The Missouri Historical Society’s Library and Research Center proves the perfect portal to transport college students through St. Louis history.

Dozens of students from Washington University in St. Louis are learning how the Missouri Historical Society’s Library and Research Center (LRC) can help them perform historical research, as part of a course on American cities in the 19th and 20th centuries. Half of their course grade is based on a research project on the history of a St. Louis neighborhood that has vanished—LaClede Town.

Courtyard of Grand Forest Apartments in LaClede Town, Jan. 11, 1985. Photograph by McCrea Photography, 1985. MHS Photographs and Prints.

In the late 1960s, LaClede Town was receiving national attention as a vibrant and thriving planned interracial neighborhood of low- and moderate-income musicians, artists, students, and working families. However, the neighborhood was all but abandoned and condemned by the 1980s. Looking at why this happened, as well as what the area was like decades before, is part of the inspiration for the course. And fortunately for these students, mostly from Washington University’s School of Architecture, one of the best resources for St. Louis history is the Missouri Historical Society’s Library and Research Center, within walking distance of their campus.

With the help of the staff and the wealth of resources at the LRC, the students have been able to trace the buildings, people, and social institutions of the city blocks that encompassed LaClede Town. Margaret Garb, assistant professor of American history, developed the course to introduce students to questions, methods, and sources employed by students of urban history. “The course is really designed to get students to think about the history of American cities, but more importantly, to think about how you relate that history to open spaces, parks, etc.,” she said. “They become urban scholars themselves.”

A fire insurance map showing one of the city blocks that later became LaClede Town. Photograph © 2007, Missouri Historical Society.

The project originated from Garb’s own research. “I wrote a book about the history of home ownership in Chicago. Looking at insurance maps and building plans was integral to my own research. I transferred that technique to St. Louis and built an assignment around those strategies.”

The LaClede Town project has two components, research and writing. First, students work in groups of three to five to research a city block of the nine-block area that comprised the neighborhood. Using fire insurance maps, land clearance records, and city directories available at the LRC, students answer such questions as when buildings were constructed and/or demolished, how the construction was financed, what materials were used in constructing buildings, how buildings were used, and the demographics of the block.

Architecture major Cynthia Mancha has been focusing on the block at the intersection of Ewing and Laclede avenues. For her research, she has found the fire insurance maps to be most helpful. “They give so much specific detail and note changes over time,” she said. The LRC is just one of the stops in Mancha’s research. She’ll also head to city hall to see how buildings were constructed and torn down.

	Washington University freshman Daniel DuGoff researches names and addresses in one of the LRC’s city directories. Photograph © 2007, Missouri Historical Society.

Student Daniel DuGoff’s group is homing in on the 2800 block of Laclede Avenue. “My part was to compile a list of everyone who lived on the block, using the city directories,” said DuGoff, who is also majoring in architecture. “I’m looking at the length of time someone stayed in one location.” Of his findings, he said, “It’s interesting to see when the schools changed from white to black [between 1920 and 1923] and how that changed the demographics of the area. He also mentions a shift from residential to commercial real estate. “A steel manufacturing plant moved into the block around 1929. It’s interesting that the people who lived on the left side of the plant stayed, but those people on the right side of it moved out.” He added with a shrug, “Maybe it was louder on the right side.” Whatever the reason for the exodus of residents, the steel company had bought most of the surrounding land and taken over half of the block by the 1930s.

	Children playing in a courtyard in LaClede Town. Photograph by CDA photographer, late 1960s. MHS Photographs and Prints.

The second part of the project consists of a 10- to 15-page essay on LaClede Town. “I encourage them to write about what jumps out at them during their research,” Garb said. “It might be looking at the great migration and when it happened, the numbers of African Americans moving into St. Louis, and the impact of that migration.” Other possible themes might include racial change and racial segregation in 20th-century American cities, tracking the careers of artists who lived or worked on a specific block, or social, institutional, and economic changes from the late 19th to 20th centuries.

Getting students to venture off campus was another one of Professor Garb’s goals in developing this course. “A lot of Washington University students haven’t really been off of campus or downtown and are frightened by the prospect of going to city hall,” she said. “This way, it’s less intimidating to them. I want to get them to think like a scholarly community, scholars sharing ideas.”

Dennis Northcott, associate archivist for the Missouri Historical Society, discusses one of the city blocks that made up LaClede Town during a presentation to students at Washington University in St. Louis. Photograph © 2007, Missouri Historical Society.

To acquaint them with the LRC, MHS associate archivist Dennis Northcott went to the university to give a presentation to Garb’s students. “MHS has been a tremendous help in the students’ research,” Garb said. “Most of the students had never done any research before or been to the MHS facility before.”

DuGoff spent several hours at the LRC in February, and he said it changed the way he does research. “I’m spending more time researching because I’m going to the actual sources, not just reading what others have already compiled. I’m trying to understand what a historian would figure out from these resources.”

DuGoff’s experience is exactly what Garb hopes for her students. “The student who sticks it out and does the research ends up with a great sense of accomplishment—a sense of what it means to actually do historical research. For the most part, students talk about how they can’t believe they’ve done this work and done this big and complex research paper. They feel they know St. Louis better,” she said.

One of Garb’s former students learned about historical research, became an intern at MHS, then received a Fulbright scholarship to study Turkish immigrant neighborhoods in Berlin. “She began by using the techniques from my class, tracing property titles and the history of those who lived on the block,” she said. “In fact, I’ve had two students from this course go to urban planning school to become urban planners. There is a social conscience among these students.”

And as for what can be learned from studying LaClede Town, Garb is hopeful that someone will write a history of the community and its phenomenon. LaClede Town may be long gone, but thanks to professors like Margaret Garb and resources like those available at the Library and Research Center, the community and what can be learned from it won’t be forgotten.

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