The Landmarks of Hyde Park: Preserving History and a Sense of Place

Landmarks are what make a great city. From the Gateway Arch, to Union Station, to Soulard Market, great works of architecture give us a collective sense of place and identity. While many famous buildings present an overall civic image to the world, the local landmarks, the ones sometimes known only to neighborhood residents, are just as fascinating. Take Hyde Park, at the foot of the McKinley Bridge. Like much of the North Side, the neighborhood possesses a wealth of landmarks, some still standing proud, while others are slipping away into oblivion.

Originally founded north of the city of St. Louis as the town of Bremen, Hyde Park sits on gently rolling hills that rise up to the College Hill neighborhood. Over the decades of the 19th century, sleepy Bremen saw the construction of hundreds of houses, some humble and some very elaborate, such as those along North Park Place. Industry provided jobs to the local population, and companies such as Mallinckrodt still operate nearby on the North Riverfront. Other industries, such as meat packing and stone quarries, thrived in what became Hyde Park. And finally, grand churches sprang up along major thoroughfares as the population expanded.

Holy Trinity Roman Catholic Church might be the most visible landmark in Hyde Park. Sitting along I-70, the Gothic Revival church, built in 1899, still holds services; its congregation has shrunk, but it holds on, even as thousands of commuters speed by. To the west, the red brick and terracotta Bethlehem Lutheran church stood at the corner of Salisbury and North Florissant since 1895; it finally succumbed to demolition in the summer of 2014. Long a landmark on a hill above North City, a piece of the landscape is now gone. But another church, the former Friedens Church, still stands around the corner at Newhouse and 19th Streets.

Krey Meat Packing on North Florissant rivaled the more famous packing houses in National City. The sheer size of the plant becomes evident when looking at the complex from a block away. There were other smaller slaughter houses in Hyde Park, and even into the 20th century, cattle would occasionally escape, running wild in the neighborhood. One former resident remembers looking out the window of her family store and seeing the glass steam up from an errant bull’s breath. Krey closed in 1978, not without deep resentment; it now slowly rots away.

Hyde Park itself has sat in the middle of the neighborhood since the 19th century. Surrounded by mostly intact houses, the park saw history unfold during the Civil War. On July 4, 1863, four Union soldiers and two fairgoers died during a riot that exploded out of the wartime tensions in the city. Several blocks north, Windsor Park holds a secret beneath its grounds: the former site of the Perkinson Quarry saw the mining of limestone before its abandonment and conversion into green space.

Near Windsor Park, Onions Market anchored the corner of Blair and Penrose from 1947 to 1962. For many people, favorite corner stores are as memorable landmarks as any church or packing plant. Now torn down for a vacant lot, the market’s memory is rapidly fading from the collective memory of the neighborhood.

Fraternal organizations, such as the Nord St. Louis Turnverein, are another example of landmarks that are rapidly fading. Having sat vacant for years, the Turners’ Hall, as most locals called it, was severely damaged by a fire in 2006 caused by fireworks. Built in the 1870s onwards in several expansions, only the gymnasium remains standing, knocking another hole in the streetscape of Salisbury.

Finally, landmarks that might escape casual viewing: the houses where people lived for generations. Two examples show the potential, and the tragic loss of the homes of the residents of Hyde Park. The first, along Bremen Avenue, there is a long row of houses with generous front lawns, which clearly once held the upper middle class of the neighborhood. The row survived intact, but was suffering until at least until 2006. By early 2014, the vast majority of the houses had been demolished, leaving only a couple of survivors.

But hope survives among the great neighborhood landmarks of Hyde Park. Around the corner from that ravaged row, North Park Place stands nearly intact, and with most houses occupied. Once the prime address in Hyde Park at the height of its prosperity, rehabbers and longtime residents continue to work to keep this landmark street alive. And hopefully, all around the hidden corners of the city, other people are doing the same.

Chris Naffziger writes about architecture at St. Louis Patina. Contact him via e-mail at naffziger@gmail.com.