'You Are in Dutchtown': The many architectural styles of the Southside

Cleveland High School was a masterpiece, but the everyday houses are what make the neighborhood special.

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Dutchtown is one of the archetypal neighborhoods in St. Louis. It seems like everyone has heard of it, many people have roots in it, and few who do not or did not grow up within its boundaries truly understand it. It's one of the largest and most densely populated neighborhoods in St. Louis, and its past and future are critical to the overall health of the Southside. Even people who do not live in Dutchtown should care about what happens in this neighborhood due to its location right in the middle of the city.

The neighborhood's boundaries are a little hazy, depending on who you ask. The official City of St. Louis considers Dutchtown much smaller than anyone who grew up there recognizes and carves off a chunk for the Mount Pleasant neighborhood. The iconic “You are in Dutchtown” signs, which you’ll find around the Southside east of Grand Boulevard, generally place the boundaries as Chippewa dog-legging up Compton to Utah on the north, the Mississippi River on the east, Walsh and Eichelberger on the South, and the Missouri Pacific Railroad tracks on the west (which went out of business in 1982). DutchtownStL.org, however, considers the modern city neighborhoods of Gravois Park, Marine Villa, Mount Pleasant, and Dutchtown to all be part of the “Greater Dutchtown” area.

What I love about the neighborhood is the amazing diversity laid down on what is basically a rigid and standardized street grid; there are only a couple of major streets that break the repetitive rectangular blocks that march south ignoring the gentle rolling hills in what was once the St. Louis Common Fields. And here and there are larger blocks that point back to earlier institutions that once anchored the neighborhood.

The largest break in the street grid is the former home of what was originally Maryville Academy, which sits at the corner of Meramec and Nebraska. The post office, built on one corner of the grounds, retains the name and memory of the former occupant. Founded in 1872 by the Society of the Sacred Heart, an advertisement in The Missouri Republican on August 21, 1872, announced its new location in what was then out in the country (Compton and Dry’s 1876 Pictorial St. Louis barely fit the northern part of Dutchtown into its publication). A 10-month session was $250, which was a good sum of money at the time, and applicants were to apply with the Mother Superior. Languages, including French, music, and painting were all part of the curriculum.

To the west are the spires of St. Antony of Padua Roman Catholic Church, which still anchors the corner of Meramec and South Compton Avenue. Restored after a fire, the church is also linked to a Franciscan monastery on site. As is common in St. Louis, there was originally another church on the site, but what is interesting in this instance was its architect being a Franciscan brother, Adrian Wewer. When the current church was built, another Franciscan brother, Anselm Wolff, provided the design in German and Italian Romanesque Revival style. But as I’ve often mentioned about St. Louis architecture, there is a certain flair and “breaking of the rules” in Brother Wolff’s church: The nave is far too wide, bright and airy, and the windows are too large to have been a Medieval church. We can tell that modern technology, such as steel or iron trusses, have cured some of the original defects of the Romanesque style. It is a beautiful church, and its presence, spotted through the trees and houses of the Southside is an inspiring sight.

Heading down Virginia Avenue, once known as Stringtown Road and one of the few streets to break the grid, the back of Cleveland High School appears. The large parcels of land on the west side of Virginia Avenue allowed for the building of large Italianate villas, such as the Villa Padua, demolished for Cleveland. A photograph of the Barnard Residence below, at the corner of Virginia and Meramec, gives an idea of the opulence of these country homes. Cleveland High School was one of William B. Ittner’s masterpieces, wedding the beauty of English Tudor schools with modern American technology when it opened in 1915. It sits empty, and was the victim of several fires.

Those landmarks are certainly part of Dutchtown, but the houses where everyday people live, for me, are what make the neighborhood special. The majority of the building stock dates from around the first decades of the 20th century, but there are some interesting exceptions. Here and there, you can spot an old Greek Revival country house, with its center hall floorplan. These are incredibly rare houses, and it is all the more amazing that they have survived. They can be spotted due to their front porches resembling a Greek temple front and symmetrical design.

But some of my favorite houses are the one-story houses, with their elaborate cast iron cornices. I learned from an older Dutchtown resident that he helped his father make these during the winter, and then builders would pick up and install them in the spring as bricklaying and construction started up again in warmer temperatures. These one-story houses are deceptively large; they’re economical, and they have a strong sense of architectural finesse to them, even for relatively inexpensive houses. There are thousands and thousands of these houses in Dutchtown and the rest of South St. Louis, and instead of being boring, the imagination and creativity of the bricklayers gave the façades of each house individuality in the red, tan, or buff brick.

Finally, I spotted these two-family apartments one day. I was struck at just how much thought and work had been put into the design and construction of what are rental properties. This brought me back to my original thought about diversity in Dutchtown: There are mansions sitting right next to apartments buildings, large houses right next to small houses. The beauty of Dutchtown is not just in its rich history, but in how its built environment encourages a strong sense of community across social classes—if we are willing to see it.

Chris Naffziger works as the archives researcher in the office of the Recorder of Deeds of the City of St. Louis. His email is naffzigerc@stlouis-mo.gov.

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