NOTE: Over the last several months, we have been reprinting the 1973 History of “The Neighborhood”, written by Gee Stuart, Kathy Harleman, and Sue Tepas. With this issue, we begin our own account of the neighborhood’s past. We have received a great deal of information, and we thank all those who have sent memories, documents and photos. These will be included in the Skinker DeBaliviere Archives and are also useful source material for our writing.
All those who contribute will be listed, and there’s still time to be a part of the project. Though our account begins here with the 70’s. memories of even earlier times in the neighborhood will be incorporated into the archives for continued documentation and research. Send them to 6117 Westminster, 63112.
With this issue, we look at some of the hard times of the 60’s and 70’s and the efforts made by residents to work with each other to address vacant buildings. blockbustmg, redlining. and fears of racial divide. This issue also includes a retrospective on the Dinner-Theatre. one of several activities which demonstrates the camaraderie and shared goals of neighborhood residents throughout the 70’s. Next issue will cover other features, including St. Roch’s, the Clinic, the Art Fair and THE PAPER.
In coordinating this effort, we acknowledge many resources. including the Missouri Historical Society. the St. Louis Public Library, our predecessors’ book THE NEIGHBORHOOD. and others, including URBAN OASIS, charred by Parkview neighbors Jean Eberle and Judith Little.
A complete list of all sources will be included later. In writing and editing this history, I rely on many others, for example. Kathleen Williams. for her account of the Dinner-Theatre. There will be many other writers’ memories of specific parts of our history. As a scholar. Lana Stein has an important role in showing how our neighborhood’s history relates to our nation’s at the same time it established its own unique and important place in that history. As a neighbor and as Editor of THE TIMES. Lana will also be contributing pieces on specific topics, such as the account on redlining you read here. And always. I rely on Morj Weir for her wonderful assistance in making this a coherent account. Together, we hope to produce an account of the last thirty years worthy of this great neighborhood.
Jo Ann Vatcha
The Skinker-DeBaliviere neighborhood in St. Louis began as a development of muddy farmland, adjacent to Washington University and Forest Park, serviced by the streetcars which had brought people to the World’s Fair in 1904.
The first advertisements said, “Select your lot today, you will never regret it. There is but one Forest Park. There is but one Washington University.” Another called this the “future residence center of modern St. Louis, with macadam streets, granitoid curbs and walks, sewers, water, gas, shade trees. Every lot [110 of them] ready to build on…one of the most desirable residence districts of the city.”
The area was developed between 1904–1920. It survived World War I, the Great Depression and World War II. Of course, these world shaking events brought change: street names changed with war—Berlin Ave. became Pershing, for example; large homes often became boarding houses during the depression and throughout World War II. By the sixties, these boarding houses had become fraternity houses and student apartments close to the Peppermint Lounge and the Bettendorf-Rapp Grocery on Delmar, and the bustling DeBaliviere Strip with its Apollo Art Theatre, Garavelli’s, Sorrento’s, as well as the Stardust Lounge (“Evelyn West and her $50,000 Treasure Chest”).
Although the Vietnam War, Civil Rights, and Women’s Liberation dominated the news and profoundly affected life in every neighborhood in America, in this, as in other city neighborhoods, a crisis of housing also threatened to cripple the neighborhood’s stability. Apartment buildings especially were getting older and were in need of repairs. Some people doubted whether it was worth the investment. Whole areas, such as what we now call DeBaliviere Place, were in danger of collapse, and the more single-family areas, east and west of DeBaliviere, were fearful of the future of their neighborhoods. Property values declined drastically. Redlining by banks and several programs of the federal government made things worse, and by 1963 when the first black families moved into the area, many longtime residents of the area decided it was time to act. Although many individuals and families through the years had actually chosen this area for its diversity and acceptance, the official policies and declining property values caused a great deal of “white flight.” In Skinker-DeBaliviere, however, many families refused to participate in this panic. The actions which these residents mounted are indeed historic, and this account of the neighborhood will seek to document this important part of our history that many regard as “saving the neighborhood.”
Nearly all of the “Memories” we have received as part of this project have mentioned the word diversity. One of our neighbors, Joe Edwards, described the key to the neighborhood’s success, “the decision by many to embrace diversity and in the process not only stabilize but strengthen the neighborhood.”
In 1963, Skinker DeBaliviere began to set a course that no previous neighborhood had followed. The first African-American residents, among them Esther and Joe Herron, bought homes in the neighborhood, then just over a half century old. In many U.S. cities, such racial change resulted in a period of integration and then re-segregation as an all-black community. Resegregation is considered inevitable by many scholars when the black population passes 30 percent. Certainly by 1970 that tipping point had passed in Skinker DeBaliviere. Yet, the neighborhood as a whole remained integrated and the number of white households actually increased after 1980. Massey and Denton found that “once a neighborhood reached about one third black, the limits of racial tolerance were reached for a majority of whites.” Skinker DeBaliviere’s continuing racial and socioeconomic diversity nullify that generalization. Despite redlining by the real estate, banking, and insurance industries, the neighborhood pulled together. Residents, black and white, joined together to fight to make this community safe and secure and to see that its historic housing could be made available to all races. A university report which forecast little likelihood that the neighborhood would stabilize proved to be invalid as churches, their own school, a community council and numerous neighbors who provided energy and creativity proved that diversity was not a pipe dream. To that end, Skinker DeBaliviere became a model for other neighborhoods in the city that had begun to experience racial change and falling property values. The history in the accounts that follow celebrate the many people who contributed to the success of Skinker DeBaliviere. Although not without difficult adjustment and some significant dissension, which this account will also describe, Skinker DeBaliviere’s story still is one of the triumph of hope and a lot of gumption.
In this account of the period 1970–1999, our goal is to acknowledge the contributions made by individual ordinary people who have volunteered their time to make a difference for their families and their community, not just the politicians and leaders, but also those who served in scores of less heralded ways: the organizing of the Art Fair/House Tour, the players and chefs of the Dinner-Theatre, those who collected for the alley lights, organized Halloween parties and conducted paper drives to plant trees, those who served on the many boards and committees.
1970
In 1970, there were several beginnings in Skinker-DeBaliviere which, in retrospect, set our course. Calvin B. Stuart was selected Executive Director of the Community Council, a position he held throughout the 70’s; THE PAPER (predecessor to THE TIMES) was born; energetic and visionary women began the Residential Service; West End Townhouse was incorporated. Why and how neighborhood residents were so motivated at this point in history gives a fascinating glimpse into this era.
In the spring of 1970, Washington Heights and Rosedale Skinker Neighborhood Associations jointly sponsored a series of four meetings at St. Roch’s Assembly Hall, regarding real estate practices. The meetings were conducted by SDCC’s Cal Stuart, lawyer John Roach, Jack Wright of the Neighborhood Citizens Committee, Susie Roach of the Residential Service, neighbors Joyce Warren, Loretta Lewis, Mike Wilson, Jane Davis, Doug McKee, and others. One meeting’s topic was the action by the U.S. government against four St. Louis real estate firms (Dolan, Jerome Howe, Armbruster and Cornet & Zeibing). The attorney for the Justice Department, Francis Kennedy, attended and received testimony from neighbors who had experienced discrimination from real estate companies over the past six years. Another community meeting, on April 14, 1970, brought together representatives of real estate companies, landlords, and FHA for a discussion of the area.
At two other meetings, FHA’s policy on 235-237 loans were explored. Some 65 houses had been sold to extremely low income families under this policy. A citizens’ committee was formed, chaired by Virgil Jack Wright, to gather support for a letter to FHA to halt this program “until an investigation of the distributional pattern of loan recipients and the real estate companies’ method of promoting 235-237 can be completed.”
Policies of the federal and local government were clearly reinforcing the prejudice of real estate companies, the banks, and others against the desire of both black and white neighborhood residents to strengthen this integrated neighborhood and keep its character—and values—high. Just as clear in retrospect is the fact that it was the dedication of volunteers, residents of the neighborhood, who were the driving force in making that success happen.
The Residential Service
Susie Roach, who had two years earlier founded the Art Fair and House Tour, and energetic activist Pat Kohn, founded the new Residential Service in 1970 and brought many other women forward to work on housing issues. Kohn wrote, “We want to encourage as many people as possible to join our neighborhood…to fill the empty houses, stores and apartments with new talent and voices for the community.”
Another of the stalwarts, Joan Bender, remembered in her Dec. ’94 recollection in THE TIMES:
The Residential Service In Action
“Real estate people were steering whites away…it was ‘Block Busting’. This was brought up time and again at neighborhood gatherings…no longer able to be silent about suspicions, the neighbors talked openly about it and looked for action and solutions. To counter the block busting, Susie rounded up a group of women to form…the Residential Service. It worked with, but was independent of, the SDCC. In fact, there was no office. It seemed to run out of the apron pockets of those young, energetic, idealistic women… Marlene Mestres and Betty Newsham were the mainstays of the Apt Rental section. Susie, Pat Kohn, Suzanne Hart and I held up the Homes for Sale end. There were a lot of helpers for both when needed. The houses for sale in SD had personalized advertising… Suzanne and I spent over 5 years showing the homes for sale. We were weekend street walkers showing interested people available housing. Early on, Susie and Pat took real estate courses and got their licenses in order to better understand what the service was up against. Therefore, they acted as advisors to the service. They each were spark plugs generating fruitful ideas.”
The Residential Service had members working on beautification (responsible for trees and grass planted along Des Peres, working with others to close off the railroad right of way, and helping plan the Tot Lot); and working with complaints concerning code violations and sanitation. Their main activity turned out to be showing property “on a non-profit, non-discriminatory basis.” In its first year, the service had been instrumental in the sale of at least 5 houses and had helped to rent several apartments. In 1972, probably its most prolific year, the Residential Service showed 33 homes and sold 22 homes, eight of which had been “listed” with the service. Their Annual Report of that year states that when a house listed with a real estate agency was sold, normal real estate agency fee structure was followed. But, always, the Residential Service was free.
By May, 1974, the group had succeeded in getting the Post-Dispatch and the Real Estate Board of St. Louis to tour the neighborhood. This was in response to widespread complaints of discrimination, as well as the activism of SDCC and the Residential Service. THE PAPER noted that, “our neighborhood is ‘coming back’, that it’s a nice place to live in. It’s people like Susan Roach who are making it happen.”
Later Susie and Pat became licensed real estate agents, and Suzanne Hart and Joan Bender coordinated the Residential Service. In April, 1977, one of the recipients of the outreach became its leader when Karleen Hoerr took over the reins of the Residential Service, in addition to her full-time job as a Special Education Teacher at Children’s Hospital. One of the first activist Skinker DeBaliviere women who also worked outside the home, Karleen proved to be a tireless champion of the neighborhood and its housing.
Later volunteers included Mary Jo Consiglio, Dee Vossmeyer, Mary Gioia, and Tia Ault. By 1979, however, there were no houses listed with the Residential Service. Actually, that was a sign of success. After nearly a decade, the real estate community was beginning to catch on. For many years, Feinberg Real Estate Co.’s Dan Feinberg and his company’s agents like Susie and Karleen were the only agents interested in actively marketing this neighborhood. Many Residential Service volunteers recall with satisfaction the moment they saw a competing realtor’s For Sale sign, for it meant that—finally!—they had succeeded in making property in Skinker-DeBaliviere valuable and marketable to all.
Redlining
Redlining was a common practice in 1963 when Skinker DeBaliviere began to undergo racial transition. It allowed widespread discrimination in lending and insuring and was part and parcel of a system that permitted some to profit from the racial fears of others. Redlining and its predecessors in housing discrimination—segregation ordinances and restrictive covenants—catered to the desire of whites to live apart from other groups, especially African Americans, but also Jews and Asians. St. Louis was one of a group of border cities that enacted segregation ordinances in the years just before World War I. These ordinances forbade blacks from moving onto preponderantly white blocks. In 1918, the U.S. Supreme Court found such ordinances to be constitutionally unenforceable. However, realtors and neighborhood associations continued to try to keep races separated. The restrictive covenant, which forbade the sale of property to African Americans and other minority groups, had been in use in St. Louis at least since the first private place was built in the 1870s. The Supreme Court declared these covenants to be unconstitutional in 1948 in the case of Shelley v. Kraemer, which originated in St. Louis.
Redlining was more widely practiced in the U.S. and was particularly pernicious because it carried the imprimatur of the federal government. Set up to protect home buyers, the Home Owners Loan Corporation (HOLC) developed standards for the guarantee of mortgage loans. These standards permitted lenders to evaluate neighborhoods and judge the risk associated with making loans there. The standards contained certain prejudices of the time. Areas with single family homes were considered most desirable. The newer the homes, the better the neighborhood was judged to be. If Jews lived in a particular area, it did not receive the top rating. The standards were harshest in regard to African Americans. Their neighborhoods were rated the least desirable and were outlined in red. HOLC did not actually guarantee mortgages itself. However, its standards, including the redlining, were adopted by the Federal Housing Administration (FHA) and the Veterans Administration (VA) which together guaranteed mortgage loans for millions of American families. Until the passage of the 1968 Civil Rights Act, FHA and VA helped to ensure a deteriorating central city and a growing lily-white suburbia. African Americans received a tiny percentage of FHA loans and such loans were not given to whites wishing to move to an integrated area. Kenneth T. Jackson documented these practices in his study Crabgrass Frontier: The Suburbanization of America (Oxford University Press, 1985). In fact, St. Louis provided a number of his examples and his text contains reproductions of the redlined maps of this metropolitan area.
The practice of redlining became widespread in a number of professions, especially in the years following the Second World War. Thus, realtors failed to show homes in integrated neighborhoods to whites. They fueled panic selling by existing white residents to increase their profits. African Americans frequently were reduced to buying homes on land contracts; conventional and government-insured mortgages were denied them. Insurance companies declined to offer coverage to homeowners in transitional or minority-dominated areas. If bankers or realtors or insurers feared slums, their practices also certainly helped to create them. Redlining continues to this day but in somewhat more subtle fashion. It is now against the law but lack of compliance is difficult to establish.
Establishing redlining’s tawdry history in Skinker DeBaliviere is not difficult. Various neighbors indicated the problems they encountered when trying to see or buy a home here. The Benders came from Pittsburgh and explored some neighborhoods on their own. They saw a house on Kingsbury that seemed ideal for their family. When they called the realtor whose sign graced the Kingsbury lawn, he clearly did not want to show them the property. Instead, he suggested suitable places in all-white areas. One-time editor of THE PAPER, JoBeth Creighton, also encountered frustration and prejudice. She learned that she could not get a 25-year house loan; the best her lender could do in “dangerously integrated” Skinker DeBaliviere was 15 years. Creighton reported, “we learned to our astonishment that the loan had been refused on the basis of the age and location of the house.” Kathy Harleman, one of the co-authors of THE NEIGHBORHOOD, remembers, “When we bought [our house], at the neighborhood’s lowest point, the people who stayed were those who believed in integration. The ones who were going to go, had already gone. You had a core of people like Art Santen. He flat out said, ‘this is my house, and nobody’s getting me out of here. [It’s] my neighborhood, and I’m not leaving.'”
Parkview, even with its different zip code and generally larger single family homes, did not escape the curse of redlining. In a history of this private place, Urban Oasis, author Jean Eberle noted that “urban blight was not accidental, but the result of careful steering by real estate companies, financial institutions, and insurance companies. The Parkview Agents encouraged residents to fight back, to put political and economic pressure on offending institutions.” Parkview fully supported Skinker DeBaliviere’s efforts to make redlining unsuccessful on this turf and joined in the work of the Residential Service, the House Tour and the Art Fair.
Parishioners of St. Roch’s came together with non-Catholic residents to forge a partnership of neighbors to fight such practices. Cal Stuart described moving to SD: “We had to battle a few realtors to convince them we wanted to buy our house on McPherson… it is a kind of real estate mentality… they cannot understand how that neighborhood can attract intelligent buyers. That some people prefer to live in a neighborhood that is mixed racially, socially, economically, every which way, is just beyond their comprehension.”
Redlining was battled for many years, leading in 1977 to the formation of the first savings and loan institution to be chartered in 25 years, the Central West End Savings and Loan, largely due to its support by SDCC and neighborhood residents. Cal Stuart remembers testifying, along with Jack Wright and others, to the importance of having such a local savings bank. And in 1979, redlining was officially discouraged with the passage of the Community Reinvestment Act, in which banks are required to document their efforts to lend in the areas in which they do business.
Another important development was the election of John Roach as alderman. As former neighbor Tom McPherron wrote recently, “John and others deserve credit… John was able to get private mortgages and that was key. FHA and VA would have destroyed us.”
The 235-237 Programs
Lyndon Johnson’s War on Poverty produced a number of housing initiatives. Perhaps its least successful was the 235 program. The 235 program was designed to assist low income families, including those on welfare, to become homeowners. The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) acquired single family homes in many central cities and then sold them to those of limited means. Frequently, these homes were to be found in neighborhoods experiencing racial turnover. Down payments as well as monthly payments were tailored for the low income. In St. Louis, many homes were frequently located in areas undergoing racial transition, such as Skinker DeBaliviere. The program failed because many of the new owners were unable to cope with unexpected maintenance expenditures such as a new furnace or water heater. The family could make the monthly house note but had no reserve for emergencies. Foreclosures were rampant. There were 10,000 foreclosures in Detroit alone. The program also provided little screening and little training for the new homeowners. Some 65 houses had been sold in Skinker-DeBaliviere to extremely low income families under this policy by 1970. This was the subject of some of the neighborhood meetings in early 1970 which led to important change in the neighborhood.
John Roach, soon to be the area’s alderman, was also very instrumental in battling the 235-237 programs, and he and Jack Wright went to Washington, D.C. in 1970 to testify about the negative effects of those programs to Congress.
West End Townhouse
On Sunday, April 26, 1970, at St. Roch’s Church, parishioner Philip J. Lucier, President of Continental Telephone Corporation and a resident of Parkview with eleven children, made an important announcement: the formation of West End Townhouse, Inc., a wholly owned real estate investment subsidiary of Continental Telephone Corporation.
Lucier announced that the primary purpose of the investment program was “fostering maximum racial integration and neighborhood improvement.”
Monsignor Robert Peet, pastor of St. Roch’s, had initiated this new corporation by inviting several leaders to discuss housing needs in the community in February, 1970. The discussion focused particularly on the many rental buildings which were becoming more and more problematic. Phil Lucier pledged money from his company, Continental Telephone, saying, according to Delphine McClellan in her book, We Stayed to Fight for City Living, “I don’t know why we cannot put a million dollars into our own area, which we love and where we intend to stay.” John Roach, a lawyer and later Alderman of the 28th Ward, assisted in organizing the corporation and served on its board.
The new corporation was initially capitalized with $150,000, with the intent to rehabilitate and rent single family homes and apartment buildings in the Skinker-DeBaliviere Neighborhood. Lucier intended for the corporation to sponsor a limited partnership as a vehicle for individuals and corporations to match Continental’s initiative, anticipating that $150,000 should attract between $600,000 and $780,000 of total investment. He felt that public utilities, such as Continental Telephone, had a responsibility to assist neighborhoods.
In addition to Lucier, West End Townhouse’s initial Board of Directors included: Ray Hutchison, Continental Telephone employee Gerry Deppe, and John Roach. West End Townhouse got off the ground quickly and had acquired several buildings when, just months later, on July 24, 1970, Lucier was killed by a car bomb in Clayton, a mystery which was never solved but which has been thought to have been a case of mistaken identity.
Lucier’s sudden death shook the hopes of many neighborhood residents that the corporation would be a major player in turning around the neighborhood’s badly deteriorated rental housing. In fact, Continental Telephone turned over the corporation in trusteeship to the people of St. Roch’s parish after Lucier’s death.
By February, 1971, Jim Hitchcock wrote for THE PAPER that, in addition to Deppe and Roach, new board members included: John Fox, retired board chairman of Mercantile Trust; Steven Saller, Virgil Jack Wright, and Wayne Grancolas. In just over a year, WET owned about 100 units of housing in 24 buildings and, according to John Roach, was actively seeking funding to purchase other remaining “problem buildings west of the railroad tracks.”
In 1972, Washington University trustees donated $150,000 as a guarantee of credit to the corporation. In addition, a long term mortgage had been obtained from Commerce Bank to retire some outstanding debts and to complete renovation of some of the corporation’s 26 buildings. Two apartment buildings, immediately west of the SDCC office and Clinic, had to be demolished.
Clearly, West End Townhouse, working through its many volunteers, carried on the vision of Lucier, and eventually undertook innovative condominium renovations in buildings on Rosedale and Pershing, as well as stabilizing over 26 buildings of rental property throughout the neighborhood. Other neighborhood residents who served on the board of WET during this period included Tom McPherron and Bob Blackburn.
In the early 80’s, after Msgr. Peet had retired and after many other changes had come about in the neighborhood, most of the properties remaining in West End Townhouse’s inventory were sold. Some were donated to Grace and Peace Fellowship. The remaining funds reverted to St. Roch’s for other parish priorities. In 1986, a new park located next to Hamilton School was dedicated and named in honor of Lucier. Greg Freeman, writing in the Summer, 1986, issue of THE TIMES, quoted other neighborhood leaders, including former SDCC Executive Director Cal Stuart, who said of Lucier and West End Townhouse, “The whole idea was designed to stimulate private development in houses in the area.” And then-Mayor Vince Schoemehl called Lucier, “a man who taught optimism to this community.”
Original newspaper source
Originally published in The Times of Skinker-DeBaliviere, April–May 2000.
Read this article in the original newspaper issue.
