Capturing the City: Photographs from the Streets of St. Louis, 1900–1930 (Missouri History Museum/University of Chicago Press, 2016).
“Street photography” is synonymous with Henri Cartier-Bresson, Vivian Maier, and Weegee—lone artists haunting the sidewalks of big cities in search of the shocking, strange, violent, or grimily beautiful.
This is street photography of another short: In the early 20th century, Charles Clement Holt of the St. Louis Streets Department sent out a corps of photographers to document civic projects, such as the spraying of dirt roads with water, or the installation of natural gas lines. At the project’s peak, in 1916, the city’s photographers took 6,000 images in one year. The initiative lasted through 1930, yet only 300 of the images survive, thanks to one observant city historian who managed to save a few boxes of glass negatives. At first, that doesn’t sound so sad, because who would find street maintenance shots compelling? But along with the digging and the spraying, the photographers caught 30 years of life in motion during a time of profound change in St. Louis. We see barefoot, grubby kids in tenement courtyards; bored-looking businessmen strolling under burlesque marquees; teamsters driving horse-drawn ash wagons; piles of trash that look awfully charming compared to today’s refuse; filigreed cigar billboards; shy faces caught through the screen doors of groceries and taverns; and neighborhood streets that are shocking either in their familiarity or their alien-ness, depending on the shot.
In addition to the photos—which are all fascinating to look at and often as artful as a Brassaï shot—the book provides a clear, lyrical text, written by historian Joseph Heathcott and MoHist’s own Angela Dietz. Not only do they explain to the reader what they are seeing and why it’s important, they also do an elegant job of deciphering phenomenon peculiar to the era (the noxious health hazard known as the “privy vault” being just one example). You can meet the authors at 7 p.m. September 15 when they visit the St. Louis County Library Headquarters (1640 S. Lindbergh), and a companion exhibit of the same name is on view at the museum through January 22. For more information, go to mohistory.org.
