[208] Work began in the early 1930s on acquisition and demolition of the forty-block area where the memorial would stand; the only remnant of Laclede's street grid that was preserved was north of the Eads Bridge (in what is now known as Laclede's Landing).
[32], After the conclusion of the Revolutionary War at the Treaty of Paris, French Creole families evading American rule moved to the Spanish-controlled land on the west bank, including wealthy merchants Charles Gratiot, Sr. and Gabriel Cerre.
[71][72] The 1830s included dramatic population growth: by 1830, it had increased to 5,832 from roughly 4,500 in 1820. The Court ruled that slaves could not be counted as citizens, overturning the basis of the Missouri Compromise and inflaming national debate about slavery.
[184], St. Louis suffered as much or more than comparable cities in the early years of the Great Depression.
[98] In particular, the writings of Gottfried Duden encouraged German immigration. [1] Both groups competed with northeastern tribes such as the Sauk and the Meskwaki, and all four groups confronted the earliest European explorers of the middle Mississippi Valley. [12][13] The local French lieutenant governor moved to St. Louis in 1765 and began awarding land grants.
[197] In May 1944, when a black sailor in uniform was refused service at a privately owned lunch counter, the action prompted peaceful sit-in protests at several downtown diners. [192][193] St. Louis produced several notable soldiers in the war, including Edward O'Hare, who grew up in St. Louis and won the Medal of Honor for combat in the Pacific. [67] New fur trade companies such as the Rocky Mountain Fur Company pioneered trails west. [24] In 1772, a census determined the population of the village to be 637, including 444 whites (285 males and 159 females) and 193 African slaves, with no Indian slaves reported due to their technical illegality.
[43] To enforce town ordinances, the Board created the St. Louis Police Department, and a town jail was established in the fortifications built for the Battle of St.
[87], Public education in St. Louis, provided by St. Louis Public Schools, began in 1838 with the creation of two elementary schools, and the system quickly expanded during the 1840s. [42] The Board passed slave codes, created a volunteer fire department, and created an overseer to improve street quality. [127] A replacement station, called Union Station, opened on September 1, 1894.
", Thomas, Lewis F. "Decline of St. Louis as Midwest Metropolis.
[205], Early urban renewal efforts in St. Louis coincided with efforts to plan a riverfront memorial to honor Thomas Jefferson, which would later include the famous Gateway Arch. [269] The rate of firearm deaths for the metropolitan statistical area was one-fifth of the city rate. More than 300 suits were filed in St. Louis before the Civil War.
[158], Company directors selected the western half of Forest Park as the fair site, sparking a real estate and construction boom.
[88] The district also opened a normal school in 1857, which later became HarrisStowe State University. [156] From 1902 until the 1950s, St. Louis was home to two Major League teams.[156].
[159] Streetcar and rail service to the area was improved, and a new filtration system was implemented to improve the St. Louis water supply.
St. Louis was also home to the Graham Paper Company, the oldest and largest paper company west of the Mississippi River.
[8][9] The settlement of St. Louis was established at a site south of the confluence on the west bank of the Mississippi on February 15, 1764, by Chouteau and a group of about 30 men. They argue its purpose was to suppress the upward aspirations of the working class. William Freivogel, "St. Louis: Desegregation and School Choice in the Land of Dred Scott" (Century Foundation Press, September 17, 2002, Justin D. Smith, "Hostile Takeover: The State of Missouri, the St. Louis School District, and the Struggle for Quality Education in the Inner-City: Board of Education of the City of St. Louis V. Missouri State Board of Education".
[152] In addition to the early Chestnut Valley players, ragtime composer Scott Joplin moved to St. Louis from Sedalia, Missouri in 1901, where he associated with Tom Turpin and composed music in the city until moving to Chicago in 1907. The Ralston-Purina company, headed by the Danforth family, was headquartered in the city, and Anheuser-Busch, the world's largest brewery, remained a fixture of the city's economy into the 21st century. Missouri was a slave state, but the city's proximity to free states caused it to become a center for the filing of freedom suits.
Like an elderly couple no longer sure of their purpose in life after their children have moved away, these neighborhoods face an undirected future. The first litigation under the 1964 Civil Rights Act was against St. Louis unions.
[238], Under a renewed agreement in 1999, all but one of the St. Louis County districts agreed to continue their participation, albeit with an opt-out clause that allowed districts to reduce the number of incoming transfer students starting in 2002. The mall's flagship Dillard's store closed in 2001.
Lambert-St. Louis International Airport (2011).
[88] By 1854, the system had 27 schools and served nearly 4,000 students.
Ragtime and blues music flourished in the city, with African Americans making major contributions also in jazz.
In the early part of the century, many African Americans migrated from the South to the city for industrial jobs, as part of the Great Migration.
[214] The most famous and largest was PruittIgoe, which opened in 1954 on the northwest edge of downtown and included 33 eleven-story buildings with nearly 3,000 units.
[243] Despite these issues, the program will continue until all transfer students reach graduation; with the last group of transfer students allowed to enroll in 20182019, the program will end after the 20302031 school year. [203] Towns such as Kirkwood, Maplewood, Webster Groves, Richmond Heights, University City, and Clayton grew rapidly between 1900 and 1930.
The air is polluted, the sidewalks are filthy, the juvenile crime is horrendous, and the remaining industries are languishing. During the 1870s and 1880s, a variety of local fee-based libraries consolidated with the school library system, and in 1894, the school system divested the library system as an independent entity, which became the St. Louis Public Library. Using the engineering planning of Robert E. Lee, levees were constructed on the Illinois side to direct water toward Missouri to eliminate sand bars that threatened the landing. [171] The St. Louis black community was stable and relatively concentrated along the riverfront or near the railroad yards. [188] Area factories also produced uniforms and footwear, K-rations, and chemicals and medicines. [206] Another factor in the city's population loss was white flight, which began in earnest during the late 1950s and continued during the 1960s and 1970s. Part of the infrastructure for the fair was the basis for major city institutions in Forest Park. [97], During the economic expansion of the 1830s, Irish and German immigration to St. Louis increased substantially. [30] In spite of the failure of their expedition, the Indians managed to torch much of St. Louis' agricultural lands and capture several heads of livestock, alongside several prisoners of war.
[104] The discovery of human remains prompted rumors of grave robbing, and a mob of more than 3,000 residents attacked the medical college, destroying most of its interior facilities.
[259] In early 2002, plans for a new park were settled among state and local leaders and Cardinals owners.
[251] The team replaced the St. Louis Cardinals (now Arizona Cardinals), an NFL franchise that had moved to St. Louis in 1960 but departed for Arizona in 1988.
[6][7] From 1756 to 1760, fighting in the French and Indian War (the North American front of the Seven Years' War) halted settlement building. [49] In addition to a street paving program, the aldermen voted to rename the streets.
But, by the 1850s and the Dred Scott case, interpretations had changed and the US Supreme Court ruled against him.
[226] The next year, however, a citycounty mass transit agency was rejected by voters, followed by a failed charter revision in 1955 that would have unified the city and the county.
During the War, St. Louis had a small skirmish on its outskirts, but was held under Union control. [135], At a Missouri state constitutional convention in 1875, delegates from the region agreed on a separation plan.
[28] However, the city was warned of the plans, and residents began to fortify the town. The period culminated with the 1904 World's Fair and 1904 Summer Olympics, which were held concurrently in St. Louis.
[95] The first freedom suit in St. Louis was filed by Marguerite Scypion in 1805. [108] Among this new class of leaders was Frank P. Blair, Jr., who led an effort to create a local militia loyal to the Union after Missouri Governor Claiborne Fox Jackson hinted about secession. [248], The city sponsored a major expansion of the St. Louis Convention Center during the 1980s, and Schoemehl focused efforts on retaining professional sports teams.
[27] The Spanish lieutenant governors at St. Louis also aided the Americans, particularly the forces of George Rogers Clark during the Illinois campaign.
"Chicago versus St. Louis: A Reassessment of the Great Rivalry.
[215] A residential mixed-income development known as LaClede Town was created in the area in the early 1960s, although this was eventually demolished for an expansion of Saint Louis University.
[4] French trading companies also built towns during the 1720s and 1730s, including Fort de Chartres and Ste. Starting in the early 1990s, St. Louis became home to a substantial Bosnian immigrant community, which became the second-largest in the United States in 1999.
Although St. Louis enforced a variety of Jim Crow laws, the area generally had a lower level of racial violence and fewer lynchings than the American South.
By 1800, only 43% of the district's population lived within the village (1,039 of 2,447). [234][235], In the 1970s, a lawsuit challenging this segregation led to a 1983 settlement agreement in which St. Louis County school districts agreed to accept black students from the city on a voluntary basis. Anheuser-Busch pioneered refrigerated railroad cars for beer transport and was the first company to market pasteurized bottled beer. [126], To accommodate increased rail traffic, a new railroad terminal was constructed in 1875, but it was not large enough to consolidate all train service in one location. [155] The original Brown Stockings club closed in 1878, and an unrelated National League team with the same name was founded in 1882.
His actions are credited as being an early instance in modern medicine of social distancing and resulting in St. Louis having half the per capita death rate in comparison to other cities that took no measures.
State funds were used to transport students to provide an integrated education.
[195], At the outbreak of war, African-American workers gained greater acceptance in industry than previously, but discrimination remained a problem for many black workers.
[227] Regional planning advocates succeeded in the 1965 creation of the EastWest Gateway Coordinating Council, a group given the power to approve or deny applications for federal aid from cities.[228]. [36][37] The Spanish officially transferred control in October 1802; however, Spanish administrators remained in charge of St. Louis throughout the time of French ownership.
[203] Starting in the 1890s, the St. Louis streetcar system and commuter railroad stations enabled commuters to travel from suburban towns bordering the city into the downtown.
The project stalled until a design competition for the memorial was launched.
They lived in villages along the Missouri and Osage rivers.
[89][90] By 1860, nearly 12,000 students had enrolled in the district.
Other industries, such as light manufacturing of clothing, automobile manufacturing, and chemical production, filled much of the gap, and St. Louis's economy was relatively diversified and healthy during the 1920s. [241][244], From 1981 to 1993, new construction projects were initiated in downtown St. Louis at levels unseen since the early 1960s. [21][22], The French settlers brought both black and Indian slaves to St. Louis; although the majority were used as domestic servants, others worked as agricultural laborers. [124] In addition to connecting St. Louis with the West, the railroads began to demand connections with the east across the Mississippi. [120], Railroad yards were built in Mill Creek Valley, establishing St. Louis as a transportation hub. Manufacturing output fell by 57 percent between 1929 and 1933, slightly more than the national average of 55 percent, and output remained low until World War II.
", Baumann, Timothy, et al.
Louis.
[10][11] Laclede arrived at the site by mid-1764 and provided detailed plans for the village, including a street grid and market area. In 1940 it contained 816,000 inhabitants: in 1980 the census counted only 453,000.
[241][242] Another criticism has been that the program weakens city schools by removing talented students to county schools.
[166] Problems came to a head with the 1939 St. Louis smog, which blackened the sky and lasted for three weeks.
Spain took over in 1763 and a trading company led by Pierre Laclede and Auguste Chouteau established the settlement of St. Louis in February 1764. It attracted French settlers leaving Illinois after their defeat in the Seven Years' War. [1][2] These were related to the center of the culture at the very large complex of Cahokia Mounds, on the east side of the Mississippi River.
[257] The renovation of the Old Post Office spurred development of an adjacent plaza, which is linked to a new $80 million residential building called Roberts Tower, the first new residential construction in downtown St. Louis since the 1970s. [54] After the purchase, the Baptist missionary John Mason Peck built the first Protestant church in St. Louis in 1818.
[194] St. Louis also was home to Wendell O. Pruitt, an African-American pilot who shot down three enemy aircraft and destroyed multiple ground targets in June 1944. [66] Smith would later be known for his explorations of the West and for being the first American to travel overland to California.
Joseph Rosati became the first bishop in 1827. [245], Although the arena opened in 1994 (and the original arena was demolished in 1999), renovations on the opera house did not begin until 2007. [201] The GI Bill allowed many St. Louis veterans to purchase homes and pursue higher education, which encouraged sub-urbanization that after the war reduced the city's population. Louis.
As of the election of Vincent Schoemehl as the city's youngest mayor ever in 1981, St. Louis's problems were more significant than many other rustbelt cities. [16][17] After the transfer, the Spanish confirmed French land grants, and Spanish soldiers provided local security.
[56] Followers of Mormonism arrived in 1831, and in 1854, they organized the first LDS church in St.
[224] A preGreat Depression annexation attempt by the city failed due to opposition from county voters, and only after World War II would more efforts be made toward consolidation.
In addition to attracting millions of visitors, the Arch ultimately spurred more than $500 million in downtown construction during the 1970s and 1980s.
[124] Between 1867 and 1874, work on the Eads Bridge over the Mississippi continued despite setbacks such as caisson disease. Beginning in the 1850s, St. Louis hosted annual agricultural and mechanical fairs at Fairground Park to connect with regional manufacturers and growers. Some native-born Americans reacted with fear to the newcomers, adopting nativist sentiments. [252], Starting in the early 1980s, more rehabilitation and construction projects began, some of which remain incomplete.
After the war, federal highway subsidies and postwar development encouraged outward migration as residents moved to gain newer housing; this suburbanization significantly reduced the city's middle-class population. [82] The first substantial educational effort came about under the authority of the Catholic Church, which in 1818 opened Saint Louis Academy, later renamed Saint Louis University. The history of St. Louis began with the settlement of the area by Native American mound builders who lived as part of the Mississippian culture from the 9th century to the 15th century, followed by other migrating tribal groups. [157] In 1899, delegates from states that had been part of the Louisiana Purchase met in St. Louis, selecting it as the site of a world's fair celebrating the centennial of the purchase in 1904. [162] Concurrently, the 1904 Summer Olympics were held in St. Louis, at what would become the campus of Washington University in St.
", Troen, Selwyn K. "Popular Education in Nineteenth Century St. Louis", Adler, Jeffrey S. "Streetwalkers, degraded outcasts, and good-for-nothing huzzies: women and the dangerous class in antebellum St.
[51][83] In 1832, the college applied for a state charter, and in December 1832, it became the first chartered university west of the Mississippi River. In 1855, the district opened a high school to considerable fanfare. During the early 1870s, the Eads Bridge was constructed over the Mississippi River, and the city established several large parks, including Forest Park. Extensive European exploration near the confluence of the Missouri and Mississippi rivers began nearly a century before the city was officially founded.
[18] As a compromise, Spanish governors ended the Indian slave trade but allowed the retention of current slaves and any children born to them. [130] Proposals for a free library system originated prior to the Civil War, and after the conflict the St. Louis Public School Library was established. Several were at the heart of the Whiskey Ring during the early 1870s, a conspiracy that began among St. Louis distillers and federal tax officials to avoid paying excise taxes. These farmers moved to towns such as Carondelet, St. Charles, and Florissant. St. Louis is known nationally and internationally for its architecture. The only building in the area to remain was the Old Cathedral.
[171] Although informal discrimination had existed in the St. Louis housing market since the end of the Civil War, only in 1916 did St. Louis pass a residential segregation ordinance.
[142], The introduction of the railroad in St. Louis helped spread the fortune and initialize much of this industrial success. [169][170] In 1925, local entrepreneur Albert Lambert purchased Kinloch Field, expanded its facilities, and renamed it Lambert Field.
[38], Initially, the governor of the Indiana Territory governed the Louisiana District (which included St. Louis), and the district's organizational law forbade the foreign slave trade and reduced the influence of St. Louis in the region. However, leading up to and before World War I, the population started to decrease as men were needed to work at the artillery plants and factories that were closer to the Atlantic. [210] In 1948, Finnish architect Eero Saarinen's design for an inverted and weighted catenary curve won the competition; however, groundbreaking did not occur until 1954. 
[169] The first airplane flight occurred in late 1909, and by the next year, an airfield had been established in nearby Kinloch, Missouri. Troen argues: When Missouri became a state in 1821, St. Louis County was created from the boundaries of the former St. Louis subdistrict of the Missouri Territory; St. Louis city existed within the county but was not coterminous with it.
Union Station's rail platform expanded in 1930 and operated as the passenger rail terminal for St. Louis into the 1970s.
[218] The other St. Louis housing projects remained relatively well-occupied through the 1980s, in spite of lingering problems with crime.
Louis. [265] In addition, St. Louis was named as the city with the highest crime rate in the United States by CQ Press in 2010, using data reported to the FBI in 2009.
[51][86] In 1853, William Greenleaf Eliot founded a second university in the city Washington University in St. [116] It also experienced rapid infrastructure and transportation development and the growth of heavy industry.
The economy remained weak through 1762 due to the ongoing war, which France lost the following year.
[256], Other downtown projects include the renovation of the Old Post Office, which started in 1998 and was completed in 2006.
[175] Leonidas C. Dyer, who represented part of St. Louis in the U.S. House, led a Congressional investigation into the events and eventually sponsored an anti-lynching bill in response. [38] On March 8 or 9, 1804, the flag of Spain was lowered at the government buildings in St. Louis and, according to local tradition, the flag of France was raised.
[255] The gentrification also has had the effect of increasing the downtown population, with both the central business district and Washington Avenue district more than doubling their population from 2000 to 2010.
[253] Among the areas to undergo gentrification was the Washington Avenue Historic District, which extends along Washington Avenue from the Edward Jones Dome west almost two dozen blocks. Designed by Louis Sullivan in 1891, the Wainwright was the tallest building in the city at the time of its construction and remains an example of early skyscraper design. [138] After a fraudulent election initially showed a rejection of the plan, a recount in December 1876 showed voters had approved the separation. The Cardinals moved into Busch Memorial Stadium early in the 1966 season.
Louis.
[207] The black population of St. Louis saw a natural increase of 19.5 percent during the 1960s, with no gain or loss through migration; during that decade, the overall percentage of black city residents rose from 29 to 41 percent.
[39] Wealthy St. Louisans petitioned Congress to review the system, and in July 1805, Congress reorganized the Louisiana District as the Louisiana Territory, with its territorial capital at St. Louis and its own territorial governor.
[40] From the division of the Louisiana Territory in 1812 to Missouri statehood in 1821, St. Louis was the capital of the Missouri Territory. [103] The 1844 riots derived from popular outrage and resentment toward human dissection, which was then taking place at the Saint Louis University Medical College.
[137] The new city charter also tripled the size of the city to include the new rural parks (such as Forest Park) and the useful riverfront from the MissouriMississippi confluence to the mouth of the River Des Peres. [209] Demolition continued until the outbreak of World War II, when the area began to be used as a parking lot.
[200] By late 1945, returning soldiers encountered a chronic housing and job shortage in the city.
[69], Construction of the County Courthouse in the late 1820s also encouraged growth, with an addition of western lots to Ninth Street and a new City Hall adjacent to the river in 1833.
Starting in the 1980s and continuing into the following century, construction and gentrification have increased in some areas of St. Louis, particularly downtown. [145], St. Louis became home to whiskey distilleries. [165] Since the 1890s, St. Louis had attempted to control its air pollution problems with little success, but damage to buildings and flora made the issue more visible during the 1920s.
[187], During World War II, St. Louis was the location of a large ammunition factory and the Curtiss-Wright aircraft factory. [150] Starting in the 1890s, the district known as Chestnut Valley (an area near the present-day Scottrade Center) became the home of St. Louis ragtime. [42], Commerce after the Louisiana Purchase remained focused on the fur trade; operations in St. Louis were led by the Chouteau family and its alliance with the Osages and by Manuel Lisa and his Missouri Fur Company.
Due to local political and economic disputes, the city separated from St. Louis County in 1876 and became an independent city. 
[236] The agreement also called for white students from the county to voluntarily attend city magnet schools, in an effort to desegregate the City's remaining schools.
The local militia was used to end the fighting.
[4] As part of a series of forts in the Mississippi valley, the French built settlements at Cahokia and Kaskaskia, Illinois.
[102], Nativist sentiment increased in St. Louis during the late 1840s, leading to mob attacks and riots in 1844, 1849, and 1852. Regulations on elections prevented fighting in future elections in 1856 and 1858. [245] Among these was the tallest building in the city, One Metropolitan Square, which was designed by Hellmuth, Obata and Kassabaum and built in 1989.
He introduced lager beer, which quickly became the city's most popular choice. The families also had marital ties to Spanish government officials, including the lieutenant governors Piernas and Cruzat.
[258], As early as 1999, the St. Louis Cardinals began pushing for the construction of a new Busch Stadium as part of a broader trend in Major League Baseball toward stadium building.
[35], The Spanish government secretly returned the unprofitable Louisiana territory to France in October 1800 in the Treaty of San Ildefonso.
", Lee, Jacob F. "Race, Empire, and Capital in St. Louis From William Clark to Michael Brown. [45] The population increase stirred interest in statehood for Missouri, and in 1820, Congress passed the Missouri Compromise, authorizing Missouri's admission as a slave state. [47] Shortly thereafter, St. Louis incorporated as a city, on December 9, 1822. [203], The city reached its highest recorded census population in 1950, reaching 856,796, and its population peaked in the early 1950s with approximately 880,000 residents.
[55] The Presbyterian Church in St. Louis began as a Bible reading society in 1811, and in December 1817 members organized a church and built a chapel late the next year.
[230] However, Schoemehl developed two projects early in his three terms in office that assisted St. Louis: Operation Brightside provided city beautification through plantings and graffiti cleanup.
Many moved to suburban developments in St. Louis County. The city also began to see an increase in immigrants from Mexico, Vietnam, Ethiopia, and Somalia. [250], In January 1995, Georgia Frontiere, the owner of the National Football League team known as the Los Angeles Rams (now St. Louis Rams), announced she would move that team to St.
[140] The greatest number of complaints to the St. Louis Board of Health were due to industries engaged in rendering, which produced noxious fumes.
During the early 1990s, garment manufacturers moved out of the large office buildings on the street, and by the end of that decade residential developers began to convert the buildings into lofts.
[4] La Salle named the Mississippi river basin La Louisiane (Louisiana) after King Louis XIV; the region between and near the confluence of the Ohio and Mississippi rivers was named the Illinois Country. However, during the 1890s, manufacturing growth slowed dramatically.
[131], Racially segregated schools had operated secretly and illegally in St. Louis since the 1820s, but in 1864, an integrated group of St. Louisans formed the Board of Education for Colored Schools, which established schools without public finances for more than 1,500 black pupils in 1865.
