Neighborhood Stabilization and Historic Preservation: Recreating a Sense of Place

Across the country, many neighborhoods have leveraged their historic capital to create more cohesive communities and attract outside investment. Successful examples include:

• the Over-the-Rhine district in Cincinnati
• the Soulard neighborhood of St. Louis

In both of these cases, coordinated historic preservation campaigns helped stabilize the physical fabric of the neighborhood and nurture a sense of identify among residents.

Old North St. Louis is an ideal candidate for such heritage-based revitalization.

A rich history

North St. Louis in 1851.

Old North St. Louis was established as an independent village to compete with the City of St. Louis for river trade to and from Alton, Illinois. Since then it has been a turnstile for successive waves of immigrants who settled, worked in the nearby factories, and then moved on to the suburbs as they made their way into the middle class. After World War II, the neighborhood continued growing as rural migrants, both white and black, moved from the American south.

Churches and a fondly-remembered candy store still draw the descendants of the original immigrants to the neighborhood on a regular basis. Factories, shops, public bath houses, and houses--many of them abandoned--tell a story of how life was lived under very different circumstances and how people got along with one another in the past.

Connecting past with present

UMSL faculty and students as well as neighborhood residents are excavating several sites in Old North St. Louis. Their findings will be used to interpret the history of the community.

Old North St. Louis was placed on the National Historic Register in 1984. Since then, there have been attempts to rehabilitate some of the neighborhood's 19th-century homes. Yet, for many residents, the neighborhood's past remains a mystery, or fails to resonate with their own life experiences.

A major goal of the Old North Neighborhood Partnership is to integrate the neighborhood's recent history with its more remote past and by involving the community in the process of interpreting this history. Public history projects offer a way to engage citizens in the discussion of their shared past. These projects help build social bonds, promoting community stability and harmony.

Where the Old North Neighborhood Partnership is focusing

• Recording the Oral History of Old North St. Louis Residents

  UMSL students and faculty are working with Old North St. Louis residents and former residents to record oral histories, and then translate these tapes, along with accompanying historical documents and footage, into a video documentary that will tell the story of the neighborhood. Check back in spring 2003 for more information.

• Developing a Bicycle Tour of the Old North St. Louis Neighborhood

UMSL faculty and students are assisting Old North St. Louis residents in the development of a bicycle tour that will link with the North Riverfront Trail, located along the Mississippi Riverfront only blocks to the east of the neighborhood. Click here for the latest version of the tour map, as well as a description of historical sites on the tour.

• Creating a Community Gathering Place

A new project "on the drawing board" in Old North St. Louis is the development of a community center space, to serve both as a gathering place for residents and a place for visitors to learn about the history of the neighborhood. Check back in fall 2004 for an update on the neighborhood museum project.

• Digging into the Past through Archaeology

  On Saturdays throughout the semester, University faculty and students are partnering with neighborhood residents, school students and Boy Scout troops to explore the neighborhood's history from an archaeological perspective. A field school is being planned for the summer of 2003 which will provide new opportunities for uncovering the past of Old North St. Louis.


See slideshow overview of the archaeology program.