History

Maplewood History: Tales of the Harper’s Pharmacy by Bill Jones

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These stories that Mr. Jones has been submitting are priceless.  I’m not sure whether I should refer to him as Bill, Will or Billy but no matter.  His stories let us understand past life in our community that we couldn’t possibly imagine otherwise.  I’m sure you’ll enjoy his latest called:

My Lesson in Growing Up

February 5, 1939–My sister said,  It’s Mr. Harper calling for Billy.”  Mr. Harper asked me, “Will you be twelve tomorrow?

History

Maplewood History: The Magnificent Cabinetry of the Harper’s Pharmacy Saved!

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Now this is a story I’ve been wanting to post for a long time.  Three years anyhow.  Those of you who have been following this blog for that long will recall that is when the magnificent cabinetry of the original Harper’s Pharmacy was removed so the space could be restored. You may also recall how many of us were upset with Mr. John Hickey, director of the local chapter of the Sierra Club because he chose not to have the cabinets returned to the place they had been since their installation in 1926.  We had an almost completely intact interior of an historic pharmacy, a time capsule of our community, miraculously survive until that April of 2014.

History

Maplewood History: The Paul Revere of Maplewood?

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My last post featured a story from 1910 in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch that told of a serious yet completely forgotten explosion in Maplewood. It came to light from the furious digging of Maplewood history aficionado, Luke Havel. Commenting on that post, Luke pointed out that there was another very interesting Maplewood related story on the opposite side of that front page. I agreed.

History

Maplewood History: An Explosive Article Brought to Light by the Research of Luke Havel

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Some posts are easier than others. This is one of the easiest of all. For me it is like shooting fish in a barrel even though I can’t imagine why anyone would ever want to do that. For those of you who may be young enough to be unfamiliar with the phrase, like shooting fish in a barrel implies that something is as easy as taking candy from a baby even though I can’t imagine why anyone would do that either. Enough of this.

History

Maplewood History: More on the 1970s Redevelopment That Didn’t Happen and One That Did.

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My co-author, Joyce Cheney, did a good job describing these events in our book, “The First 100 Years, Maplewood, MO.”  Writing from her own research, she had this to say. Attention K-Mart Shoppers

James O. Holton, president of Citizen’s National Bank in Maplewood decided to take redevelopment into his own hands. Holton gathered fifty-seven local businessmen at The St. Louis Club and presented his vision for redevelopment: a six-block stretch of Manchester Avenue and surrounding streets, from Oakview Terrace to Big Bend would be rebuilt with retail venues in a park-like setting.

History

Maplewood History: Last Days of the Wedge

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If you’ve been following the action here at Maplewood History you already know that Jim Fischer, whose family had early connections to Maplewood, gifted us with a good-sized box of  crumbling, brown newspapers and other items that had once belonged to his parents.  

He also threw in a small box of interesting old pamphlets that have nothing at all to do with Maplewood.  They once belonged to a neighbor.  I’ll have to get her story from Jim once more. I’ll post some of the more interesting of those possibly under a title such as, “Completely Unrelated Stuff Found While Looking for Maplewood History”.

History

Maplewood History: The Wedge, Route 66 and Reller Chevrolet Revisited

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First exhibited on Dec. 4, 2013 all of the photos that accompanied this blog post then had somehow dissipated into nothingness.  Given the recent interest in the Wedge and EJ Tire I decided to reload it.  Or perhaps since this is an article about a tire seller I should call this post a retread of the original. For those of you who know nothing about retreads, I can tell you I had a few.

Doug Houser - Maplewood historian

Maplewood History: The Wedge Resurrected

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Resurrected refers to the blog post not the building.  Sorry.  Several folks had asked about the history of the Wedge but when I went back to link to this earlier post all of the photos had evaporated into cyberspace.  

So here it is again…back by popular demand.  I’ll have more to add in a subsequent post thanks to information gained from the soon-to-be-legendary box of Jim Fischer’s.

History

Maplewood History: Our Second Train Depot and James Sutton’s Cabin in the Woods

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What in the world could our second train depot have to do with our pioneer settler, James C. Sutton’s cabin in the woods? Thanks to a couple of old maps and Luke Havel’s newly discovered photograph we now know almost exactly where the second depot was located. (See my previous post). I imagine by now you’re beginning to think that Luke’s photograph was from 1906 and James Sutton bought his property and built a cabin on it in 1826. 80 years apart.

Doug Houser - Maplewood historian

Maplewood History: The Unrecognizables

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My corralling of Maplewood’s historic photos began early in 2002.  Barry Greenberg, now a councilman, had issued a call for persons interested in starting an historical society. Recently retired I showed up along with a fair number of like-minded souls. I don’t recall how many were at that first meeting but I know we had around twenty show up for a few of the later meetings.  I didn’t know it then but that was a number that proved difficult to eclipse. Such is the fate of an historical society I would find out later. Possibly the first event we planned was a physical display of historic photographs and items set up in one of the empty store fronts on Sutton.  There were several to choose from.  Our event took place in one that is now the Maya Café or very close to it.

History

Maplewood History: Wait a Minute. I Recognize That Ghost!

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On a warm weekend in the middle of last September and in the middle of Sutton Avenue, the theater department of St. Louis University presented their Maplewood/Shakespeare adaptation play, “Remember Me”. 

The very large audience (I heard 1700 on just Saturday night) was charmed by an all Maplewood cast and the many ghosts of Maplewood portrayed by giant puppets and conjured by the playwright, Nancy Bell.  A couple of my favorite ethereal personalities, the Maplewood Spectre (she of the variable height of whom I have written several times) and the ghost of Charles Rannells, the builder of our most historic piece of property, Woodside, were among the spirits roaming the stage those nights. Nancy also borrowed details from a tragic story concerning a very old St. Louis family, the Clamorgans. Some of them including a young woman named Clara once lived just beyond our border in the City of St.