The Locust Business District

The Midtown Rally Grand Prix bicycle race takes place within the heart of the Locust Business District. Fast racers meet fast track development. Here’s a bit more information regarding the first day of the Tour de Grove.

Locust Business District is a special tax district in the heart of St. Louis, Missouri, with the express objectives of stimulating community morale and facilitating “spin-off” investments in new construction and rehabilitation.

Origin

The Locust Business District (LBD) was incorporated pursuant to Ordinance 58728, approved December 23, 1982 relating to the Locust Business District, a special business district, established through provisions of Section 71.790-71.808 R.S.Mo. and as amended by the Board of Aldermen December 1, 2000, Resolution 184 which enlarged the LBD to provide a catalytic force in the area with the express objectives of stimulating community morale and facilitating “spin-off” investments in new construction and rehabilitation.

Boundaries

The entire Locust Business District area extends generally from Delmar and 18th street on the southwest corner, moving south on 18th Street to Market Street, turning west on Market Street to the western edge of 21st Street, heading south to the northern property line behind the Area Rescue Consortium of Hospitals and UPS to the eastern edge of Jefferson where it heads north along Jefferson, then northeast along the southern property line of Grainger’s property and the east property line of Harry’s to Market Street, then west on Market Street to the eastern line of 23rd Street, north on 23rd Street to Olive Blvd., then west along Olive Blvd. to Compton, turning north on Compton to the alley north of Washington, heading east along the alley to Leffingwell and north along Leffingwell to Delmar, then east along Delmar to the point of beginning of Delmar and 18th street.

With the exception of certain major institutional and public uses, the area is currently characterized by small family owned businesses and new companies seeking creative uses of older buildings.

Moving Forward

Since its incorporation, the Locust Business District has made a concerted effort to stabilize the area and to attract new investment within its boundaries. However, the physical condition, size, and prior use of the buildings vary greatly, and these existing conditions have complicated the redevelopment process to some extent. For instance, retrofitting modern office uses within buildings with turn of the century column spacing can require additional costs associated with that effort. Therefore, this premium expense becomes a development proforma as well as a timing issue that can impede business’s decisions to locate within a redevelopment area. In spite of these existing conditions, there has been a substantial amount of investment over the years.

This area has the potential of being revitalized as a viable commercial and institutional core for the City of St. Louis. Major businesses located within the LBD include: Blue Cross Blue Shield of Missouri, AG Edwards, AT&T, SJI and St. Louis University’s Amelia Earhardt School. Additionally, smaller, exciting business entities such as The Charles Motor Company, St. Louis Brewery and Tap Room, Panama Red’s, Fountain on Locust, Mulligan Printing and Signcrafters all contribute to the character and stability of the District.

As well, the LBD is enhanced by strong neighbors like Union Station, St. Louis University, Grand Center, Harris-Stowe State College, UPS, Sigma Chemical and the Martin Luther King Business Park that act as anchors for the Locust Business District. The Locust Business District constituents and Board have a deep respect for investment and ongoing corporate citizenship in this area.

Here are a few snapshots of  the neighborhoods history.

T.S. Eliot Home

Thomas Stearns Eliot (T.S. Eliot) was born in St. Louis on September 26, 1888, the seventh and youngest child of Henry Ware Eliot and Charlotte Champe Stearns.

Eliot lived in St. Louis for 18 years and attended Miss Locke’s School and Smith Academy. During his last year at Smith, he visited the 1904 World’s Fair and was so taken with the fair’s “native villages” that he wrote short stories about primitive life for the Smith Academy Record.

T.S. Eliot was awarded the Nobel Prize in literature in 1948, “for his outstanding, pioneer contribution to present-day poetry” and won general attention and critical acclaim in the 1950′s with his two verse dramas, The Cocktail Party and The Confidential Clerk. More recently, his name was again before the public due to the immense popularity of the play Cats, adapted from his, Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats.

Because of Eliot’s close ties to St. Louis, the family chose to remain in their urban, Locust Street home long after the area had run down and their peers had moved to other areas of the city. The location of he Eliot home is now part of the AT&T parking lot on the 2600 block of Locust Street on the north side. A commemorative plaque on the sidewalk marks the location.

Scott Joplin House

Among those who were drawn to St. Louis in the 1880s was a teenager named Scott Joplin.

Of all the houses and clubs in which Joplin lived and worked in St. Louis, only the brick fourplex into which he and his wife Belle Hayden Joplin moved in 1901 survives. It was here that the former itinerant pianist composed not only “The Entertainer,” “The Cascades” (for the 1904 World’s Fair, despite the fact that his music was considered to lowbrow to be performed on its stages!), and “The Gladiolus Rag,” but also his first (alas now lost) ragtime opera “A Guest of Honor.”

Despite its designation as a national historic landmark in 1976, the last surviving St. Louis home of Scott Joplin was almost razed a year later. In 1983, it was turned over to the state of Missouri by Jeff-Vander-Lou, Inc., the neighborhood development association that had preserved it from demolition.

In 1991 the Scott Joplin house was opened as a museum dedicated to Scott Joplin’s life and music, and to the vibrant community that surrounded the building at the turn of the century.

Other Interesting Locations

Automobile Row: The District was once an important regional center of automobile sales, manufacturing and parts support.

For information on this exciting neighborhood: