St. Louis, Missouri: Gateway to the West

Our next venture took us to St. Louis, Missouri...gateway to the west! Why St. Louis you ask? Why not! I'd been here before for work but I never really got to "see" St. Louis. There's lots to learn...

The city is on the banks of the Mississippi River and was founded by the French in 1764. Named for King Louis XI, it was a fur trading post. In 1801, it became part of the Louisiana purchase and then became the jumping off point of the Lewis & Clark expedition to find a route to the Pacific Ocean.

To commemorate the purchase and the president that made it, an arch was built. It's 630 feet tall and made of stainless steel. It sits on the west bank of the Mississippi river and can be seen from most anywhere in the city of St. Louis. Construction started in 1963 and was completed in 1965. It was opened to the public in 1967. It was originally named for Thomas Jefferson but it eventually became Gateway Arch National Park.

To go to the top, you need to climb into this tiny little pod that holds only five small to medium sized people. The door closes and there are no windows. If you're claustrophobic, you might have a small problem. It takes about 4 1/2 minutes to get to the top as the pod jerks and goes sideways before it rights itself again. It's a little disturbing because you don't know what to expect.

Once you get to the top, there are about six little windows on each side of the arch. From below, they look like little slits. You can go up on each side of the arch. At the top, there's a rope that splits the sections. Half those windows go to the south arch.

You have to kind of lean over to look out. One side looks to the Mississippi River and the other side looks over St. Louis. There's not a lot of room to maneuver up here and you only get about ten minutes at the top.

The views are amazing! This is the St. Louis side. After you've had a look around, it's back in the pod for the three minute ride down to the bottom. Yup, it goes faster on the way down.

On the bottom floor of the arch, inside the visitor center is a museum. It's a combination of the history of St. Louis and the making of the arch. This is an exhibit about the Old West where the buffalo used to roam.

This is the "Old Courthouse". Construction started in 1816 and wasn't completed until 1828. It was, at one time, St. Louis' tallest building. By 1839, Missouri had been a state for a while and St. Louis had tripled in size. They needed more room so a new courthouse was designed but it encompassed the original courthouse in the East Wing. 

One of the original courtrooms that has been restored. In 1846, possibly in this courtroom, Dred Scott and his wife sued for their freedom. They won in Missouri but Irene Emerson, their "owner", appealed and the Scotts lost in the Missouri Supreme Court. The case went on and eventually went to the U.S. Supreme Court where they lost. Irene remarried and deeded the Scotts to a man named Taylor Blow. Mr. Blow manumitted them in 1857. Sadly, Dred Scott died in 1858. 

The cupola of the courthouse. The building ceased to function as a courthouse in 1930. However, it became part of the Gateway National Park in 1940. It's open as a museum, free of charge. There are two renovated courtrooms. It's definitely worth a visit.

Another cool place to go that is also free is the St. Louis Art Museum (SLAM). The museum was originally part of Washington University. In 1909, the museum split from the university.

The building itself is really cool. I think it's bigger than we imagined. We were only there for a couple of hours and we only saw what was in the main building. But, what we saw was pretty amazing!

This is called "Water Lilies" by Claude Monet. It's part of a triptych - One part is in the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art in Kansas City. We saw that!

They had something from all the masters. The Dreamer by Pierre Auguste Renoir.

They had sculpture as well as paintings, though paintings are my favorite type of art. This is "Little Dancer of FourteenYears" by Edgar Degas. There were ladies there that were making drawings of this statue. 

The SLAM is located in Forest Park. This is a view of Art Hill and it's right across the street from the Museum. It's a beautiful park to walk around it. Unfortunately, it was close to 100 degrees the day we were there. But, also located in this park is the Missouri History Museum (also free) and the St. Louis Zoo. The park is 1300 acres and there are all kinds of things here. If you're in the area, check it out!

We wanted to try something uniquely St. Louisan so John found this place called the Blackthorn Pub. We followed the GPS through a neighborhood and we thought we'd entered the wrong address but no. This pub is at the end of a residential street. How cool!

The thing to get was St. Louis -style pizza. Huh? We'd never heard of such a thing but we decided to give it a shot. We ordered and it took AN HOUR to get it. After a while of waiting, we got a little silly. This is me doing jazz hands to the 80s music being played in the restaurant.

This cheesy mess is St. Louis style deep dish pizza. It's very similar to Chicago-style but the difference, according to google, is in the crust. What I will tell you is that it was delicious...and filling. I ate one piece. When we went in to order, we were going to get a large so we'd have leftovers but the bartender said we'd be eating pizza for a week. John said, "Medium?" and the bartender shook his head. So we got a small and still ate pizza for breakfast and dinner the next day.

In Gateway Arch National Park you'll also find the Basilica of St. Louis, King of France. The parish started in 1766 meeting in a tent. In 1770, build a log structure for them to meet in. By 1818, they'd constructed a building of bricks. By 1834, the city had grown quite large an a new church was needed. This structure was built on an old cemetery. Anyone buried here was reinterred as the Second Catholic Cemetery. The church is still in use. You can go inside but be sure to check the hours. I thought it was open until five and it was not.

Another thing you should know about St. Louis is that it is a baseball town. The St. Louis Cardinals are the home team here but back in 1875, they were known as the St. Louis Brown Stockings. They played at a place called Sportsman's Park.

At the St. Louis Cardinals Museum and Hall of Fame we learned that the Brown Stockings joined the National League in 1892 as the St. Louis Browns. In 1899 they changed their name to the Perfectos and their color to "a lovely shade of Cardinal". A sportswriter overheard the comment and started calling them the Cardinals. In 1900, they made it official and changed the name to the Cardinals.

The Cards have quite the history. In 1953, Anheuser-Busch bought the team and changed the name of Sportsman's Park to Busch Stadium.

In 1966, a new stadium was built and it was called Busch Memorial Stadium. In the photo above, the white outline at the top is where this stadium sat. The marker is located on what was part of the infield of that stadium. This stadium was in use until 2005.

The St. Louis Cardinals are in second place for having won the most World Series Championships. The first was in 1926 when they beat the New York Yankees (who have won the most). Their most recent win was in 2011 when they be our Texas Rangers.

In 2005, Busch Stadium (Busch Stadium III) was built. In order for it to be ready for the next season, the construction was ongoing during the 2005 season. Once the season was over, they were able to complete it. You can see in the earlier picture that the stadiums overlap a bit. The St. Louis Cardinals are the only team to have won a World Series during the inaugural year of their stadium.

Because the stadium is in downtown St. Louis, it's hard to get a photo of the whole thing. We were on the top level of the parking garage across the street and this was the best we could do.

Here comes Fredbird! He's the mascot for the St. Louis Cardinals.

A view from our seats at the game. You can see the Arch from all over the city, including here in the stadium. Our tickets were for a day game. What were we thinking! It was almost 100 degrees but luckily, we were in a part of the open air stadium that had shade.

The fans got hats when they came into the game. I chose to wear mine. John wore his Rangers cap.

Sadly, the Cardinals lost to the San Diego Padres. The heat must have gotten to them.

We had fun in St. Louis. The Arch is beautiful and you can't help but take photos. I really liked this one but then I like to see monuments lit up at night.

A little over 300K people live here. We didn't venture too far out of the downtown area except to go to the Art Museum. We did go into one of their local grocery stores: Schnuck's. The company was started in 1939 and is the largest privately held grocery store. It's still run by the family.

There are several big companies headquartered here in St. Louis. Anheuser-Busch and Wells Fargo Advisors to name a couple. They also make Tums here! Right in this building across from the ballpark.

If you have a chance, you should definitely check out St. Louis.