MoHistory

John O’Fallon barely knew his father James, but the lingering tales of his father as a “reckless, debt-ridden adventurer” certainly contributed to John’s lifelong obsession with business success. While in his early 20s, John heard from his famous uncle William Clark about the incredible amount of goods moving through St. Louis, and headed there in …

Continue reading "The Namesake of O’Fallon, Missouri"

Listen to an episode about W. C. Handy and the “St. Louis Blues” on our Here’s History podcast with KDHX. If there is one song that is most closely identified with St. Louis, it would be “St. Louis Blues,” by W. C. Handy. It’s been recorded more than 1,800 times and is, after all, the …

Continue reading "How Nights under the Eads Bridge Led to a Classic St. Louis Song"

Listen to an episode about Miriam Coste Senseney on our Here’s History podcast with KDHX. Do you have a 5-second rule in your house? That when you drop food on the floor, you can pick it up and eat it if it’s within 5 seconds? What about expiration dates? Will you drink milk after it’s …

Continue reading "St. Louis’s Food Safety Crusader"

In the early 1900s, a staggering number of men spent their days gathered in saloons, escaping their responsibilities on an ocean of booze. Some lost their family’s income one beer at a time, while others rendered themselves so stammering drunk they couldn’t make it to work. Beer buckets even let them take “one for the …

Continue reading "Carrie Nation’s Hatchetations"

This year marks the 165th anniversary of Scott v. Sandford, one of the most famous US Supreme Court decisions. On March 6, 1857, the court ruled that a Black family from St. Louis, Dred and Harriet Scott and daughters Eliza and Lizzie Scott, were personal property, not citizens. The Scotts’ court case demonstrated how Black …

Continue reading "Dred and Harriet Scott’s Freedom Suit"

Dr. Gerty Cori, a Washington University in St. Louis professor and the recipient of the 1947 Nobel Prize for medicine, was asked to sum up her beliefs on a radio program in 1951. She said, “I believe that cynicism and despair are inimical to first rate achievements in art and science. . . . Honesty …

Continue reading "Gerty Cori’s Nobel First"

“The Barn,” the loving nickname given to the Arena by St. Louisans, is actually quite appropriate. It opened in 1929 as a proud new home for the National Dairy Show, an annual livestock prize contest. Although it featured the show just once, the name stuck on St. Louis’s huge new entertainment space. For 70 years …

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The life and career of Joseph William “J. W.” Postlewaite is elusive and fascinating. For years he and his various bands and orchestras entertained audiences across the St. Louis area. He composed and published works that proved popular in the Midwest. However, his identity as a Black man was either accepted or hidden, depending on …

Continue reading "St. Louis’s Forgotten 19th-Century Black Composer"

Listen to an episode about Satchel Paige on our Here’s History podcast with KDHX. St. Louis is the home of many baseball legends, players like Stan Musial, Dizzy Dean, and Bob Gibson. But there’s one legendary pitcher who had a long and storied history with the city of St. Louis, even though he never played …

Continue reading "An All-Star Pitcher for the Ages: Satchel Paige"

Listen to an episode about Nathan B. Young on our Here’s History podcast with KDHX. Nathan B. Young Jr., a prominent African American judge in St. Louis, passed away in 1993 at the age of 98. It’s amazing to think about what he experienced over those years—from the Harlem Renaissance and the Great Depression to …

Continue reading "Jurist, Painter, Pioneer: Nathan B. Young"

Often called Missouri’s first Black city, Kinloch has faced more than its share of struggles, but those who grew up there are proud to have called it home. The story of Kinloch illustrates the complex legacy of housing discrimination and segregation within St. Louis, as well as the ways Black communities came together and supported …

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St. Louisan Roscoe Robinson Jr. became the first African American four-star general in the US Army. In retirement he also served on the Board of Directors for Northwest Airlines, McDonnell Douglas, Metropolitan Life Insurance, and Giant Foods. Robinson’s leadership philosophy was “take responsibility for those under you, set goals, be willing to listen, be decisive …

Continue reading "Roscoe Robinson Jr.: A Journey of Excellence"

Historian Carter G. Woodson organized the first national Black History Week (then called Negro History Week) in February 1926. The celebration’s purpose was to recognize the central role Black people played in the development of the US. Woodson chose the second week of February to coincide with the birthdays of abolitionist Frederick Douglass and President …

Continue reading "Black History Month in St. Louis: A Timeline"

The Lindbergh 100 Project is made possible in part by the Institute of Museum and Library Services MA-30-19-0454-19. Charles and Anne Lindbergh spent three weeks visiting Greenland during a survey flight expedition in the summer of 1933. They were investigating a potential northern route to Europe for commercial airlines. The Lindberghs took the trip in …

Continue reading "Charles and Anne Lindbergh’s Greenland Inuit Kayak"

The following is excerpted from David Ramsey’s piece on Fontella Bass in the Oxford American’s Up South issue. As a teenager, Fontella Bass played piano or organ at various churches around the St. Louis area, including Morning Star Missionary Baptist Church, which bought its first organ for Fontella to play (at this time, despite eventually …

Continue reading "Fontella Bass: Can’t You See That I’m Lonely?"

Public housing challenges affected low-income communities across the nation, but it was St. Louis’s 1969 rent strike that brought these problems into focus as residents in Pruitt-Igoe and other public housing facilities grappled with the system’s shortcomings. Though rent strikes were becoming a common form of protest in the 1960s and 1970s, St. Louis had …

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Written by TMH Apprentice Gabby Johnson Artists like Ella Fitzgerald, Nat King Cole, and Billie Holiday are widely known for the well-loved music they produced. Less familiar to the public is the history behind the often segregated venues in which they performed, many of them in St. Louis. Castle Ballroom and Cave Hall There were …

Continue reading "Segregated St. Louis Dance Halls"

Woven clothes have been around for thousands of years, but hardly anyone makes their own today. Since agriculture enhanced society some 1,500 years ago, animals and plants have been readily available to harvest hair or natural fiber. Cleaning and smoothing the fiber, spinning it into thread, then weaving it into cloth that can be cut …

Continue reading "Grandma Bugg’s Rocker Loom"

This post is part of a series exploring menus with holiday connections. Barnum’s Hotel Theron Barnum opened his first major hotel in Philadelphia before moving to St. Louis in 1840 with his wife Mary Lay Chadwick. He took over the City Hotel on Third and Vine in the Spring of 1848. Less than five years later Barnum retire …

Continue reading "Holiday Menus from the Collections: New Year’s Eve"

If you grew up in the St. Louis area, you likely saw a film at a Wehrenberg Theatres location at some point. Moviegoers can still recall the whispered name that played at the end of the company’s pre-movie video: “Wehrenberg. Wehrenberg. Wehrenberg.” The legacy of how it became the US’s oldest and largest family-owned movie …

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