A photo expedition to St. Louis' venerable College Hill neighborhood

The architecture's a historic mix, though much of it's been abandoned or vandalized--and the water towers stand guard, and the Pink Sisters pray.

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Once a month I participate in Photo Flood, the creation of Jason Gray, who provides many of the amazing shots for my articles on historic breweries and other buildings around St. Louis. For the last half decade, we’ve been going through each of the City of St. Louis’ 79 official neighborhoods, taking photographs for two hours and dining at a local restaurant afterward. In February, it was College Hill’s turn. Gray prefers the golden, clear morning light of the winter, so Saturday morning, we got started at 7:15, reaching the North Side neighborhood before the atmosphere began to cloud up. An inch of snow had covered the ground, creating opportunities for striking imagery.

Not all readers will be familiar with the College Hill neighborhood, but they’ll certainly recognize some of the landmarks of this small quarter of the city, bounded by Ferry Street on the south, I-70 on the east, Warne Avenue on the north, and West Florissant Avenue on the west. The Grand and Bissell Water Towers anchor the large southern hill, which is bisected by East Grand Boulevard, and at the other end of the neighborhood, cutting through what I call the East Prairie Avenue Valley, rises the northern hill, where Mount Grace Convent sits. The name College Hill comes from Saint Louis University’s old farm, which once lay on southern slope of the northern hill, looking down on East Prairie Avenue. Some of the original parcels of land from the farm remain intact, never subdivided into individual lots.

College Hill also features some important names in St. Louis history. To the north was John O’Fallon’s farm, which became the eponymous park. Its rugged contours remind me of the lay of the land before the extensive grading mellowed the earth’s original surface. Just to the east of the Bissell Water Tower is the Lewis Bissell House, one of the oldest houses in the city, and certainly one of the earliest built of brick. A building at the corner of East Grand and Blair, owned by a non-profit in Florida, is the old Jewish Orthodox Old Folks Home. It’s been stripped of its windows, damaged by fire, and covered by graffiti.

Major landmarks always interest historians, but what also draws my attention are those buildings that “don’t belong.” What I find fascinating about College Hill’s architecture is how varied it is. While many neighborhoods in St. Louis have an odd house here or there built much earlier or later than the rest, College Hill has a mix of houses on every block. It developed slowly, over the course of decades, so I found myself walking down streets with houses that date back to 1870—and others built in 1950. Rarely did I find more than two or three houses of the same architectural style right next to each other.

Even more interesting are the clusters of houses of similar age and style. As many people involved in St. Louis history know, laws against wood frame construction required brick instead, so I was intrigued to find two clusters of houses in frank violation of that building code: one around West Florissant on DeSoto, another on Conde Street at College Street. Most likely, these wood frame houses were built out in the country before the area was annexed by the City of St. Louis—which poses the question “Why are they here?” In parts of South St. Louis, for example at Compton Avenue and Walsh Street, there was a large quarry nearby, but on DeSoto, Compton and Dry’s pictorial history gives us no clues about this little settlement. The same goes for the mysterious clump of old wood houses on Conde Street.

Architectural intrigue is all well and good, but the other purpose of Photo Flood is to get out and talk to people in all parts of St. Louis. We met several College Hill residents in front of their houses, warming up their cars or shoveling their sidewalks. People are always friendly to me in North St. Louis, and they enjoy talking about to me about the architecture of their houses, how long they’ve lived in their home, etc. They also are blunt and honest about the challenges facing their community.

College Hill faces severe abandonment, crime, and disinvestment. Between Grand and DeSoto, most of the houses are vacant, and I’d estimate that well over half of the properties are vacant lots. There are no convenience stores, and curbside memorials mark the location of murders. A quick perusal of the internet reveals stories from around the globe calling College Hill one of the most dangerous neighborhoods in the United States, elaborating that assertion with tales of mayhem and violence. These accounts rarely mention all the good people I met, working and living and trying to make their community better.

I think about the owner of Fresno’s Diner, right on the curve of the roundabout that circles the Grand Water Tower. The St. Louis Post-Dispatch covered the travails of her attempts to operate the only restaurant in College Hill, only to have her business hit by an out-of-control automobile that smashed a hole in the side of her building. I stopped in for lunch last year, and the food was delicious; I hope to go back again soon.

One place that is still holding on is Mount Grace Convent. Even if you’re not Roman Catholic—or particularly religious—this is a place you need to visit. Well, the only part you can visit is the first half of the chapel, which is open to the public, because the Sisters of Perpetual Adoration are cloistered, meaning they cannot have direct contact with the outside world. We found them in the middle of their 8:30 a.m. service, dressed in their pink habits and singing in their small but clear and confident voices. I enjoy coming here every so often, to witness a counterpoint to the arrogance and vanity so common in the world today.

Grace Hill Settlement House, the For the Sake of All team, and a group of College Hill residents came together last year with a new initiative to tackle the challenges their community is facing. They, along with all the other faithful residents, have refused to give up on this corner of St. Louis. As the Better Together discussion and the citywide March primaries heat up, I wonder what the leaders of St. Louis will have to offer the beautiful people and buildings of College Hill.

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