Empty skyscrapers are always stealthy–they blend in with their busy neighbors with strange ease. Maybe it’s because people in the city are always looking town. Here’s a chance to look up–way up–at one of St. Louis’ longtime abandonments.
history under ground
Missouri
Arcade-Wright Building
Falstaff Brewery
Saint Louis, MO
A dead brewery marks the graves of four others on the outside of St. Louis, the new Detroit. It’s been empty longer than I’ve been alive, and things are not looking up…
Holy Name Catholic Church
Kansas City, MO
During the Kansas City riots following Martin Luther King’s assassination this circa-1911 gothic revival was the site of a nearly tragic stampede.
Horace Mann Elementary
Kansas City, MO
Somewhere between the bricks and boards, cats in a row fish forever.
Imperial Brewing Company
Kansas City, MO
This brewery fought off the local competition only to be brought down by Prohibition. After the booze started flowing again, instead of hitting the bottle it hit the sack–the flour sack. It spent the rest of its life as a flour mill, and most of it survives today.
James Clemens House
Saint Louis, MO
Many older cities around the US have areas like this, where last century’s mansions are today’s abandonments and hastily-split tenements. Not friendly places, people usually zoom through with their doors locked. I might have passed the neighborhood over too, if it wasn’t for one word, TWAIN.
Lemp Brewery
St. Louis, MO
You almost have to pass Anheuser Busch’s giant flagship brewery on the way to Lemp, something that makes everyone that sees the latter to the former. Read on and see for yourself what it looks like when a major brewery in a brewing town goes under…
Saint Mary’s Infirmary
St. Louis, MO
Serving those who were turned away because of race and income, training generations of nurses, and now collapsing into the streets of St. Louis out of neglect. Now that raindrops freefall from the clouds above to the basements in the shadows without touching a floor, wall, bed or desk, it’s clear that this city lost an opportunity and a landmark.