One of the things I love most about St. Louis history is that there's always another story waiting to be uncovered. That's why I couldn't resist turning the Landmarks Association of St. Louis' Summer in the City Bingo Challenge into an excuse to explore some of the city's best-known landmarks—and share a bit of history that sometimes I didn’t even know along the way.
A few days ago, I stumbled across the Landmarks Association of St. Louis’s Summer in the City Bingo Challenge. The official goal is to visit enough landmarks to complete one line on the bingo card.
Instead of just trying to complete one line, I’m attempting to visit all 25 landmarks before the July 30 deadline, all while sharing the history of each stop along the way. Rather than just posting photos, I’m digging into the stories behind each place—especially the ones that aren’t as well known.
So far I’ve visited (click each to visit the IG post):
📍 The Landmarks Association headquarters – a remarkable Soulard building that remained in the same family for 130 years before becoming the home of the organization dedicated to preserving St. Louis history.
📍 Central Library – Andrew Carnegie’s million-dollar gift and Cass Gilbert’s stunning design make this worth a visit. I recalled the days when readers filled out paper slips and librarians disappeared into the towering closed stacks to retrieve books, and talked about its glorious renewal several years ago that removed those stacks and created a new atrium.
📍 The Chatillon-DeMenil Mansion – a four-room farmhouse transformed into one of St. Louis’ grandest Greek Revival mansions, only to narrowly escape demolition for Interstate 55.
📍 Union Station – long before the world’s largest railroad station stood here, much of the site was occupied by Chouteau’s Pond, once one of St. Louis’ favorite places for fishing, picnics, and escaping the city. After its completion in 1894, Union Station became the world's largest and busiest railroad station used by 22 railroads.
If you’d like to join me on my journey (virtually, of course!), I’m sharing every stop on Instagram at @unseenstl, with a selection of those posts also appearing on my Unseen STL Facebook page.
And of course, it would be great to see others participating! See @landmarksstl’s post on Instagram for rules.
And if you enjoy discovering the hidden stories behind St. Louis, consider subscribing to Unseen St. Louis here on Substack. Every subscription here helps me continue researching, photographing, and telling the stories that don’t always make it into the history books.
Help cheer me on, and maybe I will make it to all 25 before the deadline!
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