Brentwood resident Barry Williams recently sent a letter to Brentwood Mayor David Dimmitt, encouraging a Lustron historic district along Litzsinger Road to protect the eight Lustron houses between Annalee Avenue and High School Drive. He said that with property values rising, the historic enameled steel houses are endangered.
Williams’ letter to Mayor Dimmitt:
Dear Mayor Dimmitt,
With land values soaring in Brentwood and large houses now all the rage, our city’s remaining Lustron houses are clearly endangered. I therefore would like to see Brentwood establish a Lustron historic district along Litzsinger Road to protect the 8 consecutive Lustrons between Annalee and High School. These unique steel houses are now over 70 years old – more than old enough to quality for federal “historic” status – and few cities possess as many of them per capita as Brentwood does. (Brentwood may actually be Number 1 per capita!) But if a special historic district is not possible, I would like to see the City reserve a site in one of its parks to which one or two of these houses could eventually be moved. Perhaps they could be rented out for special events. I feel it’s important that one or two of these historic houses be preserved in Brentwood, especially in light of their ties to the St. Louis Cardinals’ DeWitt Family.
Williams also included, in an email to 40 South, a link to a national Lustron locator, which shows Brentwood’s 12 surviving Lustrons along with two that were recently demolished.
I thought that there was one at display at one of the county parks or maybe at the Museum of Transportation. I do know that it is pretty neat to see so many like is on Litzinger.
Someone know what is the connection to the Dewitt family since it is not told in the story?
The St. Louis distributorship for Lustrons was owned by the father and uncle of Bill Dewitt, owner of the Cardinals ball team.
They also owned the St. Louis Browns .
The distributorship office was first on Grand Avenue, near Sportsmans Park. Later it moved to Brentwood Blvd.
is that why there is so many there on Litzinger? Were they display models for the company? I seem to remember that there were several models and had a metal plate somewhere inside the house showing which model it was.
The display model was located at Antler Drive and Brentwood Blvd. (Brentwood Blvd was still known as North and South Road then). There is a metal plate mounted on the rear wall of the utility room showing the model number and the serial number. I don’t know why so many were built on Litzinger. Webster Groves has the largest number of Lustrons, followed by Brentwood.
The Missouri History Museum had a Lustron display going many years ago. It might have been temporary, though
Maplewood had two Lustrons. One was on Bartold in the area that is now Porsche of St. Louis.
The other was on the south side of Flora, a few doors east of Laclede Station Road.