My husbands GGgrandfather William Dunn is listed in the article below. Published Wednesday, March 10, 1976 titled "It Happened in Lemay"
Religion in Lemay
The community of Lemay was 201 years old before the first church spire appeared.
When the Jesuit Fathers came in 1704, the seed of the Roman Catholic faith was planted in the hearts of the Indians; the first mission house was built near the spot where Broadway and Horn are today. But after the Fathers went back to Canada, the little mission fell into a state of disrepair and because of lack of interest among the settlers was abandoned.
The same thing happened to the little log and stone mission near Mount Olive Cemetery, built and serviced at a later date by traveling priests from Ste. Genevieve.
Spiritually hungry people of the settlement had to content themselves with facilities offered in Carondelet, or in Cahokia - across the Mississippi river.
Because of such hardship and lack of convenience, many of the people fell away from the faith and at the turn of the century, 1899 to 1900, the average citizen considered religion as only a minor need.
In 1904 William Dunn, realizing the need for a Catholic parish in his locality, spoke with John Lechner and the two of them canvassed the neighborhood to see how many Catholic families they could find. They located 40; later Mr. Dunn's children went "way out in the country" and found 60 additional families.
On Sunday, August 14, 1904, a meeting for the purpose of organizing a parish was held at old Kugler Hall, 9800 South Broadway. After that meeting the Archbishop approved establishment of a German parish to be used by all nationalities in its territory. The name St. Pious parish.
First Mass was celebrated February 5, 1905 by Rev. Father Albert Mayer at the little frame chapel of the Sisters of Mount St. Rose Sanitorium, who loaned their facilities to the new parish until a new building was completed at Hoffmeister and Military roads.
It was December 17, 1905, that the new church was dedicated - a frame building, 110' x 47', of which the first 30' was classrooms for a grammar school. At this time the name of the parish was changed to St. Andrew
Within the next six years St. Andrew grew to such a size that it was necessary to build a new church and additional school facilities.
On March 23, 1930 Father Mayer turned the first spadeful of durt for the new location of the church, a few feet east of the original building. This was a courageous step for Father Mayer because at the time the country was in the depths of a terrible depression. In fact, many of the St. Andrew parishioners were begging for daily bread.
In the spring of 1931 the people of St. Andrew dedicated their new church.
In the past quarter of a century, the Catholics of Lemay expanded and multiplied until now there are five other parishes in the Lemay area: St. Martin de Tours, St. Francis D' Assisi, St Bernadette, St. George and Assumption.
The St. Andrew Catholic Church of Lemay, Missouri established the very first Credit Union in the world on July 7, 1927
With the current flooding in St. Louis, I thought that this would be appropriate.
St. Louis, MO Flood Aug 1915
GULF STORM BRINGS FLOOD TO ST. LOUIS Hundreds in City and Suburbs Driven from Homes by Nearly Six Inches of Rain. RAILROAD TRAFFIC STOPS Rescues Made in Boats--Levee Breaks at East Alton, Ill., Sending Flood Waters Through Town. ST. LOUIS, Aug. 20.--- The storm that devastated the Texas Gulf Coast last Monday and Tuesday, sweeping northward, struck St. Louis with diminished fury last night and today, bringing with it the heaviest downpour in the history of the city, and causing a flood that drove hundreds of city and suburban residents from their homes. Up to 5 o'clock tonight the rainfall since the storm began was 5.95 inches. The flood here was due to back water in the storm sewers in the western part of the city and to a big rise in the River Desperes, which went out of its banks in the western and southern parts of the city, and flooded suburbs, interrupted train service, and caused annulment of street car service to suburban towns. Through train service into St. Louis was affected by the storm which continued tonight. Rumors of drownings in Maplewood and other suburbs were unconfirmed. By the middle of the afternoon every automobile road and street car line leading from St. Louis to the surrounding suburban towns had been closed because of high water. Firemen were rescuing inhabitants of several suburbs from second-story windows in boats. Four feet of water entered the subway of the Union Station, the underground passage through which baggage and mail is handled. The gates of the tunnel leading from Union Station to the main Post Office were closed, preventing damage to the latter building and its contents. Damage was slight.
Shortly before noon Mayor Kiel ordered Street Department trucks to take lifeboats from the city harbor boat to Maplewood to help in the work of rescue. All available city automobiles were hurried to the suburbs. At noon one fire engine company in the extreme southern part of St. Louis had taken 115 persons from their homes. A train stopped at Delmar station, near the city limits, but the water around the station was so high that firemen and street employees were called on to assist the marooned passengers. Ropes were tied about the rescuers to pull them through the current as they waded in. Police stations received many telephone calls from persons who said they were marooned on the second floors of their homes. Many houses in the suburbs of Greenwood and Maplewood were completely surrounded by water, with only roofs and chimneys visible. From a distance, rescuers in skiffs could be seen taking the people from second story and attic windows. The 500 residents of Benbow City and West Wood River were warned of the oncoming flood by two men on horseback, who, preceding the water by a few minutes, rode through the streets calling, "Run for your lives!" The entire population of both towns sought refuge in the city of Wood River. Four hundred employees of the Western Cartridge Company and the Equitable Powder Company in East Alton escaped the wall of rushing water. The property loss of these two plants alone was estimated at more than $200,000. A Cleveland, Cincinnati, Chicago & St. Louis train, with seventy-five passengers, was caught between two streams of flood water and was stalled. Efforts to remove the passengers by boat were begun. The New York Times, New York, NY 21 Aug 1915
This is one site worth visiting. It shows downtown St. Louis in 1804. It has a clickable map and is basically a virtual tour of the homes and streets.
This map allows the user to walk again on the streets of Colonial St. Louis, a vanished world now largely occupied by the grassy grounds of the Gateway Arch. It was created by Historian Bob Moore at Jefferson National Expansion Memorial using information reprinted in J. Thomas Scharf, History of St. Louis City and County, Vol. I Philadelphia: Louis H. Everts & Co. 1883. This information includes an 1804 census of property owners and sizes, styles and materials of houses standing in the town at that time. Most of the houses drawn here are speculations based on the verbal descriptions on the 1804 list. A few of the houses survived into the era of photography or were drawn by artists in the 19th century, and these are rendered as closely as possible to the original sketches. Overall, each of the buildings standing in St. Louis in 1804 is rendered here. The viewer will see the houses of rich and poor, tradesmen and residential buildings, all intermixed as they really were in 1804. As the viewer uses the mouse to virtually "walk the streets" and "knock on the doors" of these houses, they will discover that a lot of information is known about some owners and relatively little about others. However, this map will give the viewer the opportunity to learn about a vanished culture and society and "meet" some of the characters of early St. Louis encountered 200 years ago by Lewis and Clark.
The map can be viewed in several ways. At the top of this page, a simplified map provides access to every house and building in Colonial St. Louis, just by putting the mouse's arrow on the structure and clicking.
In the "Expanded St. Louis Map" section, entered by clicking on the text in quotes just above or through the menu list at the top left of this page, the viewer can see enlarged sections of the map with trees, gardens and people. These expanded maps also include the modern street names in the City of St. Louis, to better identify the site of each house. Each of these expanded maps has an arrow which can be clicked to move to the next map section to the right or the left. There are nine section maps altogether, and the houses and buildings on them can be clicked to see the same information available through the simplified map above.
Was trying to find out more about my grandparents Ice Cream Parlor. Found this article on wikipedia and thought that I'd share it here.
Gravois Road
The turn of the century found the little community "out by the Gravois" developing all the signs of a little town. The further development can be traced to the prominence of Gravois Road. The earliest recorded data on Gravois Road is dated 1804, according to Mr. B. Cordell Stevens, a resident of Clayton and president of the St. Louis Historical Society. On an old map this principal thoroughfare of Affton is described as the "Road that led to the Salt Spring of Clamorgan in a wagon." James Clamorgan was the name of an early Irish settler who came to Jefferson County and built a home south and east of what is now Fenton. The words "Salt Spring" refer to the saline spring, common in that region, located near this early homesite.
That early trail bore little resemblance to our Gravois of today. In fact very few, if any, of the original roads in St. Louis County can be recognized as the early trails and turnpikes laid out and traveled by the pioneers who settled this region and picked from the solid wilderness a few traffic routes which later developed into highways and boulevards. In most cases our modern highways, built to meet the needs of fast motor transportation, do not follow exactly the earlier routes which were determined largely by accommodation to the natural terrain. Modern road building machinery and materials have solved many of the problems with which the early settlers were unable to cope.
However, this early "big road" (it could accommodate a wagon) rapidly became a much used thoroughfare. This is attested to by the fact that on December 20, 1804, a John Boli was granted a license to operate a ferry across the Meramec River two miles below what is now the present site of Fenton.
Plans for rerouting began with a petition, dated May 23, 1818, addressed to the Circuit Court asking for a road from Reaszin Sappington's mill to the mill belonging to Wilson P. Hunt whose property was located on River des Peres. From this point the road was to proceed to the town of St. Louis. Of special interest is the names of some of the signatories of this petition: Wilson Hunt, Theodore Hunt, Joseph Wells, John Sappington, Wm. L. Long, August Chouteau, Antoine Soulard, Bernard Pratte, Sylvester Labadie and many other pioneers around whom the history of St. Louis and St. Louis County is written.
Fourteen years later (1832) this "Road to Fenton" was established and declared a public road. (Note: It was a common practice at that time for individuals to be granted the right to charge a "toll" on vehicles using a road if these individuals would maintain and keep in repair the roadway near their homes. This practice was common in Western Europe, and the idea was brought over by our early settlers.) According to the records, this new road began at the "Three-Mile Post," where Gravois Ave. now intersects Arsenal St.
By an act of the Missouri State Legislature, passed February 11, 1839, Gravois Road became a state road. All the roads of those days were of dirt corduroy (logs laid side by side), or of planks, which made for the smoothest riding. Remember, in those days this area was covered with dense forest and trees were regarded of little value.
In 1845, the Missouri Assembly appropriated a sum not to exceed $7,000 to be apportioned to each township along the route for the macadamizing (a mixture of gravel and tar, a new type of road surface developed by John Loudon McAdam in Scotland) of Gravois Road within the limits of each township.
The use of the name of Gravois Road came into being about this time. The name "Gravois" came from the combination of French words meaning "gravely creek" referring to the small gravely creek that runs through the area.
In 1847, the General Assembly authorized the County Court to borrow $50,000 to macadamize all of Gravois Road. However, the general practice in road building, until the Civil War period continued to be the "plank" type of roadway. In some ways this type of road was superior to the newly developed macadam surface, which was of rather soft construction (the "steam roller" had not yet been invented), the hope being that travel would tramp the gravel and tar to a hard surface. However, the carriage wheels would cut deep ruts into the roadway and there soon appeared to one side of the right-of-way what in those days was referred to as a "summer road," a dirt road which was passable only in the summer months. To Gravois Road belongs the distinction of being the first road in the county to be treated with a concrete surface. The experiment was made over a 6,000 foot length, extending from the St. Louis city limits at Gardenville, to Grant's Farm, then owned by the late August A. Busch who paid half the cost of construction. The concrete roadway, 16 feet wide, was laid in 1914. All work was done with horse-drawn equipment.
Except for the state regulated Gravois Road, all the local county roads used the "toll-gate" system. We have already seen that earlier roads were maintained by the farm residents along the route for the privilege of collecting money from those traveling along the road. To enforce payment, a log, on a pivot, was swung across the road to prevent passage until the toll was collected. However, such a practice was so distasteful to travelers that as the roads became used more and more, pressure was exerted on the county governments to maintain these roads as county (tax) expense. In 1868, a county order was announced that the "toll gates on the St. Charles Road, and all those roads designated as county roads, be removed as far as the county line, as their location constituted an injustice to countians."
Other roads began to take on the names we know them by today. Tesson Ferry got its name from a settler named Tesson who operated a ferry on the Meramec River. Rock Hill Road received its name from a quarry in a "rock-hill." MacKenzie of course was taken from the first subdivider when he had his land divided and sold in 40 acre (162,000 m²) tracts. Weber Road was the road going between the Weber Nursery Office and nursery grounds. After MacKenzie Road was paved in 1939 other subdivisions came into being and the streets often took the names of the farmers who had sold the tract of land. Thus the names of early settlers have become permanent landmarkers: Darlow, Shepperd, Neier, Vasel, Stafford, Ashwell, to mention only a few. As Gravois Road became more traveled, more settlers came into the area of rich truck farms and the need for more local businesses was evident. About 1915 Affton had several small businesses, according to Kenneth Keller who has done quite a bit of research on Early Affton. Tony Bauer operated a blacksmith shop on the northeast corner of Gravois Road and the Frisco Railroad tracks. August Mehl operated another smithy near Consul Ave. Affton also had 3 groceries belonging to the Hummelsheims, the Schneebergers, and Wohlschlaegers. In the Wohlschlaerger's Store was located the second U.S. Post Office in Affton. Meyer's meat market was also a favorite source of food.
Affton also claimed a feed store at the corner of New Hampshire and Gravois (in fact, if you remember, the old building was just torn down a few years ago). A telegraph exchange was operated by Louis J. Keller on Gravois Road between Brenda and MacKenzie. Affton also had a lumberyard, a dry goods and a hardware store, a coalyard and even an ice cream parlor. By 1915 Affton also claimed more churches: Eden Evangelical, Salem Lutheran, and St. George's Roman Catholic Church. An interesting note about the church services at Eden was that they were conducted regularly in German and only occasionally in English.
