen Britt stumbled up the back staircase of a rooming house at 212 Targee Street, burst into girl friend Frankie Baker's apartment, threw an oil lamp and pulled a knife. She grabbed a .32-caliber pistol from beneath her pillow and fired a fatal shot. Songwriters turned Britt’s name to the catchier Johnny -- as in the ballad of "Frankie and Johnnie." The world knew he had done his woman wrong. ---by Tim O'Neil
13 photo(s)
10/15/2010
Album ID: 1097258]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1092643&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 08 Oct 2010 00:00 CST
On Oct. 9, 1939, St.Louis Mayor Bernard Dickmann took a crowbar to the corner of a crumbling two-story warehouse at 7 Market Street to begin clearing 486 buildings from the riverfront. The massive demolition to follow would make way for the Jefferson National Expansion Memorial and the Gateway Arch.
25 photo(s)
10/8/2010
Album ID: 1092643]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1087589&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 01 Oct 2010 00:00 CST
The bronze statue of King Louis IX (St. Louis), 13th century French king, saint and namesake of this region, has held its place of honor atop Art Hill since an unveiling ceremony on Oct. 4, 1906. The statue has served as a St. Louis landmark, popular meeting point and a target for creative vandals who liked to steal the King's sword. The statue was inspired by the popularity of a similar statue made of reinforced plaster that was outside the 1904 World's Fair at the main gate, at Lindell and Union boulevards.
13 photo(s)
10/1/2010
Album ID: 1087589]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1082758&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 24 Sep 2010 00:00 CST
In October 1816, Charles Lucas opposed fellow lawyer Thomas Hart Benton in a civil suit in St. Louis. They clashed in the courtroom, essentially calling each other liars. The contentious relationship lead them to Bloody Island for a duel. On Sept. 27, 1817 they met once again at Bloody Island for a second duel. Benton fired first, fatally wounding Lucas.
4 photo(s)
9/24/2010
Album ID: 1082758]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1076938&CategoryID=48250 Wed, 15 Sep 2010 00:00 CST
On Sept. 22, 1954, two inmates lured a guard into their cell, jumped him and took his keys. This was the beginning of what would be the worst riot ever at the penitentiary. Four inmates were killed, thirty-four inmates were wounded and four guards were injured. The prison closed in 2004. It had been there since 1836.
15 photo(s)
9/15/2010
Album ID: 1076938]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1073618&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 10 Sep 2010 00:00 CST
On Sept. 14, 1857, Henry Clay Sexton became St. Louis’ first fire chief (formally, "chief engineer") at a salary of $1,000. He had 30 employees and three steam fire engines. As the city grew in bounds, so did its fire department. In 1910, with the city population at 687,000, the department had 50 engines and 17 hook-and-ladder trucks.
15 photo(s)
9/10/2010
Album ID: 1073618]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1069068&CategoryID=48250 Sat, 04 Sep 2010 00:00 CST
By Tim O'Neil --- Workers opened the four lanes of their new Missouri River bridge in phases during the first week of September 1958. The bridge replaced a 1904-vintage span downriver that was overwhelmed by 16,000 vehicles daily. It opened the way for migration into St. Charles County and a clear drive across the state. At $8.5 million, the bridge was a key part of the Mark Twain Expressway, later called Interstate 70. The 24-mile, $97 million Mark Twain from downtown into St. Charles was the first spoke in the pinwheel of today’s regional system of superhighways.
21 photo(s)
9/4/2010
Album ID: 1069068]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1065014&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 27 Aug 2010 00:00 CST
The St. Louis Zoo's ever-popular Zooline entered the railroad business on Aug. 29, 1963, with a ceremony at the original station near the bear pits. Zoo director Marlin Perkins and Zoo board chairman Howard Baer whacked at a "golden spike" to complete the 1.5 mile loop of track.
19 photo(s)
8/27/2010
Album ID: 1065014]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1061137&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 20 Aug 2010 00:00 CST
On a hot Aug. 22, 1848 Julia Dent married Lt. Ulysses S. Grant in her family's city residence at 701 South Fourth Street.
12 photo(s)
8/20/2010
Album ID: 1061137]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1057485&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 13 Aug 2010 00:00 CST
"Lie-ins" at downtown East St. Louis financial institutions took place in August of 1963. On Aug. 15, more than 200 chanting protesters entered First National, lay down and sang, "We shall not be removed." Police commandeered a passing Bi-State bus to haul people to jail.
25 photo(s)
8/13/2010
Album ID: 1057485]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1053723&CategoryID=48250 Thu, 05 Aug 2010 00:00 CST
On election day, Aug. 7, 1854 riots rocked the Irish 5th ward, spilling out into other St. Louis areas with Irish residents. Battles ranged as far west as Franklin and Eighth streets, now part of the America's Center convention hall.
4 photo(s)
8/5/2010
Album ID: 1053723]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1049624&CategoryID=48250 Sat, 31 Jul 2010 00:00 CST
The Great Flood of 1993 damaged or destroyed 55,000 homes and killed 50 people in the Midwest, most of them in vehicles that became trapped in high water or flash floods. The Mississippi crested at St. Louis on Aug. 1, rising halfway up the grand staircase at the Arch and almost 20 feet over flood stage -- six feet higher than the formerly great flood of 1973. The Mississippi remained above flood stage for five months.
28 photo(s)
7/31/2010
Album ID: 1049624]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1045829&CategoryID=48250 Sat, 24 Jul 2010 00:00 CST
On July 23, 1953, St. Louis'' first integrated public housing, Igoe, accepted its first four white and three black families. Between it and Pruitt, which housed black families, there were 33 eleven-story buildings for 2868 low-income families, with monthly rent beginning at $20. Pruitt-Igoe was blown up less than 20 years later.
22 photo(s)
7/24/2010
Album ID: 1045829]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1041596&CategoryID=48250 Sat, 10 Jul 2010 00:00 CST
SS Andrea Doria,after striking the MS Stockholm off the coast of Nantucket, MA on July 25, 1956.
2 photo(s)
7/10/2010
Album ID: 1041596]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1034979&CategoryID=48250 Sat, 03 Jul 2010 00:00 CST
Forest Park became a home to popular golf course in 1912.
18 photo(s)
7/3/2010
Album ID: 1034979]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1030797&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 25 Jun 2010 00:00 CST
The St. Louis Ordnance Plant made 6.7 billion cartridges during World War II, but work for the 16,000 employees ended on June 27, 1945, as the war wound down. Production resumed during the Korean and Vietnam wars. Today, 2,000 employees of Social Security, Veterans Affairs and other federal agencies have offices in some the old Ordnance Plant buildings.
36 photo(s)
6/25/2010
Album ID: 1030797]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1026084&CategoryID=48250 Thu, 17 Jun 2010 00:00 CST
Homer G. Phillips moved to St. Louis after World’s Fair and became prominent in civil rights and politics. He was murdered in 1931, and the Board of Aldermen voted quickly to name the new black hospital in his memory.
7 photo(s)
6/17/2010
Album ID: 1026084]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1022564&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 11 Jun 2010 00:00 CST
On June 14, 1917, the Army Signal Corps signed a lease on 624 acres near Belleville to construct one of nine new U.S. bases to train aviators. Thus began Scott Air Force Base, the nation’s fifth oldest continuously operating military flying field.
20 photo(s)
6/11/2010
Album ID: 1022564]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1017404&CategoryID=48250 Thu, 03 Jun 2010 00:00 CST
In 1959, Robert Tomarchin sold the St. Louis Zoo a chimp, but had second thoughts. He broke into the zoo, busted “Mr. Moke” out and took him on the lam.
12 photo(s)
6/3/2010
Album ID: 1017404]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1001892&CategoryID=48250 Tue, 18 May 2010 00:00 CST
A Coast Guard inspector’s hammer had punched a hole through the hull of the S.S. Admiral, and there would be no more cruises for the beloved St. Louis riverboat.
20 photo(s)
5/18/2010
Album ID: 1001892]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=1004444&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 14 May 2010 00:00 CST
As St. Louis plans to fill in the tunnel that runs under Tucker Blvd., we take a look back at the massive undertaking it took to dig the tunnel in 1931. The Illinois Terminal Railroad ran commuter and cargo trains from Alton, Edwardsville, Granite City and other communities across McKinley Bridge.
8 photo(s)
5/14/2010
Album ID: 1004444]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=999086&CategoryID=48250 Thu, 06 May 2010 00:00 CST
On May 8, 1900, streetcar workers voted to strike against the St. Louis Transit Co. When the strike ended four months later, 14 people had been killed. It would take 18 years and another strike for streetcar workers to win union recognition.
10 photo(s)
5/6/2010
Album ID: 999086]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=991296&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 30 Apr 2010 00:00 CST
On Saturday, April 30, 1904, the earlybirds filed through the turnstiles to St. Louis’ World Fair in Forest Park. When it closed seven months later, about 20 million people had passed through those gates to view the wonders of the Louisiana Purchase Exposition.
31 photo(s)
4/30/2010
Album ID: 991296]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=986516&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 23 Apr 2010 00:00 CST
Dr. Isaac Kelley Jr., a prominent St. Louis surgeon was kidnapped, and his captors later released him to a Post-Dispatch reporter. The case remained unsolved for nearly three years.
14 photo(s)
4/23/2010
Album ID: 986516]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=975632&CategoryID=48250 Tue, 06 Apr 2010 00:00 CST
This week five finalists are announced to design the Gateway Arch grounds of the Jefferson National Expansion Memorial. As this process starts to, we take a look back at the origins of this favorite St. Louis landmark.
15 photo(s)
4/6/2010
Album ID: 975632]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=969202&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 26 Mar 2010 00:00 CST
A replica of Christopher Columbus’ sailing ship, the Santa Maria, arrived in downtown St. Louis on March 29, 1969. The vessel was to be another nod to the city’s brief history as a Spanish colony two centuries ago. Just one month later, a wild thunderstorm roared through St. Louis with tornadoes, 70 mph winds and two inches of rain. The storm broke the moorings of the Santa Maria and the old Becky Thatcher restaurant boat, carrying the boats two miles downstream. They crashed against a dock on the Illinois bank, and the Santa Maria sank like a tub.
18 photo(s)
3/26/2010
Album ID: 969202]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=960589&CategoryID=48250 Thu, 11 Mar 2010 00:00 CST
“Holy Joe” Folk was a reform-minded lawyer who became St. Louis’ city circuit attorney in 1900, later convicting party boss Edward Butler who helped elect him. Folk also served as Missouri’s governor from 1905-1909.
9 photo(s)
3/11/2010
Album ID: 960589]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=876707&CategoryID=48250 Wed, 10 Mar 2010 00:00 CST
Prior to its days as the home of the President Casino, the Admiral Riverboat was a St. Louis fixture from 1940 through the '70's.
39 photo(s)
3/10/2010
Album ID: 876707]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=956222&CategoryID=48250 Thu, 04 Mar 2010 00:00 CST
Emerson Electric workers voted to abolish their “house union” in 1937, and their new union held at “sit-down” strike for 53 days at the motor plant at 2018 Washington.
21 photo(s)
3/4/2010
Album ID: 956222]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=956572&CategoryID=48250 Thu, 04 Mar 2010 00:00 CST
Since 2003, volunteer workers have been rehabilitating an old building on the grounds of Jefferson Barracks in south county with plans to open a Missouri Civil War Museum in the spring of 2011.
18 photo(s)
3/4/2010
Album ID: 956572]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=946103&CategoryID=48250 Wed, 17 Feb 2010 00:00 CST
Parents of five black public school students went to court on Feb. 17, 1972, alleging that their schools were inferior to those in white neighborhoods. Thus begat Liddell v. Board of Education
19 photo(s)
2/17/2010
Album ID: 946103]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=942681&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 12 Feb 2010 00:00 CST
In pain from heart disease and gout, August A. Busch Sr. took his life on Feb. 13, 1934. He had been president of Anheuser-Busch Inc. since 1913, managing the company’s survival through the anti-German bias of World War I and Prohibition. Thousands of mourners, from senators to brewers, lined up outside the mansion to view the bronze casket, blanketed with lilies of the valley. Busch had directed that he be buried in Sunset Burial Park, within sight of Grant’s Farm.
5 photo(s)
2/12/2010
Album ID: 942681]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=938445&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 05 Feb 2010 00:00 CST
As St. Louis’ first trained pilot, aviation pioneer Albert Bond Lambert was part of a group that established the Kinloch flying field in northwest St. Louis County. He later became the owner, and sold it to the city on Feb. 8, 1928. The purchase was the beginning of today's Lambert-St. Louis International Airport, named in his honor.
26 photo(s)
2/5/2010
Album ID: 938445]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=925762&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 15 Jan 2010 00:00 CST
The early years the Cold War were long and nerve-wracking, and Americans were sure the Soviet nuclear threat would have arrive by airplane. At schools and businesses, students and workers dutifully practiced by gathering in hallways and crouching upon floors, covering their heads with their hands.
19 photo(s)
1/15/2010
Album ID: 925762]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=921866&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 08 Jan 2010 00:00 CST
On Jan. 10, 1962, a grain-dust explosion in Ralston’s mill shattered the mill, at Seventh and Gratiot streets, and started a fire that raced through the Checkerboard Square complex, killing two Ralston employees. Temperatures were bitterly cold, right around zero.
12 photo(s)
1/8/2010
Album ID: 921866]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=918017&CategoryID=48250 Thu, 31 Dec 2009 00:00 CST
During the Great Depression, more than 5,000 homeless settled on a stretch of the Mississippi River in downtown St. Louis, living in shacks of crate wood, scraps of sheet metal and canvas.
21 photo(s)
12/31/2009
Album ID: 918017]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=916365&CategoryID=48250 Wed, 30 Dec 2009 00:00 CST
From the economy to military funerals to giant pencils and the inauguration of the 44th president, 2009 made for quite a varied photographic year.
26 photo(s)
12/30/2009
Album ID: 916365]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=900767&CategoryID=48250 Tue, 29 Dec 2009 00:00 CST
As we close out the decade we take a look back at the 2000s. We start with a look at our coverage of how St. Louis rolled in the century.
35 photo(s)
12/29/2009
Album ID: 900767]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=911028&CategoryID=48250 Tue, 22 Dec 2009 00:00 CST
When baby boomers were youngsters, downtown St. Louis was a Christmas wonderland. The three main department stores competed against each other with bright busy displays in their streetside windows.
25 photo(s)
12/22/2009
Album ID: 911028]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=906506&CategoryID=48250 Thu, 10 Dec 2009 00:00 CST
Opening in 1937, he Homer G. Hospital Hospital for Colored was a towering symbol of pride for St. Louis’ black community, but by the 1970’s there were stirrings at City Hall to close Homer G. and consolidate care at City Hospital, where most of the patients also were black. Each time, black political leaders would block the idea. But hospital costs kept rising.
23 photo(s)
12/10/2009
Album ID: 906506]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=896392&CategoryID=48250 Wed, 25 Nov 2009 00:00 CST
“Black Tuesday” hit St. Louis on Nov. 28, 1939, as the worst of many smoke-choked days in what was to be the city’s smokiest cold-weather season. The city was already known for the nation’s filthiest air.
25 photo(s)
11/25/2009
Album ID: 896392]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=892646&CategoryID=48250 Thu, 19 Nov 2009 00:00 CST
Dedicated on Jan 20, 1917, St. Louis’ MacArthur Bridge was originally called the Municipal Bridge, or the “free bridge”. Construction began in 1907, and it cost more than $10 million to complete.
20 photo(s)
11/19/2009
Album ID: 892646]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=888496&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 13 Nov 2009 00:00 CST
By Tim O'Neil---On Nov. 14, 1936, the dedication took place of the St. Louis Floral Conservatory in Forest Park, already going by its enduring nickname, the Jewel Box. It would become the settings for thousands of weddings, parties and wildly popular annual displays for Easter and Christmas. And it would become a favorite retreat offering the tranquilty of tropical plants, bounties of flowers and the soft bubbling of the waterfall.
26 photo(s)
11/13/2009
Album ID: 888496]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=883035&CategoryID=48250 Tue, 10 Nov 2009 00:00 CST
During Sesame Street's first season in 1970, Post-Dispatch photographer Paul Berg visited the New York set. In March 1971, Sesame Street actors Bob (Bob McGrath) and Susan (Loretta Long) visited St. Louis children at the KETC television studios.
13 photo(s)
11/10/2009
Album ID: 883035]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=877154&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 30 Oct 2009 00:00 CST
Two days after the 1948 election, at St. Louis’ Union Station, President Harry Truman held up a copy of the previous day’s newspaper, and a famous photograph was made. Truman had surprised everyone with a victory over his Republican challenger, Thomas E. Dewey.
5 photo(s)
10/30/2009
Album ID: 877154]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=872146&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 23 Oct 2009 00:00 CST
Historical photos of the construction and early days of the Gateway Arch, one of the world’s most recognizable landmarks. Completed on October 28, 1967, the monument to western expansion was a creation by architect Eero Saarinen.
44 photo(s)
10/23/2009
Album ID: 872146]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=865868&CategoryID=48250 Thu, 15 Oct 2009 00:00 CST
On Oct. 16, 1931, workers inside the new Bagnell Dam flipped switches to run current from its big hydroelectric generators. High-power lines strung through dense, hilly forests carried power to a big feeder station in Wellston and to present-day Park Hills, in Missouri’s old Lead Belt. Back then, Union Electric Light and Power Co.’s dam on the Osage River was hailed for its power to make electricity. A few rough fishing camps popped up along the dam’s creation, the Lake of the Ozarks. But it would take almost three decades to turn the 60,000-acre reservoir into a bustling summertime playground.
19 photo(s)
10/15/2009
Album ID: 865868]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=860234&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 09 Oct 2009 00:00 CST
By early October 1963, demonstrations at Jefferson Bank & Trust had gone on for more than a month. Civil-rights groups demanded that the bank, with only two black employees, hire four more for office jobs. It was a year of civil-rights actions across the country, and the Jefferson Bank protests endure as the most significant local event in the modern civil-rights era.
17 photo(s)
10/9/2009
Album ID: 860234]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=842577&CategoryID=48250 Tue, 22 Sep 2009 00:00 CST
Bobby Greenlease Jr.’s kidnapping and murder in 1953 was one of the most sensational crimes in Missouri in the 20th Century. His killers, Carl Austin Hall and Bonnie Brown Heady, were captured in St. Louis, and were executed 81 days after their crime. Two St. Louis police officers went to prison over the mysterious disappearance of half of the ransom money.
27 photo(s)
9/22/2009
Album ID: 842577]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=839984&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 18 Sep 2009 00:00 CST
Frontiersman Daniel Boone moved from the crowds in Kentucky to St. Charles County, Missouri, where he lived for over 20 years before dying on Sept. 26, 1820. An explorer, legislator, militia officer, surveyor and Indian fighter, Boone’s story was a mixture of folklore and robust deeds.
16 photo(s)
9/18/2009
Album ID: 839984]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=838969&CategoryID=48250 Thu, 17 Sep 2009 00:00 CST
Ford Motor Co. opened their new $12 million plant in Hazelwood on Sept. 20, 1948, as part of Ford’s muscular post-war expansion. By the time Benson Ford, 29-year-old grandson of the Ford Motor Co.’s legendary founder, arrived for the formal dedication, the plant’s workers already had begun making 1949 Mercurys.
24 photo(s)
9/17/2009
Album ID: 838969]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=834210&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 11 Sep 2009 00:00 CST
In September 1962, the United States was in space but still trailing the Soviet Union. President Kennedy dropped by McDonnell Aircraft Corp. in north St. Louis County "to see some of the hardware the dollars are buying." McDonnell was building both the Mercury capsules already in use by America’s first astronauts and the untested two-seat Gemini capsules, the next U.S. hot rod in the space race.
17 photo(s)
9/11/2009
Album ID: 834210]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=828852&CategoryID=48250 Thu, 03 Sep 2009 00:00 CST
On Sept. 7, 1982, Fox Theatre in midtown celebrated their grand reopening. The lavish old movie palace underwent a $3.6 million renovation, making it the catalyst for a rejuvenated Grand Avenue district.
12 photo(s)
9/3/2009
Album ID: 828852]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=819928&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 21 Aug 2009 00:00 CST
On Aug. 22, 1876, voters in St. Louis city and county went to the polls to decide the region’s most fateful ballot question -- the "Great Divorce," or whether to split the city away from the county.
9 photo(s)
8/21/2009
Album ID: 819928]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=814560&CategoryID=48250 Wed, 12 Aug 2009 00:00 CST
9,000 people rallied in the old St. Louis Municipal Auditorium (site of the Scottrade Center) against defense plants that refused to hire black Americans in the war effort.
4 photo(s)
8/12/2009
Album ID: 814560]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=810355&CategoryID=48250 Wed, 05 Aug 2009 00:00 CST
The Mill Creek Valley area, dating back to 1765, was home to nearly 20,000 people living in 5600 homes. In 1954, when Mayor Raymond Tucker announced plans to demolish the tenements, it would become the city’s biggest urban-renewal project and, for a time, the largest in the nation.
13 photo(s)
8/5/2009
Album ID: 810355]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=802872&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 24 Jul 2009 00:00 CST
In 1877, the fourth year of a depression, an east coast wildcat railroad strike spread quickly, turning violent along the way. It reached the bustling yards of East St. Louis on July 22. Marchers inspired spontaneous walkouts at foundries, stove works, canneries and barrel factories. Deckhands and roustabouts abandoned steamboats. Newsboys quit selling papers. Union Depot, the city’s train station, "was like a banquet hall deserted. The protest blossomed into a general strike, paralyzing the city’s industry and commerce. Some historians say it was the biggest of its sort ever in America. And no one was killed here
6 photo(s)
7/24/2009
Album ID: 802872]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=798106&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 17 Jul 2009 00:00 CST
The Expressway Highway opened on July 19, 1937, at a cost of $3 million. The highway, which eventually would become part of Highway 40, ran from Kingshighway to Vandeventer, connecting it to the year-old section that already ran through Forest Park to Skinker Boulevard at Hi-Pointe.
6 photo(s)
7/17/2009
Album ID: 798106]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=794396&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 10 Jul 2009 00:00 CST
The summer of 1954 saw temperatures climb to 115 degrees in St. Louis. A week-long heat wave beginning July 14 took 104 lives.
6 photo(s)
7/10/2009
Album ID: 794396]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=785224&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 26 Jun 2009 00:00 CST
Although The Cathedral Basilica of Saint Louis was completed in 1914, it was not consecrated until June 29, 1926. Also known as the “New Cathedral”, the building was designated a basilica by Pope John Paul II on April 4, 1997. Pope John Paul prayed and delivered a speech at the Cathedral during his St. Louis visit in January of 1999.
14 photo(s)
6/26/2009
Album ID: 785224]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=765878&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 29 May 2009 00:00 CST
Browse through some collected images from the garden's past. See photos for Henry Shaw, the Palm House and historical moments.
14 photo(s)
5/29/2009
Album ID: 765878]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=731948&CategoryID=48250 Tue, 14 Apr 2009 00:00 CST
In two months, the St. Louis Blues stormed back from 15th place in the Western Conference to the sixth seed in the NHL 2009 Stanley Cup playoffs. Here's a gallery of key wins that put the 'Note back in the playoffs.
8 photo(s)
4/14/2009
Album ID: 731948]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=729356&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 10 Apr 2009 00:00 CST
The new Planetarium in Forest Park formally opened April 16, 1963. The first show was called "New Skies for St. Louis."
18 photo(s)
4/10/2009
Album ID: 729356]]> http://stltoday.mycapture.com/mycapture/folder.asp?event=686847&CategoryID=48250 Fri, 06 Feb 2009 00:00 CST
Eight people died in a tornado that ripped through St. Louis in February of 1959.
17 photo(s)
2/6/2009
Album ID: 686847]]>