IT ALL STARTED WHEN THEY BURIED the River des Peres. First, they took the Forest Park section underground to make room for the World’s Fair. But in 1915, a flood of slimy, gray water convinced the city to bury another 18 miles of the river, and soon a giant concrete tunnel had to be built to keep sewage from seeping into the park. It was an engineering coup, but it cut the park’s lakes and lagoons off from each other, leaving them to stagnate, scum over with algae, and slurp away their banks.
Over the next six decades, the surrounding land grew more crowded, less serenely beautiful. Designed for carriage rides and picnics, Forest Park’s winding roads were now crumbling and clogged with traffic, its streetlights broken, its shadowy glens hide-outs for drug deals and illicit sex. Alarmed, civic leaders wrought consensus from a series of community meetings in the mid-’90s. John Hoal, a determined architect from South Africa, took calm charge of the master plan. He started by layering transparent sheets that mapped terrain, land use, the original River des Peres course, and the changes over the years. Instantly, it became obvious: The park needed a waterway again. And doing it right would cost a pretty penny.
Forest Park Forever threw itself into fundraising, the city issued bonds, voters approved a sales tax—all told, St. Louis raised $102.6 million, setting a national record for urban-park renovation. By 2004, a century of wear and tear had been cleared away, and the park looked new again. In an exuberant bulb blitz, volunteers planted 27,800 perennials in four days.
Today, the Grand Basin at the foot of Art Hill looks like something you’d see in Paris; The Boathouse feels like summer in Maine. Instead of manicured artifice, there’s nature—artfully designed. Breezes ruffle tall native grasses around Pagoda Island. A long waterway curves past prairie and savannah, around Picnic Island, under arched wooden footbridges, through wetlands. Flat rocks create weirs—natural dams—and the water riffles, glides, cascades, flows into the next lake or lagoon.
Everything is connected again. Shrubs and flowers are native to Missouri, so they flourish. Yells from the handball courts or ball fields are balanced by places of utter quiet or gentle romance; the bustle of the museums by lone cyclists and the college kids who study by the waterfall. The institutions aren’t at odds with the surrounding landscape; the park’s surprises continue a visitor’s experience of science, art, history, zoology, or horticulture. Graffiti and trash are no longer a scourge; the park’s users are fiercely protective.
For good reason.
Playing Statues
Forest Park memorializes everyone from a crusader king (Louis IX on Art Hill) to a real-estate developer (Nathan Frank Bandstand on Pagoda Island) to a couple who fell in love at the World’s Fair (the Adolf and Annie Schermer bench at the Grand Basin). But don’t miss the subtler tributes…
To agility: The neoclassical Friedrich Jahn Memorial hides among the trees at the eastern foot of Art Hill, honoring “the father of gymnastics.”
To joy: When Jacques Lipchitz’ sister fell ill, he softened and created “La Joie de Vivre,” all ribbons and curves in place of his earlier Cubist angles. It faces the skaters as they glide around Steinberg Skating Rink.
To paradox: The Frank Blair statue at Lindell & Kingshighway praises the U.S. senator for keeping St. Louis from joining the Confederacy; one block west, a bronze angel blesses the Confederacy.
To sheer irony: Gentle St. Francis of Assisi, outside of the Jewel Box, honors Harry Turner, a race-car driver accused of spying, forgery, and mailing obscene literature. The statue was bestowed on the park by Alice Martin Turner, his second wife and partner in crime.
Did You Know…
…the cannon near Lindell Boulevard in Forest Park was intended to grace St. Louis’ [Admiral George] Dewey Day celebration in 1900? Nobody else did either. Volunteer “Big Fred” Ruhrwien got so tired of people asking him for information about the mysterious cannon, he started combing archives himself. Went to the Spanish consulate. Interviewed historians and cannon makers all over the country. Turns out the cannon, forged in 1783 in Mexico City, sat locked in a warehouse until the
St. Louis Post-Dispatch wrote a tongue-in-cheek plea for reprieve (in the voice of the cannon).
