RGHStory 2 Ep 4
EPISODE 4
(Published April 10, 2022)
1-2-3
THAT’S HOW ELEMENTARY
IT’S GONNA TO BE
As good fortune would have it, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch published a facinating article on May 13, 2021, discussing how growth in the St. Louis suburbs exploded after WWII. Many of the figures I am using below come from this article.
In 1950, the City of St. Louis was jam-packed with 856,700 residents, 200 of whom were leaving each week to live in new subdivisions in St. Louis County. In 1941, residents in St. Louis County numbered 274,200. By 1960, St. Louis County’s population reached 700,000 and continued to grow. From 1945 to 1955, school-age residents doubled to 125,000 in St. Louis County. In 1930, St. Louis County claimed 20 municipalities, most near the City of St. Louis or railroad lines stretching from the City. By the end of 1950, the number of municipalities had increased to 84, including the Village of Moline Acres, the City of Bellefontaine Neighbors and the Village of Riverview, with the Village of Dellwood joining ranks in 1951.
In 1940, St. Louis County issued 3,600 building permits. By comparison, more than 83,000 housing units were built during the 1950s and more than 96,000 were built during the 1960s. Among those thousands of building permits issued in the early 1950s were those for homes in three new subdivisions located in the Riverview Gardens School District: Hathaway Hills, Glasgow Village and Bissell Hills. These three subdivisions were the early trailblazers in scale, construction concepts and techniques, floor plan design, and modern home equipment and appliances.
The developer of Hathaway Hills was the first to file its initial plats in 1949 and 1950 and break ground to build its new homes. Sales were brisk. The developer of Glasgow Village followed suit in 1950 and 1951, selling out the first two plats in record time. Likewise, there was no stopping the developer of Bissell Hills after the first plat was filed in August 1951.
Amassing 4,700 homes within the District boundaries, these three subdivisons alone ushered in many of the families with children who would begin their school years in the District and graduate from Riverview Gardens High School. I have bombarded you with all of these numbers to give you an idea of the scope of what was happening precisely around the time we were born. Now, I want to explore each of these subdivisons individaully, starting with Hathaway Hills, the first major new subdivision in the Riverview Gardens School District after the 1949 annexation.
HATHAWAY HILLS
HATHAWAY HILLS SUBDIVISION MAP
Hathaway Hills followed the lead of a few earlier subdivisons in the Riverview Gardens School District to feature “Hills” in its name. Early promotional ads stated that the “location lies high, making it very desirable from the standpoint of health, air, sunshine and cleanliness. Property situated in this manner commands a very stable valuation.” St. Louis Post-Dispatch, September 11, 1949. As we travel through the District, you’ll see certain naming patterns such as the “Hills” moniker, something I had never noticed before. Without success, I tried to discover where the name “Hathaway” originated, especially since it is used in other subdivisions in the District.
In August 1952, Ann and Morgan Lingenfelter and their three kids (17 year-old Danny, 12 year-old Mickey and 1 year-old Patti) moved into their new home at 1000 Hopedale Drive. Patti’s was the first family to take up residence on Hopedale Drive. You can locate Hopedale on the Hathaway Hills Subdivision Map above.
Promotional Ad for Hathaway Hills No. 5 (Plat 5) property on which Patti Lingenfelter's home at 1000 Hopedale was located. The ad shows both 2 Bedroom and 3 Bedroom floor plans.
Patti Lingenfelter and her nephew, Lil Danny. In the background are two classic Hathaway Hills brick homes with awnings and one-car garages on Filibert Drive. LINGENFELTER FAMILY COLLECTION
1000 Hopedale Sketch. Patti Lingenfelter's home contained 982 square feet of living area. The garage contained 220 square feet, just enough room for the Lingenfelter family car. The sketch also shows the front porch and a patio in the backyard. ST. LOUIS COUNTY REAL ESTATE INFORMATION
As you see on the Subdivsion Map above, Hathaway Hills is located near the Halls Ferry Circle. P.E. Vorhof and Milton Duenke, builders who operated as the developer under the name Milton Construction Company, constructed approximately 1,000 homes, 700 of which were situated in the Riverview Gardens School District, with the balance in the Jennings School District. The first 95 homes were constructed in the Jennings School District in an area between Highway 367 and Halls Ferry Road. That portion of Hathaway Hills serviced by the Riverview Gardens School District was located east of Highway 367 and stradled Jennings Station Road, with about 220 homes found south of Jennings Station Road featuring streets named Duenke, Edgewater, Astoria, Yukon, Waldorf, Dell, Longridge, Garwood, Kimball, Hamlet and La Rue.
The north side of Jennings Station provided 480 new Hathaway Hills homes in the School District. Duenke (where Mona See lived), Waldorf, Wentworth (where Deb Hussey lived), Astoria, Newark, Bluegrass, Harden (where Dave Gould lived), Yorktown, Acosta, Aetna, Ardmore and Dunford (where Nancy Wheeler lived) were to the west, and Harnell, Halbrook, Filibert, Fontaine Place and Patti’s home on Hopedale were to the east. Diana Griffin and Mike Michalik also lived in Hathaway Hills homes on St. Cyr. Hathaway Hills stradled another major thoroughfare in the District—Bellefontaine Road, leading to Marias (where Dan Green and Mike Howard lived) and Lebon (where Pat Blakeney, Angie LaFata and Bruce Groves lived).
The pictured home is located at 1257 Jennings Station Road at its intersection with Duenke Drive in Hathaway Hills. We are looking east and can see the Portland Cement smoke stacks in the distance. One lone car is traveling on Jennings Station Road. The vacant foreground is reserved for future retail on Highway 367. St. Louis Post-Dispatch, May 13, 2021.
On Monday, September 18, 1950, Milton announced the initial price offerings at $14,250 to $17,500. On Tuesday, September 19, a line had formed outside the display home by 8:30 a.m. and, by 9:15 a.m., 43 home-buyers had signed contracts and made deposits on homes in Hathaway Hills that were near completion or in the last days of construction. The Vorhof-Duenke Real Estate Co., sales agent for Milton and Hathaway Hills, claimed a home-selling record: 43 sales in 45 mintes!
Milton reserved several sites at the intersection of Jennings Station Road and Highway 367 for a shopping district and retail businesses. I remember Rapps Supermarket at the southeast corner and who can forget Howard Johnson’s on the northwest corner? My favorites were the fried clams with skinny French Fries and the chocolate ice-cream soda. Yum!
On the northern border of the subdivision, Milton dedicated land along St. Cyr Road for Our Lady of Good Council Catholic Church, where Patti attended grades 1-5 before finishing grade school at Danforth Elementary and then moving on to Central Junior High and RGHS.
Patti looks pretty happy having her photograph taken with her Dad, Morgan Lingenfelter. LINGENFELTER FAMILY COLLECTION
In August 2021, Pat described her experiences in Hathaway Hills: Growing up there was wonderful. Our neighborhood was full of caring neighbors, lots of kids, a strong Church Community and great schools. I feel I received a good education. And my social life was full. Dancing school, softball, swimming, bowling, school picnics, bike riding, sledding and playing in the snow are just a few of the things my friends and I did. I am now 70 years old and will always hold tight to my great memories of living at 1000 Hopedale Drive.
Recent photograph of 1000 Hopedale.
Ann and Morgan Lingenfelter sold their home on Hopedale in October 1972, a year and a half after Pat married her high school beau, the late Jim Sanders (RGHS 1967).
Twenty years earlier, another couple moved into a new home in Glasgow Village, the second major new subdivision in the Riverview Gardens School District.
GLASGOW VILLAGE
Glasgow Village Subdivision Map
Our new house in Glasgow was like a mansion. It had everything—a bathroom, running water, a garbage disposal. I had never heard of a garbage disposal. We had room for our dining furniture. I was the first person in my family to own a home. Helen Byers (Taped Interview with Jane Byers on September 3, 2006)
The GLASGOW VILLAGE home includes many extra items of construction and convenience that will brighten the heart of any housewife. St. Louis Post-Dispatch, July 29, 1951
GLASGOW VILLAGE is in the making and if you are home-minded, it will be well worth the effort for you to look over the plans for this attractive village. It is conveniently located north in the rolling country along the Mississippi. The spot is historic, being the old Glasgow property, one of St. Louis’ oldest property grants, dating back to the territorial days. St. Louis Post-Dispatch, September 9, 1951
In July 1952, Helen and Thurlo Byers and their two girls, Cheryl (aka Sherry or Cher) and Janey, ages 3 and 1, moved into their new home at 341 Caithness Road in Glasgow Village. Helen was pregnant with their third child, Tommy, who was born in November 1952. They paid $11,000 for their first home, borrowing the $1,000 downpayment from Thurlo’s Dad, who at age 81 mortgaged his own home in Gideon, Missouri in order to provide them with the funds. Thurlo was making $67 a week, the equivalent of their monthly mortgage payment. The present value of $11,000 in 1952 is approximately $108,000 in 2021; the present value of $67 in 1952 is approximately $659 in 2021; and the present value of Thurlo’s $3,484 annual salary in 1952 is about $34,200 in 2021 dollars. Helen and Thurlo also had looked at the display homes in Bissell Hills and Hathaway Hills but bought in Glasgow Village because the homes there were not as expensive as the other two neighborhoods. With another kid on the way, they also definitely needed 3 bedrooms, a great feature and selling point for every single Glasgow home.
Sherry and Janey Byers are all dressed up with nowhere to go. It's the summer of 1953 and their home in Glasgow Village at 341 Caithness is directly behind them. There's a tractor and a dog in the front yard and someone is standing behind the screened door. Dad has installed planters below the front bedroom windows and built a stone flower bed to the right of the porch. The shingles on the house are made of asbestos. Some scrawny trees seem to be holding their own, the neighborhood is starting to get a leg up and the girls look pretty pleased. BYERS FAMILY COLLECTION
A headline in the September 16, 1951 edition of the St. Louis Globe-Democrat declared “Glasgow Village Could Ultimately Cost $25,000,000 and Provide 2200 Units.” Units referred to both houses and apartments. As it turned out, houses predominated. A small section of apartment buildings was added to the development after most of the houses were built.
Glasgow Village came in waves—16 waves to be precise.The first wave came in August 1950, when the first plat was recorded, and the last wave started in June 1956, when the sixteenth plat was recorded. By that time, the Class of 1969 was primed to begin Kindergarten in September 1956.
The two grand roadways that ran the full length and the full width of the Village were Spring Garden, the eastern boundary off of Riverview Drive, and Shepley Drive between Spring Garden and Lilac Avenue, the western boundary. Shepley Drive meandered all the way from Lilac to Spring Garden, a road that first appeared in a 1929 subdivision of 33 lots called Glasgow Woods, located between Spring Garden and Lookaway Drive. Shepley was named in honor of John R. Shepley, an early supporter of Washington University. I am not sure of the origins of Lilac Avenue but believe it may have originated in 1894 with the Prospect Hill subdivision. All of the other streets in Glasgow Village are Scottish names, except “Valley Road,” an extension of Valley Road that was part of the 1917 Riverview Gardens subdivision.
The 362-acre development in unincorporated St. Louis County was named after a prominent St. Louis family that owned the land via an original 1838 land grant. It was the family’s desire to commemorate its Scottish heritage. M.H. Carpenter, Inc., the developer, C.T. Wilson Contracting Company, the builder, and Paul Klingensmith and Associates, the architect, adhered to the original vision of the Glasgow family and created a subdivision of winding roads and cul-de-sacs featuring a super colossal 1,730 new 6-room homes of approximately 900 square feet, give or take. The houses in the early waves had a footprint of 854 square feet, unless you were Debbie Rhoades, whose parents bought a house on Renfrew with 1,022 square feet of living area (including a breezeway) and a one-car garage. Debbie’s house had fabulous curb appeal with white shingles, red awnings with white fringe, red and white shutters and a red and white garage door! I passed it every day on my walks to and from school. Most Glasgow houses featured driveways only, though later waves included the occasional garage or carports, as did Karen Sandt’s home on Ben Nevis.
341 Caithness Sketch. The main dwelling and frame overhang constituted 854 square feet of living area in the Byers home. The frame overhang created an alcove at the back of the dining room, where the family's upright piano found a home. Jane's Dad built the concrete patio/screened porch when she was around 4 years old. The wood deck was added years later. When Jane's sister Lavonne (the fifth kid) was born in 1959, her Dad built a bedroom and bathroom for her and her sister Sherry in a full third of the basement. Initially, the bedroom was decorated in pink and white. It was a dream. The two girls had lots of privacy and it wasn't long before they had a phone in their room. For as small as the house was, it never felt small. ST. LOUIS COUNTY REAL ESTATE INFORMATION
10410 Renfrew Sketch. Debbie Rhoades' house included a breezeway that added 168 feet of living area in her Glasgow Village home. Her Dad finished the breezeway as a family room where they hung out year-round. They also had a one car garage! ST. LOUIS COUNTY REAL ESTATE INFORMATION
Debbie Rhoades' house at 10410 Renfrew. A picture is worth a thousand words! Thanks to Debbie and her sister Cheryl Rhoades (RGHS 1972) for providing the picture of their fabulous Glasgow Village home. RHOADES FAMILY COLLECTION
Glasgow houses were built by the “factory in the field” method. In other words, there was a tremendous amount of construction staging going on directly at the subdivision site before the houses in each wave started going up. Saw sheds, framing jigs and other construction equipment were assembled into a “factory,” where specialized crews prefabricated many parts of the houses before they were affixed to foundations. Whole walls were constructed in panels and roof trusses were framed in advance, all at the site. Cranes then lifted the walls and trusses into place after foundations were poured. The Glasgow site was wooded, rugged terrain. Clearing the building sites and pouring foundations required heavy machinery and large units of construction equipment, some of which C.T. Wilson Contracting designed to accomplish the job at hand. Site fabrication, mass-production of building components and houses, as well as the purchase by the builder of large quantities of construction materials, contributed to a reduction in the construction cost of each home. The initial offering ran from $10,050 to $12,000. Price variations were governed by lot-size and whether the house had a garage or carport, or neither.
ASSEMBLY-LINE PRODUCTION IN GLASGOW VILLAGE.
By September 1951, the first wave of houses, numbering about 128, had been completed and occupied on a small stretch of Spring Garden and on Cameron, Dudley, Ross, Estridge and Trongate. Classmates who lived in this section of the Village were Ellen Leonard, Allen Hellman, Greg Molnar and Bruce Schulz. The second wave of 132 houses was under construction at that time on Cameron, Renfrew, Crawford and Galloway. The third wave came on-line in 1952 on Cameron, Renfrew, Caithness, Lanark and Lancashire. Nancy Jackson and I moved to Caithness Road in the summer of 1952. Patty Geller joined us in 1956. Cindy McBride, Patty Kelly, Kathie Merinbaum, Ann Brady, Nancy Hall, Steve Edwards, Debbie Rhoades, Debbie Kotyk, Bill Harlan and Fred Joshu were among our classmates who lived on other streets of the second and third waves.
GLASGOW VILLAGE FROM THE AIR. It's interesting to see what the first two waves looked like from the air. Plus, it appears that just a few houses have been built in Denness Hills in the Village of Riverview by the early 1950s. It's amazing how thick the woods are in this picture.
Fourth and fifth wave plats were filed in June 1952 for Presley, Balmoral, Tay, Midlothian, Banff and Renfrew, where Paul Palecek, Patty Gabbert, Ken DeBeer, Dennis McCormick, Barb Arnold, Bob Herkenhoff, Runa Caquelard, John Ranes, Cathy Hunt and Dennis Greenwood would take up residence. Ken DeBeer remembers that he and Denny Greenwood, who both lived on Midlothian, entertained themselves by walking all over the neighborhood on stilts!
With 1953 came the sixth, seventh and eighth waves, which included houses on Renfrew, Shepley, Macdougall, Prestwick, Gretna, Braemer, Dunkeld and Lothian, completing the middle section of Glasgow Village between Renfrew and Spring Garden. Classmates who would live in these houses were Don Hutchison, Carl Chappell, Pat Kern, John Banocy, Susan Hynek, Jim Barbour, Ralph Beam and Linda Schnuriger. Plus, Billy Ochterbeck lived between, and right next door to, Sherry Anderson and Jerry Standeford on Shepley.
A TYPICAL STREET IN GLASGOW VILLAGE
1954 and 1955 saw the development of the next three waves—the entire northeast section of the Village, anchored on the east by Spring Garden Drive, leading directly to Chain of Rocks Park. Perthshire, Grampian, Ben Nevis, Glen Garry, Moidart, McAlpine, Roderick, Brigadoon, Monteith, Mcduff and Dundee are familiar street names to classmates who lived here: Ray Johnston, Debbie Sexauer, Evelyn Harbison, Wayne Ream, Sharon Otten, Christine Ponder, Fred Hennig, Ann McLaughlin, Debra Brown, Pam Hauck, Steve Koester, Joan Beach, Mike Dunham, Pat Hourston, Jeff Hill, Karen Sandt, Wes Walters, Marilyn Varney, Paula Owen, Ed Fleming, Trudy Mardis, Lauran Kowalski, Steve Bremer, Pat Perry, Debbie Penrod, Doug White, Debbie Kamm, Michelle McMurry and Sonja Geraud. In our school days you could see Evelyn Harbison and Sharon Otten riding their bikes to each others houses, Evelyn’s on Dundee Circle and Sharon’s on Spring Garden.
With the completion of the fourteenth, fifteenth and sixteenth waves on the far west side of the Village, houses on Shepley, Lilac, Durness, Gourock, Hobkirk, Melvich, Wishaw, Banavie, Dornoch, Kirkwall and Valley became homes for John Bruenger, Lyn Baker, Scott Drysdale, Tonya Peich, Maria Bommarito, Bob Streicher, Ron Lessnau, Mike Pitts, Barb Quirk, Steve Mendoza and Joe Paulsen. Joe’s family moved into a house at the south end of Durness near the Village of Riverview boundary line. He remembers that they moved into the first house that was finished on that end of Durness in the summer of 1956. When they first moved, the land between his house and the new Riverview Gardens High School on Shepley was wooded. The woods steadily and methodically disappeared as new houses were completed. He also remembers playing in the basements of nearby houses as they were being constructed. The Paulsens moved just in time for Joe to start Kindergarten at Glasgow Elementary School, located at the north end of Durness.
Glasgow Village would also become home to a thriving shopping center at the intersection of Spring Garden and Shepley. The center was anchored by a Tomboy grocery store, a Rexall drugstore and a Ben Franklin dimestore (where Edith Jackson, Nancy's Mom, worked). When I received my first quarter allowance in grade school, I spent an entire Saturday roaming Ben Franklin and eyeing all the treasures, trying to decide what to buy! Other essential establishments included a bakery, a dry cleaners, a hardware store, a laundromat, a doctor’s office, a dance studio, a barber shop, a beauty shop, a real estate office and Bonnie Boys, a popular hamburger hangout owned by the Herzogs, who also lived in the Village. At the corner was Norm’s Village Service Station.
GLASGOW VILLAGE SHOPPING CENTER: ECHOES 1960
This ad appeared in the Echoes 1960 yearbook. The yearbook staff began selling ads in ECHOES 1950 and continued the practice through ECHOES 1961. I like this particular ad because it provides an excellent record of all of the businesses that operated in the Glasgow Village Shopping Center in 1959-1960.
Land was reserved by the developer for two public elementary schools (Glasgow and Highland) and two churches, both located on Shepley Road: St. Pius X Catholic Church, which included a rectory and a school for grades 1-8, and a Presbyterian Church.
Several four-family apartments were constructed directly across from the shopping center on Shepley Road. I passed by those apartments all the time without knowing anyone who lived there. Recently, I discovered that our classmate Mike Cook lived in one of those apartments during our Sophomore and Junior years when his family moved from South St. Louis, where he attended McKinley High School. He remembers moving to both his new home and new high school as positive experiences. The Glasgow apartment was so nice compared to the subdivided building where he had lived in the City. Living just less than a mile from the High School and consequently not eligible to ride the school bus, Mike walked the length of Shepley Road in the Village back and forth during the school year, and during the summer he walked along Spring Garden to Chain-of-Rocks Park to enjoy the rides and arcade games. Mike was walking before it became fashionable!
SIDEBAR: GROWING UP ON CAITHNESS ROAD IN GLASGOW VILLAGE. I’m not sure if it was unique to Caithness Road, but kids on our street did not address the adults as “Mr.” or “Mrs.” They were Edith and L.E. (Jackson), Joan and Herm (Geller), Bonnie and Ralph (Newman), Buster and Elmer (Bowman), Elaine and Jack (Stinson), Kathy and Russ (Brinton), Francis and Gerald (Bussen) and Helen and Thurlo (Byers). You get the drift. No disrespect was intended. That was just the way we did things on our street. On the other hand, I usually addressed my friends’ parents in the Village with a “Mr.” or “Mrs.” salutation.
We played loads of softball games in the street. My Dad (a kid at heart) was the ringleader, so much so that kids from up the street rang the doorbell one day and asked my Mom, “Can your Dad come out and play?” When one of the boys slammed a line drive through the Turpin’s picture window, Dad paid the replacement costs. Street games were where I learned to hold my glove like Mike Stinson held his—thumb and index finger in the thumb and index glove fingers and the last three fingers all in the very last glove finger! Super Cool! That’s the way I broke in my new Ken Boyer Rawlings glove that I received for Christmas when I was in 5th grade.
When L.E. Jackson decided to build a free-standing garage in his back yard, it became a street garage-raising. Many of the Dads on the street helped build the garage. It was so exciting that summer anticipating my Dad coming home from work, eating supper and then heading two doors down to the Jackson’s to work on the garage. They built a storage closet at the back of the inside of the garage, and Nancy’s Dad added a ladder to the closet roof, where Nancy organized her Club House. We read all of Nancy’s comic books when we hung out in her Club House!
During elementary school years, I walked a few doors down and across the street to pick up Patty Geller to walk to school. Joan, her Mom, did her housework first thing in the morning. She usually was dust-mopping when I arrived. It was from Joan that I learned to get my work done first—then play! Joan loved to sun tan on her fold-up chaise in the driveway, which she did religiously after she finished her morning housework.
We played at the Little Park at the bottom of the street and fished for crawdads in the creek nearby. We explored the Big Park, one street over off of Cameron. We reached the Big Park by climbing a steep hill. The Big Park was a wooded, scary and intimidating place with plenty of poison ivy, which I caught on a regular basis. We needed an ocean of calamine lotion growing up in Glasgow Village. Patty and I also spent hours exploring the plentiful ditches and open storm sewers scattered throughout the Village.
The caption states: "Large slabs of broken concrete placed in Glasgow Village's open storm sewers, which have failed to prevent rains from washing away clay soil. Houses in above photograph are on Roderick Drive." Patty Geller and I frequently climbed around and in and out of these open storm sewers. We called the huge open storm sewer at the bottom of Caithness Road the "big ditch." The sewers at Wilson Park, where we played softball, resembled huge gullies. For us, it was just another day of hiking in the Grand Canyon!
In 3rd grade, we signed up for the GVIA Softball League teams that played at Grampian and Wilson Parks in the Village. Our team was called the Canaries. Patty hit a walk-off grand slam at the All-Star Game at Wilson Park in the summer of 1961 between 4th and 5th grades.
CANARIES AT THE WISHING WELL
My Dad took this picture of Patty and me by the wishing well in our backyard. He added the props and labels. What's cool about the picture is that we can see the Jackson's garage two doors away. L.E. Jackson, Nancy's Dad, built the garage with the help of the other Dads on our street. This picture was from the summer of 1961. BYERS FAMILY COLLECTION
There were bikes to ride, roller skates, hula-hoops and other games to play, like hide-and-seek, Red Rover and canasta. After games and play were done for the day, we spent evenings talking Cardinals baseball with my Dad on the front porch.
A summer never slipped by without the Caithness kids holding a carnival in someone’s front yard. We sold Kool-Aid and treats that our Moms provided. My Mom’s specialty was chocolate covered marshmallows. All the kids flocked to the carnival for that tasty bite. We concocted games with prizes—sometimes we had a cakewalk. Patty remembers me as a fortune teller!
Most of our parents were still very young—in their 20s and 30s. Because they brought so much energy to the neighborhood, I’d like to share a few words about some of my Glasgow friends’ parents, who made growing up in the Village memorable. Mr. and Mrs. Hunt and Edith and L.E. Jackson were always so welcoming and glad to see me. “Hi Janey. Come on in.” Mrs. Anderson was very hip and in the know. She subscribed to Life magazine. One of the articles was about young teens who had necking parties in their homes—with their parents’ knowledge! She let us read the article. Radical! Joan Geller was the most glamorous of all the Moms—long blonde hair and a spectacular tan! Mrs. Caquelard seemed so sophisticated and stylish. I loved the way she enunciated her words with precision. Plus, she had an antique wall telephone in her home—very unique. One time I saw her wearing saddle oxfords and knee socks. Wow! And Mr. Caquelard was the most gregarious Dad I knew. I thought they were a cool couple. Mrs. Kowalski was fun, likeable and easy to be around. We played Beatles 45s in her house. Mrs. Mardis was cool, collected and decisive. She drove a snazzy, teal-green Pontiac and knew where she was going. Mr. and Mrs. Drysdale seemed very enlightened and friendly. They always were intensely interested in what was going on at Glasgow School. Plus, Mr. Drysdale was really cute—the cutest of all the Dads. Mrs. Merinbaum (sometimes Juanita) kept the most immaculate home in Glasgow Village. The Merinbaum’s house was a street over and backed up to a house that was about three houses up the street from ours. I loved hearing her voice lilt through the summer air as she talked over the back fence with Martha Headrick, her next door neighbor. I can hear her voice even today. Finally, Mary Owen was a Mom with whom I could have a real bonafide conversation. I always felt secure with her.
I did marry once upon a time and we had an enchanting wedding in the backyard at 341 Caithness on August 18,1973. My Dad fixed up the yard for the ceremony. It was a Caithness Road affair—the highlight of the Social Season. One of the Bowman twins (RGHS 1962), a minister, officiated. Many of the neighbors were invited and brought culinary delights for the reception, also held in the backyard. It was the hottest ticket in the Village—to the point that a couple of youngsters up the street knocked on the door and asked my Mom, “Can we come to the wedding?”
BACKYARD WEDDING AT 341 CAITHNESS: We were lucky that the weather was perfection. We didn't have a Plan B. My Dad walked me down the hill and we faced the guests during the ceremony. The birds in the birdhouse had a birdseye view.
There's the wishing well again. The screened porch is the one my Dad built when I was four years old.
Another angle. My Dad rigged the speakers in the trees and we piped in music.
Helen and Thurlo sold the Glasgow Village home in May 1975 to my brother Tom for $18,000. Tom married Renita, the girl next door (well, two doors up), in June and they lived in the Caithness home with their two kids, who attended Glasgow School. When they sold the house in 1989 for $52,000, Renita wept.
I know I have spent beaucoup time and space on Glasgow Village, but I make no apologies. My biases definitely are shining through. It was a huge subdivision that gave us many RGHS graduates. Glasgow Village, in my experience, was a most wonderful, remarkably impressive neighborhood! But now it’s time to tell the tale of another prodigious neighborhood—Bissell Hills, the third major new subdivision in the Riverview Gardens School District.
BISSELL HILLS
Described as a “vast subdivision” in a St. Louis Post-Dispatch article, Bissell Hills (another “Hills”), when completed in the mid-1950s, would provide houses for 2,270 families, or 540 more houses than the Glasgow Village development and over three times the number of houses built in Hathaway Hills within the Riverview Gardens School District. Charlie and Mildred Niebur moved into one of thoses houses at 10142 Coburg Lands in September 1952 with their four daughters, Sue, Marsha, Joan and Cheryl. Through bonuses and savings, Charlie and Mildred had accumulated $2,000 and began house shopping. They paid $12,000 for their new home and, since the downpayment was $2,500, they borrowed $500 against their car to complete the purchase. Their three-bedroom frame home contained 982 square feet and included a one-car garage.
The Niebur family moved to 10142 Coburg Lands Drive in September 1952. The signature Bissell Hills look was a white frame home or a red brick home. The frame homes did not come in colors, as in neighborhoods such as Glasgow Village. This picture of Cheryl's house is one Mr. Niebur included in his memoirs. The neighborhood possessed a charming ambience.
10142 Coburg Lands Sketch. The original home did not include the Frame room identified as "D" or the patio identified as "C." ST. LOUIS COUNTY REAL ESTATE INFORMATION
Norman Schuermann of the Schuermann Building & Realty Co. had been a homebuilder of North County homes for a couple of decades before he broke ground on the five display homes in Bissell Hills in 1951. Known as a builder of homes for the “average man,” he had never before built three-bedroom homes and the Nieburs bought one in Bissell Hills, tapping into a demand that was then starting to trend heavily. Cheryl and Joan shared a bedroom, as did the two older girls. Of course, Schuermann also offered two-bedroom homes at a lesser price. Of the five display homes in Bissell Hills, two were brick construction and three were frame construction.The two brick displays were located at 10201 Bellefontaine Road and 10113 Jepson. The three frame displays were located at 1133 Kilgore, 1140 Kilgore and 10179 Jepson.
BISSELL HILLS SUBDIVISION MAP: WEST OF BELLEFONTAINE ROAD
Bissell Hills featured three distinct geographical areas, the first of which had been part of the old Daniel Bissell estate, bordered by Bellefontaine Road and Chambers Road in the northwest quadrant of the intersection of those two roads. This area was by far the largest of the three with 1,640 houses. I call this area the original Bissell Hills. Across Chambers Road, with access via Fonda Drive and south of Gibson Elementary School (opened in the Fall of 1953) was the second geographical area of Bissell Hills, numbering 360 houses. These homes were built on what had been part of the Gibson land grant property. I call this area the Gibson Elementary side of Bissell Hills. These two areas were situated west of Bellefontaine Road.
Construction in the third area began in the Spring of 1955. I have seen this area referred to as Bissell Hills East (see the map below), located south of Chambers Road east of Bellefontaine Road and bordered by the railroad tracks on the west and Lilac Avenue on the east, also part of the Gibson land grant property. Growing up, I didn’t associate this neighborhood with the original Bissell Hills, but Bissell Hills it is—with 270 houses.
Two main thoroughfares meandered through and traversed the original Bissell Hills—Coburg Lands Drive (Cheryl’s street) and Ashbrook Drive. These were identified as traffic engineered streets, wide “collectors” of traffic from less frequently used streets. Looking at the subdivision map above, we can see that several of the streets in the north end cut across both Ashbrook and Coburg Lands. As these “collectors” wind toward Chambers Road, the streets to the east feed into Coburg Lands and the streets to the west feed into Ashbrook.
A total of 14 Bissell Hills plats (some with additions) were filed commencing in August 1951 and continuing until April 1955, so most of these homes were built over a period of less than five years. The first homes were completed in 1951 on Bellefontaine, Jepson, Farrington, Newbold, Gabrial, Crete, Cabot, Ashford and Chambers. All of the homes fronting on Bellefontaine and Chambers were brick construction, regardless of when they were built. Our classmate Doris Rogers lived on Newbold in one of the very first houses built in Bissell Hills.
Plats 2, 3, 4 and 6 followed in quick succession in 1951 and 1952 and these houses were constructed on Ashbrook, Coburg Lands, Chambers, Ashford, Bosworth, Grenshaw, Tappan, Kilgore, Laire, Odessa, Unicorn, Cabot, Addison, Avant, Bakewell, Bliss, Roxton, Darr, Hoyt, Esquire, Rapid, Nectar, Ewell, Byfield, Anson and Druid. Is that a mouthful? Bill Becher, Jim Maloney, Don Redemeier, Bonnie Collins, Mike Culella, Cheryl Niebur, John Allen Rone, Mary Ann Roman, Frank Kardasz, Joan Fischer, Richard Conover, Mike Mesle, Judy Hamilton, Larry Simpson, Karen Knop, Sue Reynolds, Barb Sampl, Steve Grote, Kathy Belter and Bob Hall and their families lived in these homes.
Mildred and Charlie with their four girls in the backyard at 10142 Coburg Lands Drive. The picture includes a peek at the back of the house next door. Cheryl and Joan (RHGS 1967) are holding their Easter baskets. Sue (RGHS 1960) and Marcia (RGHS 1962) are too grown up for a basket!
Bob Hall lived on Odessa, a street over from Cheryl. His house also included a one-car garage and it was in this very garage that the COE group decorated Bob’s car for the Homecoming Parade when we were Seniors. As Rosemary Henson and John Allen Rone (Bob’s neighbor) reminisced, it took a long time to make and put all those flowers on his car. Then the car overheated because they affixed so many flowers over the vent on the hood of the car. When that happened, they turned the heater on to try to keep the car from overheating! John Allen put it succinctly: “Oh to remember those days.”
Homecoming: 1968 (Senior Year).The car was the COE entry for the Homecoming Parade. Bob Hall, who lived in Bissell Hills, contributed his car!
It was also during 1952 that Schuermann built the first 107 houses (Plat 5) on the Gibson Elementary side of Bissell Hills on Fonda, Delhi (where Linda Bergmeyer and Gene Michel lived), Billings, Ensley, Colony and Danville. Over the course of 16 months in 1951-52, 1,080 Bissell Hills houses were completed and occupied or close to being so. The staggering pace at which these houses were constructed is a testament to the pent up demand by our parents for these homes and the builder’s ability to deliver on that demand. It’s quite amazing that approximately 2.25 houses per day were completed during this period. Wow!
The pace became more measured in 1953, when Schuermann constructed 308 homes in the north end of the original Bissell Hills (per Plats 7 and 11) on Roxton, Bliss, Bakewell, Ewell, Avant, Ashbrook, Addison, Nectar, Seaton, Repose, Esquire, Darr, Coburg Lands and Bellefontaine for Bruce Ealick, Susan Mueller, Susan Meyers, Mike Bauer, Steve Bockstruck and Mike McGuire and their families. On many occasions, Mike McGuire’s friendly neighbors on Roxton let Mike and Steve Robison play pool in their basement for languid stretches during our teenage years.
On the Gibson Elementary side, construction began on 230 homes in the southernmost end of the Hills (per Plat 8) on Durham, Colony, Admiral, Forest Home, Blodgett, Mead, Hemlock, Griffin, Duluth and Cutler at about the time Gibson Elementary School opened in 1953. Classmates who lived in these homes were Marilyn Bartley, Paul Klick, Janis Rittel, Steve Wallis, Ken Bay, Rich Leh, Denise Schewe and Roger Siemsen.
In 1954, the far west side of the original Bissell Hills at the intersection of Highway 367 and Chambers was completed with the construction of 359 houses (per Plats 9 and 10) on Dwight, Akron, Attica, Ballard, Comet, Surf, Corinth, Fathom, Hedge, Golden, Kilgore, Ashbrook, Lance and Chambers. These houses were home to Jim Douglas, Pat Kraichely, Carol Stumpf, Karen Mobley, Carol Tomlinson, Rosemary Henson, Jim Luhrsen, Tim Miller, Jacque Richards and Ellen Beck. Plus, each of Cheryl Kreienkamp and Margaret Rowe lived in one of the lovely brick homes on Chambers.
Early in 1955, Schuermann added 23 houses on Forest Home Drive and Forest Home Court on the Gibson Elementary side to bring to a close the construction of Bissell Hills houses on the west side of Bellefontaine Road, a total of 2,000 homes, all built in less than 5 years. The Class of 1969 would not start Kindergarten until the fall of 1956. They had another year to play in their fabulous new subdivision before beginning their studies!
BEN FRANKLIN: BISSELL HILLS SHOPPING CENTER. ECHOES 1957
A neighborhood shopping center at the corner of Bellefontaine and Chambers included a Bettendorf-Rapps grocery store, a Ben Franklin dimestore, a drug store, a camera store, a beauty shop, a jewelry store and a dance studio. Schuermann also built small brick retail shops within the Bissell Hills neighborhood, one being Al’s Market located at 10236 Cabot Drive and another being Darr Quality Market located at 1200 Darr Drive. These were mini-grocery stores. Cheryl’s Mom would send her on spur-of-the-moment bicycle trips to Al’s to pick up a last minute item for dinner. Cheryl remembers Al’s was also handy for candy and ice cream treats, and Mike McGuire remembers buying scads of packs of baseball cards with bubblegum at Al’s.
Ad for Al's Market. ECHOES 1955
Ad for Darr Quality Market. ECHOES 1959
Churches located in the friendly confines of Bissell Hills were Grace Lutheran, Bellefontaine Baptist and St. Jeromes Catholic. Of course, Gibson Elementary School became a part of the fabric of the neighborhood in 1953, as did Tanglewood Park right next door to the school.
Looking back, I believe I personally thought of Bissell Hills as a metaphor for hope and optimism. The same applied for the stretch of Bellefontaine Road running from Coburg Lands Drive to Jennings Station Road. These areas possessed a quality for me reminiscent of Joni Mitchell’s Morning Morgantown and the Beatles’ Penny Lane. Passing through Bissells Hills, with its wide “collector” streets, sidewalks, and picturesque white frame and red brick homes, or driving along Bellefontaine or Chambers, always gave me a highly comforting “feel good” feeling.
BISSELL HILLS SUBDIVISION MAP: EAST OF BELLEFONTAINE ROAD
The finishing touch to Bissell Hills was Bissell Hills East on the east side of Bellefontaine Road. A neighborhood of 270 frame houses, it came on-line in the spring of 1955 (per Plat 14). The kids living here attended Riverview Elementary (even though the neighborhood was part of Bellefontaine Neighbors) and included Kathy Krahman, Jim Grafeman, Art Verme, Dave Riccardi, and Ed and Ernest Oventrop. One of the streets is named Science Hill to commemorate the original name of the School District.
Perhaps the last vestige of the Science Hill School - a street sign in a Bissell Hills neighborhood. PHOTO TAKEN BY JANE BYERS - JUNE 2019
Like Pat Lingenfelter and me, Cheryl was age one when her family moved to their Coburg Lands home. Throughout her elementary school years, she became besties with Betsy Peckron, who lived in Green Acres, where she recalls spending loads of time with Betsy. They walked to each other’s homes or their parents chauffered them back and forth.
Learning about Bissell Hills has left me a bit puzzled by the process used to name the streets. Coburg Lands, Bellefontaine, Chambers, Science Hill and Forest Home are names rooted in area history. Coburg Lands goes back to an early subdivision in the area created by Coburg Land & Improvement Company in 1917. Bellefontaine Road was named after Fort Bellefontaine commanded by General Daniel Bissell in the early 1800s. B.M. Chambers was a landowner from the Ferguson area. Science Hill was the original name of the School District. Forest Home goes back to the Gibson land-grant days. But I could not figure out a pattern or unifying theme for street names for such a monumental subdivision. How do names like Surf, Rapid, Unicorn, Delhi and Hemlock end up in the mix? If any Bissell Hillers has an insight, I would appreciate hearing about it.
Charlie and Mildred Niebur sold their home on Coburg Lands in 1982. As Charlie remembered with pleasure, “[t]his is the home the girls grew up in. We got along just fine and have many good memories.”
Mildred and Charlie with their four girls in their front yard at 10142 Coburg Lands Drive. This time we get a peek at the garage and the family car. Cheryl gets to hold Butch the Dog. Cheryl didn't get to hold her purse like her sisters do. Joan looks very happy!
We have explored the beginnings of the big three housing developments in the District commenced in the early 1950s. However, no amount of attention given to these three pivotal subdivisions can diminish the importance of other subdivisions in the District that were home to many RGHS graduates, including those from the Class of 1969. Therefore, it’s time to take a tour.…a Magical History Tour!
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