What was St Louis like Roughly around the years 1985-1999

i,Iive,to,draw · PostMay 18, 2014#12014-05-18T19:00+00:00

I often found details, articles, stories and, many sites of photographs on various cities in rougher periods (like NYC in the late 70'sand early 80's as an example) but i can't really find anything about St Louis, since I was only in first grade at the end of the1990's. I was wondering if any one else has anything to say about their experiences in the late 80's and and 90's about St Louis.

The things Im interested are.

1. What was the economy of the city and region like? I imagined it was mediocre to bad. I would also Like to know what downtown was like, and what good about it then and what was bad about it. and just what was it like before downtown was seen as a residential area. I remember when I was little and my dad would pick up my mom from Boatman's I remember seeing all the cupples buildings boarded up and covered with old rusty fire escapes. I also remember the new court house being built and I looked forward to how tall it was getting every time i saw it.

2. What where the neighborhoods like , especially Soulard, CWE, Shaw, Lafayette square and the Cherokee street area. I want to know things like how much of those areas where vacant, how vibrant where they back then. and how had much they changed since then. I also imagine more crime in the city as a whole and i imagined more of the north-side's built environment intact, but with high crime rates and a huge gang problem.

3. What where the city Politics Per-slay was like. Was there more dysfunction, alderman fighting each other where racial tensions higher?? and and other stories of city politics at the time? Also what was the city and county relationship like then? and was there more animosity then?

quincunx · PostMay 18, 2014#22014-05-18T20:49+00:00

The cable access show World Wide Magazine offers glimpses into that time period. Mostly cultural, so not quite what you're looking for, but still fascinating.

http://urbanstl.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=9689

BrickCity4470 · PostMay 18, 2014#32014-05-18T21:32+00:00

This is my perspective of what i can remember in the 80s and 90s as i was growing up. Im old now so things do change a lot either for the better or worse.
As a child being born in the 80s and growing up in the 80s and 90s you really don't have a clue on how bad or good the area you live in is/was . I do remember living on DeTonty St and the loud highway noise on 44 . I had no clue the city was losing population..
In the 90s as i was older you get a real sense of your surroundings and the place you are living ..
City hospital was nearly collapsing Lafayette square wasn't as popular as it is today and the same can be said about Soulard.. North St.Louis still do this day has the most crime but back in the 90s it was even worse than what it is today However parts of North St.Louis are slowly making a real comeback... South City was a much more vibrant place but like North City South City is really making strides to get better. Forest Park was in horrible shape and what you see there now is dramatically an oasis of its on purely the most beautiful urban park in the country... CWE has also kept its Character and scary part is its vastly becoming one of the most hippest areas in the entire country.. Tower Grover SE was non existent .. McKreetown was a haven for arsonist.. College Hill wasn't as violent as it is today but The Ville is getting to be much better Slu hasn't changed much from what I've seen accept for adding the Arena and the new Building. Barnes wasn't as big and powerful as it is today Washington U has grown significantly ..Cherokee St was a mess. in the 90s Metro Link just started Downtown had way many more jobs however didn't have the residents. Washington Ave reeked of piss smell and i remember the VP fair being a huge draw and still is Union station had the big mall and St.Louis Centre was pretty much a lost cause. Famous Barr was still popular until it got bought out by Federated. AG Edwards was going though big expansions City Garden didn't exist our greyhound and train station were the laughing stock of the country that has changed a lot . there were numerous mid rise projects in the city most of those are gone .Highway 40 was highway 40 until the late 90s when they started to incorporate 64 into the signage .. Racial tensions were much more prominent back then than today. there was the case of an aldermen peeing while at court ... I could go on and on... I'll say in my opinion St.Louis is on a path to much better times.. Theres a light at the end of the long decline and people are actually interested in the city..

PostMay 18, 2014#42014-05-18T21:36+00:00

Oh and public schools were accredited but doesn't mean they were good .. I feel like the are better today than in the past without being accredited.. Charter schools weren't around either from what i remember ...

stlhistory · PostMay 18, 2014#52014-05-18T22:13+00:00

That peeing thing was only a few years ago in 2011.
http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/story?id=121447

stlgasm · PostMay 19, 2014#62014-05-19T00:43+00:00

The early and mid-'90s were definitely the lowest point in St. Louis history in my opinion, but it's also the time that I fell in love with the city. Washington Avenue has undergone one of the most drastic and (for St. Louis) fastest transformations in recent history. I remember riding the Bi-State bus with my brother from my house in Creve Coeur to Washington Avenue when I was in high school, and the old days of Wash. Ave (early '90s) was an eye-opening experience. The street was gritty and cold, but oh so cool. One time a dude walked up to us, opened his trench coat, and revealed a collection of gold chains that he aggressively tried to sell us. I remember Knickerbocker, an old Jewish-owned men's clothing store with an old-time elevator that even had an elevator attendant! My brother and I spent entire afternoons popping in and out of the old garment stores-- Goodman's, Weinberger, Marte Shoes, Levin's, etc, and caroused the endless aisles of Amitin's for hours on end (usually looking at old St. Louis books or flipping through Penthouse magazines from the '70s). We bought a bag at Herkert & Meisel luggage company just so we could own an authentic product from the St. Louis garment district. Ate lunch at Chinese Wok (a hole-in-the-wall that later became Hungry Buddha), where a pimp sat down with us and offered to find us some "girlfriends." Around the corner at 9th & Washington, there was Jimmie's Diner- a 24-hour greasy spoon that was right out of a sitcom. One night a hooker walked in with her pimp-- she was wearing nothing but a leather mini-skirt high-heeled boots, a red lacy bra, a leopard fur coat, and eye shadow that would make Boy George jealous. The pimp was wearing a purple double-breasted suit with a matching feather hat, gold rings on every finger. There they were, eating toast and eggs at 2:00am, completely oblivious to the table of suburban teens at the next table (us). A few years later, the backdoor rave clubs found a home on the street and added a raw late-night energy to an otherwise desolate thoroughfare (too many to mention)... The old days of Washington Avenue are long gone, and while I'm glad to see (most) of the buildings restored and reused, but I miss the old shabby garment district that screamed "St. Louis is still a big city" (albeit a shabby one) at every corner.

Cherokee Street was where we'd go with our friends on Friday afternoons to buy bongs and pipes. There were a handful of seedy head shops like Spectrum's, Ngomsom's, T-Shirt Headquarters and a couple others I believe. Today, only T-Shirt Headquarters remains. Ngomsom's was a trip-- it was part head shop and part sex shop owned by a Vietnamese family. I remember there was a little room full of dildos and vibrators. They even sold life-sized arms and fists if you're into that.

Here's a link to a handful of pics I posted on our blog a while back:
http://stl-style.com/_blog/STL-Style_Bl ... e_changes/

I have literally hundreds of photos from all over the city-- North Side, South Side, West End, Downtown and all points in between and surrounding suburbs-- that Jivecity and I took from the early '90s-early 2000s. Many are not scanned in, but others are and I'd be happy to share. Just ask!

i,Iive,to,draw · PostMay 19, 2014#72014-05-19T02:48+00:00

Thank you and that is cool. Do you plan to upload anymore to your blog? and What i remember from when I was a little there was a pawn shop on loughborugh, when i was a kid I would often get movies from as a kid with my parents since my dad was friends with the owner. Since I was born in 92 and don't have much memories of the 90's but i remember the trains, and buses having a orange stripe, with color coordinated symbols for the trains, buses and airport i miss that look.

What I found that was cool is apparently someone in The Bronx had and idea to make a facebook page to post images and things from the Bronx between the 70's-90's which i found pretty interesting, I wish someone would make a St Louis version of the page.

https://www.facebook.com/pages/The-Real ... 0149865609

johnnyqnola · PostMay 19, 2014#82014-05-19T05:44+00:00

You should also have a look at the dept of natural resources website where they show the many applications for the state historic districts. The pictures are always at the end, and the ones from the 1970s forward can give you some "snapshots" of street life in the neighborhoods back in the day. They're pretty cool...

EDIT link: http://dnr.mo.gov/shpo/StLouisCity.htm

Mark Groth · PostMay 19, 2014#92014-05-19T12:14+00:00

I recently read the late Bob Reuter's St. Louis memoir: Tales of a Talking Dog

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/sa ... louis-memo

It is a very honest account of a white kid/teen growing up on the north side in the 1970's. A must read in trying to understand the history.

stlgasm · PostMay 19, 2014#102014-05-19T12:22+00:00

Here are some other blog posts I dug up with some good pics:

http://stl-style.com/_blog/STL-Style_Bl ... forgotten/

http://stl-style.com/_blog/STL-Style_Bl ... ly_2000s!/

http://stl-style.com/_blog/STL-Style_Bl ... 1997-2002/

quincunx · PostMay 19, 2014#112014-05-19T13:17+00:00

Thanks, I didn't realize Gaslight Square made it past 2000. I knew they had survived into the 90s because Fred Willard makes PFP take him there in one of the WWM episodes. I would have figured if they'd made it to when the HTC era it would have been a no-brainer. Utter stupidity.

dweebe · PostMay 19, 2014#122014-05-19T14:57+00:00

Just a stream of thoughts after staying up all night with a sick child. Hope this works for you.

My exposure to the city was limited through high school and I really didn't start experience the city until I cam back from college in 1990.

I lived in Soulard back then. Hard to believe that Soulard was considered a "good" neighborhood at the time. The Darst-Webbe projects really put a damper on the area. You can still see traces of how the neighborhood used to be viewed by the bars still on the windows at Carson's and recently removed from Cat's Meow. My pretty decent car was broken in to twice and flat out stolen twice. After that I got a piece-of-crud pickup truck with a stick shift.

Downtown was decent in pockets but Washington Ave was scary back then. Sometime during 1989 the first bar/nightclub opened down there called 1227. When you told people you were going there they'd act like you were insane. I also remember seeing Nine Inch Nails play there to a half-full crowd on a cold winter night. I honestly think if it wasn't for them blazing the trail, people wouldn't have rediscovered that part of Washington Ave. and downtown for a while.

Like stlgasm I also patronized Jimmie's Diner. Lots of stories from late nights there. I remember sitting in the middle of the place when a group of out-of-place drunk rednecks stumbled in. They started throwing about the N-bomb and other slurs while a number of the guests and staff took offence. The rednecks even tried to drag us into it but we just ignored them. I was halfway through my meal when I got up, threw some money on the table and as I walked out I told the rednecks "You're on your own you idiots."

The Botanical Heights area and even Shaw was a major drug shopping area for all the people from the suburbs to score and quickly jump back on 44. I dated a gal who lived in the Shaw neighborhood and it was amazing at what I would get offered when driving or walking.

It's still stunning to see how the Grove has progressed. I remember when a buddy bought a house in the neighborhood and we thought he was insane. And the few GLBT bars in the neighborhood barely had any signage. Today they're all lit up and have the rainbow lags flying proudly.

Maplewood is another interesting turn around. The current Schlafly Bottleworks used to be an ugly, run down Shop n Save. And the current SnS used to be a KMart with a parking garage in front. And the whole Maplewood strip was a ghost town except for a few shops here and there. Oh, and the now-highly regarded school district which is now viewed as a destination was almost de-accredited in the 90's.

debaliviere · PostMay 19, 2014#132014-05-19T17:50+00:00

If my memory serves me, the CWE was significantly bolstered once the Chase was renovated in the late 90s. It's amazing to think that it sat vacant as long as it did - it was boarded up when I was in college in the mid-90s.

And development in Lafayette Square seemed to pick up once the Darst-Webbe projects were demolished and the site redeveloped. The City Hospital rehab soon followed.

Obviously, those developments in the CWE and Lafayette Square coincided with increased general interest in city living, but they seemed to serve as catalysts as well. Both neighborhoods were great ones that continue to get even better. It's been great to see new infill throughout both, but especially around the rougher edges, such as the eastern blocks of Maryland and Westminster in the CWE and Dolman in LS.

Grand Center was full of vacant buildings, the most prominent being the Continental and the Coronado. Now there's just one prominent vacant building - the Missouri Theater building - and that one's slated for rehab. Infill projects like KETC and KWMU, and the Pulitzer and the Contemporary Art Museums have been awesome. I can't wait to see the (numerous) parking lots in the district filled in with mixed-use buildings to add to the density there.

southsidepride · PostMay 19, 2014#142014-05-19T17:55+00:00

Interesting input from everyone. I grew up in St. Charles in the 80s but it was when I transferred from MU to UMSL in 1993 that I really started taking an interest in the city and tried to spend as much time as I could getting to know downtown and the neighborhoods.

I'm sorry I missed Jimmys. Sounds like quite a place. I do recall a dive bar in the basement of the Mark Twain Hotel. Anyone remember the name?

It's crazy to remember how the group Metropolis used to have pub crawls downtown in the late 90s and couldn't find enough places open after 5 pm to patronize.

Anglophile · PostMay 19, 2014#152014-05-19T17:57+00:00

I'm really curious to know what St. Louis was like in the 70s. I doubt many people on here have direct memories of it, but it just seems like such a sh*tty/sleazy era that it's really interesting to me. It was also the decade that the City lost the greatest portion of its population.

stlgasm · PostMay 19, 2014#162014-05-19T18:32+00:00

southsidepride wrote: I do recall a dive bar in the basement of the Mark Twain Hotel. Anyone remember the name?

Chod's!

southsidepride · PostMay 19, 2014#172014-05-19T18:34+00:00

T h e 70s were a tough decade for cities that weren't located in the Sunbelt. NYC lost 800,000 people and Chicago almost 400K during that time. Sure STL with a 25 percent drop led them all but unlike the 90s where Chi town and the Big Apple were doing better in the 70s the pain was shared.

I'm too young to remember but I did have family who lived in North St. Louis, Baden, at the start of the decade but were in St. Charles by 1980. I used to work with a lady who lived on St. Louis Ave and she remembered how her entire block emptied out within 3 or 4 yrs in the early to mid 70s.

johnnyqnola · PostMay 19, 2014#182014-05-19T18:42+00:00

southsidepride wrote:I do recall a dive bar in the basement of the Mark Twain Hotel. Anyone remember the name?quote]

Candy's. I remember hearing reggae coming out of it when I would deliver pizzas to the Mark Twain in high school. We weren't allowed to go up in the building--the residents had to come down to the lobby.

PostMay 19, 2014#192014-05-19T18:48+00:00

oops... my bad! Stlgasm got it--it was called Chod's. Candy was the owner, and I think people used to refer to it as Candy's.

southsidepride · PostMay 19, 2014#202014-05-19T19:05+00:00

Thanks guys. I went there a couple if times in probably 1998.

Both times on a Metropolis pub crawl. I seem to recall the dual names now, officially Chods but known as Candys to regulars. I also remember Gingers bar upstairs on Tucker. Another joint with some character, and characters!

roger wyoming II · PostMay 19, 2014#212014-05-19T19:09+00:00

I'm pretty sure during this time Nelly wasn't dreaming of being a big time country music award winner.

Ebsy · PostMay 19, 2014#222014-05-19T20:45+00:00

roger wyoming II wrote:I'm pretty sure during this time Nelly wasn't dreaming of being a big time country music award winner.

I don't think it would have crossed his mind.

dweebe · PostMay 19, 2014#232014-05-19T20:55+00:00

debaliviere wrote:And development in Lafayette Square seemed to pick up once the Darst-Webbe projects were demolished and the site redeveloped. The City Hospital rehab soon followed.

It wasn't that long ago that at the eastern edge of Lafayette Square (where the pet supply store is now and just a few doors down from Square One Brewery) was one of those chop suey places where you order, pay and get served through a slot.

debaliviere wrote:Grand Center was full of vacant buildings, the most prominent being the Continental and the Coronado. Now there's just one prominent vacant building - the Missouri Theater building - and that one's slated for rehab. Infill projects like KETC and KWMU, and the Pulitzer and the Contemporary Art Museums have been awesome. I can't wait to see the (numerous) parking lots in the district filled in with mixed-use buildings to add to the density there.

Getting rid of all those parking lots is the next big step for Grand Center.

PostMay 19, 2014#242014-05-19T21:03+00:00

i,Iive,to,draw wrote: 1. What was the economy of the city and region like? I imagined it was mediocre to bad.

Not as bad as you might think. McDonnell-Douglas was a monster employer. During the 60s and 70s they were churning out F4's at sometimes multiple planes a day. Then in the 70's and 80's they had programs like the F15 and F18 variants. It seemed 10 to 20% of the parents of kids I grew up worked at Mc-D. It was always rumored the only reason 370 got built was for the Mc-D missile plants in St. Charles.

Plus the auto production was huge with both plants down in Fenton and the Hazelwood Ford factory.

Plus Lambert and TWA were rocking and rolling. (F*ck you Carl Icahn.)

southsidepride · PostMay 19, 2014#252014-05-19T21:12+00:00

In the 90s a common saying about finding a place in South St. Louis was, "stay west of Hampton". I haven't heard anyone say that in forever.

I do miss how many jobs we still had downtown back then though. I interned in the Wainwright Building in 1994 and while there were nowhere near the nightspots abd residential (which was almost non existent then) there were more office jobs east of Tucker in those days. Overall I think downtown is better now. Union Station was more hopping but St. Louis Centre was on its last legs. And while there was still a Walgreens, two actually with STL Centre, there was no Culinaria back then. Just a ghetto Schnucks on N. Tucker that no one who worked downtown went to.