Kirkwood Historic Walks
Built on land that was part of the Louisiana Purchase, Kirkwood owes its existence to the twin tragedies of epidemic and fire that struck St. Louis in 1849 and to the development of the Pacific railroad route. It was a stop on the early Pacific Railroad.
After a major fire and a cholera epidemic destroyed part of downtown St. Louis, the climate was ripe for development of an area outside of the city that offered relief from the congestion and dangers of city life. Two real estate developers, Hiram Leffingwell and Richard Elliott, promoted the idea of a suburb, a community environment removed from the city.
In 1850, the two, as part of a group of 40 investors, bought several hundred acres along the proposed railroad route for the line that would link the eastern part of the country with the Pacific coast. The selection of a Missouri River route for the trans-continental railroad put St. Louis at the terminus of the railroad.
The city was formally established in 1853 and was named for James Pugh Kirkwood, the engineer who platted the city and surveyed the Pacific railroad route which passed through the area.
The streets of the original town were platted into a rectangular grid with blocks divided into quarter sections of more than one acre each. Families could purchase an entire block creating a five-acre estate.
Dead restrictions limited commercial endeavors in Kirkwood keeping the city free of things such as slaughter houses, soap factories or dram shops which were prohibited.
Kirkwood's streets leading from the train depot are named for presidents--Washington, Adams, Jefferson, Madison, Monroe, Taylor, Harrison, Van Buren and Fillmore. But Kirkwood veered from the plan when it came to Andrew Jackson opting instead for Geyer Road. Main Street was renamed Argonne in 1919 to honor U.S. servicemen in World War I. The main north-south thoroughfare had several names before it became Kirkwood Road. It is known as Lindbergh Boulevard outside of Kirkwood.
When trains first rolled into Kirkwood in 1853, they stopped at a building at the site of the present station. A stagecoach would then take passengers from the train station to Manchester, Missouri. A larger station replaced the original station 10 years later, and the current station, an outstanding example of Richardsonian architecture, was built in 1893.
From the beginning, the train was an integral part of life in Kirkwood. Early promoters hawked the city as a healthy place to live. With the cholera epidemic that killed a fifth of St. Louis' population a recent memory, they pitched the new community's fresh air and open spaces. Many early Kirkwood residents were wealthy businessmen eager to safeguard their families from the dangers of life in the city by moving them from the crowded urban area to the new suburb. Some kept town homes in the city where they stayed during the workweek returning to their homes in suburbia on the weekends. Others commuted daily to the city via train and, in fact, commuter trains brought workers to their jobs downtown until they were discontinued in the 1960s.
The Civil War came closest to Kirkwood in 1864 when Confederate troops moving up from Arkansas came within 10 miles of St. Louis on the St. Louis and Iron Mountain Railroad. This made Union commanders nervous since local sympathizers could reach the Confederate Army relatively easily. That led the Union commander in St. Louis to issue an order that "traitors and four spies caught in the act of passing the Federal lines to the rebel forces now invading the state will be shot on the spot."
Later that year the Confederates raided a post office at Cheltenham near Manchester Avenue on the Pacific Railroad. The raid was between Kirkwood and St. Louis and brought a detachment of the Missouri Militia that camped at Laclede Station on the Pacific Railroad holding back a Confederate invasion of the town.
Kirkwood has always been a hub for transportation. In addition to its link with the railroads, it was a stagecoach stop during its early days, and by 1898 streetcars were offering service from Kirkwood to other points in the St. Louis area.
A section of Kirkwood became a resort area catering to wealthy St. Louisians when the Meramec Highlands opened in 1895. Located on the Meramec Bluffs with a nearby spring gushing 60,000 gallons of water a day, the resort offered a large, luxury 125-room hotel and 15 rental cottages. Its rustic beauty and location made it a popular excursion point. Vacationers could dance in the large dance pavilion, bowl in the bowling alley, play billiards in the billiard hall or take a boat onto the river.
With the development of electric streetcar lines, visitors could take the St. Louis Meramec Highlands Railroad to the Highlands for a nickel. The Frisco Railroad also offered service to the Highlands. In 1895 nine trains a day and four on Sunday took visitors to the resort.
During the 1904 World's Fair, visitors could travel from downtown to the Highlands by streetcar for a nickel, but by 1905 the popularity of the Highlands waned, and it closed in 1911. The hotel burned down around 1927 but 13 of the cottages remain today. Most are private residences. Today the area is known as the Greenbriar District and much of the old resort is the site of a 400-acre subdivision.
In more recent years, Kirkwood has settled into its role as a desirable bedroom community conveniently located an easy drive from downtown, but a community with strong historic traditions and a quiet lifestyle reminiscent of life in a small town.
One of the most intriguing things about Kirkwood is its diverse architecture. Take a drive down its streets and you will see examples of Victorian, Italian Villa, Italianate, Gothic Revival, Greek Revival, Tudor Revival, Vernacular, Eclectic, Victorian Country Classic, Victorian Italianate, Victorian Vernacular, Richardson Romanesque and Carpenter Gothic in the homes and churches of Kirkwood. The city even has a dog-trot log cabin.
The Kirkwood City Council established a Landmarks Commission in 1981 to study the city's buildings and designate structures that qualify as historical landmarks. Kirkwood has 83 structures and sites that have been designated as landmarks. Most are private homes but some are commercial buildings, churches and schools. A cemetery has also been designated as a landmark.
Five structures in Kirkwood are on the National Register of Historic Places. They are:
Kirkwood Station which is an outstanding example of Richardsonian architecture.
Mudd's Grove, an antebellum Greek Revival home built in 1859, named for Henry T. Mudd who bought the house and 100 adjoining acres in 1866. Mudd's Grove is a popular venue for weddings, receptions and other gatherings. It is the headquarters of the Kirkwood Historical Society located at 302 W. Argonne.
Frank Lloyd Wright House in Ebsworth Park is nestled in grassy fields on 10.5 acres in the Sugar Creek area of Kirkwood, Missouri. This 1,900 square foot residence, built for Russell & Ruth Kraus, was Frank Lloyd Wright's first building site in the St. Louis area and one of only five Wright designs in Missouri. The home is notable not only for its architectural integrity, but for retaining all of its original Wright-designed furnishings and fabrics. Frank Lloyd Wright is widely recognized as the greatest American architect of the 20th century.
Turner School, located in the Meacham Park neighborhood of Kirkwood. The school, which has modern features, is one of the last old schools in St. Louis County built to educate black children during the era of segregation.
Eliot Unitarian Chapel, a limestone Gothic Revival church built in 1860 as Grace Episcopal Church.
Kirkwood has two historic districts. They are:
Meramec Highlands Historic District encompasses part of the area that was once the Meramec Highlands Resort
Frisco train station where 12 trains stopped each day during the Highlands heyday, a 20-foot high train tunnel with a vaulted brick ceiling built in 1883 at the end of Barberry Lane. The former Meramec Highlands grocery store built in 1895. It is now a private residence. A one-room schoolhouse built in 1895 to serve children living in the Highlands area has been remodeled into a Colonial Revival residence. Central Plaza Bungalow District in the 300 block of Central Place. The bungalows in the district date from the 1920s and are a prime example of small homes built during that time Wisconsin House, 415 Scott Avenue, built as the Wisconsin hospitality house at the 1904 World's Fair. The building won a grand prize because it "nearest fulfilled the ideal state home." After the Fair, the building was moved to Kirkwood, presumably by rail, and reconstructed as a private home. Hazard House,401 Clark Avenue, built in 1875. The house belonged to Rebecca Naylor Hazard, a 19th century social reformer. During the Civil War as a member of the Ladies Union Aid Society and the Freedmen's Relief Society, she cared for soldiers and newly freed slaves. She went on to organize the Woman Suffrage Society of Missouri and was elected president of the national American Woman's Suffrage Association in 1878. Seven Gables,503 E. Monroe Avenue, a Tudor Revival House built in 1913. The house actually has 10 gables, and the grounds covered a full block. A vast formal garden had beds of roses, peonies, and zinnias planted in different patterns. It is rumored that George Bernard Shaw had a dalliance with a young woman at the house. McLagan House, 549 E. Argonne Drive, an Italianate house built in the 1860's of wood siding cut and beveled to look like stone. The home was once owned by Charles Block, publisher of the Clayton Argus, and later by Ethan Allen Taussig and his wife, Edith, renowned opera singers with the San Carlo Opera Company in London, and later still Phil Rau, a merchant and amateur entomologist who published studies of the mining bees he kept on the grounds. Pemberton-Monroe House, 345 E. Argonne Drive, a Victorian-style house with adaptations in the Italianate style, built in 1876. This is another house built from wood siding cut to look like stone. Cragwold House, a rustic stone and stucco house built into a bluff overlooking the Meramec River in 1911 for Edwin A. Lemp, a member of the legendary Lemp Family. The house is of the Prairie School with Tudor influence. The family which owned the Lemp Brewery in the city, built several palatial houses in the area before Prohibition. The family, though fabulously rich, was plagued by tragedy including the suicides of several family members. Today the historic Lemp Mansion in the Cherokee Antique District is a bed and breakfast and restaurant featuring murder mystery dinners. With its historic train station and vintage buildings, downtown Kirkwood has retained the charm and warmth of a town of an earlier era although it is a modern suburb. O.K. Hatchery, Feed and Garden Store at 109 E. Argonne was built as part of Holekamp Lumber Company in 1920. The structure is typical of lumberyard buildings of that period. The Old Post Office and Old Fire House No. 1 at 123-125 W. Argonne are now the site of the Messenger Printing Company. The firehouse was built in 1919 for $7,900. The Old Post Office, in the Colonial Revival style, was built in the 1930s. Most of the other buildings in the central business district were built in the 1800's or early 1900's.
Brownhurst, 1201 S. Kirkwood Road, built about 1880 by St. Louis manufacturer Daniel S. Brown, an amateur horticulturist, as his country home. The shingle and limestone building is in the Richardson Romanesque style with 40 acres of the estate dedicated to gardens, conservatories and greenhouses. Brown donated many specimens from his collections of rare palms, ferns and orchids to the Missouri Botanical Gardens. The orchids became the basis of the Garden's orchid collection.
