History of Saint Louis City and County, from the earliest periods to the present day: including biographical sketches of representative men, Part 12

Author: Scharf, J. Thomas (John Thomas), 1843-1898
Publication date: 1883
Publisher: Philadelphia : L.H. Everts
Number of Pages: 1358

USA > Missouri > St Louis County > St Louis City > History of Saint Louis City and County, from the earliest periods to the present day: including biographical sketches of representative men > Part 12

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According to the tax assessor's report for 1882, the valuation of the real estate in the city of St. Louis is as follows : In the old limits, or within the limits before 1877, there are 63,652 lots, valued at $143,- 585,820, and 1417 acres, valucd at $3,440,270 ; total, $147,026,090. In the area between the old and present limits there are 18,367 lots, valued at $7,233,- 670, and 19,056 acres, valued at $7,917,850; total, $15,151,520. The grand total for the entire city for the 82,019 lots and 20,473 acres is $162,177,610.

St. Louis now has about one-third of its area cov- ercd with building and park improvements. There are about three hundred and thirty miles of improved streets, two hundred and fifteen miles of public and district sewers, two hundred and thirty miles of water- pipe, eighteen street railroads, having nearly onc hun- dred and thirty miles of route through the city, and sixteen steam railroads centering at Union Depot.

- The United States government now owns property in real estate and buildings in St. Louis to the value of $5,787,800, and the St. Louis school board owns property valued at $2,382,342. The valuation of property owned by private schools and convents is

$1,418,465, and by church corporations, $3,610,586. The total amount of real estate exempt from taxation in the city is about $35,000,000.

The increase in the assessed value of real estate in St. Louis in 1882 was about fifteen per cent. as to the entire city. In the central part of the city twenty and twenty-five per cent. increase was made, while in the suburban sections five to ten per cent. additional value was placed on real estate. But few owners made petitions appealing from these additional valuations.

Below are given samples of the assessments on Washington Avenue and Olive Street for the past two years, from which some idea may be obtained of the increased values.

Washington Avenue.

Between Fourth and Fifth Streets:

Ames' estate, 90 feet front, valued at $187,500 in 1881, and $190,000 in 1882.

William G. Clark, owner, 112 feet front; increased from $155,750 to $174,500.

Mercantile Block, 18 feet front; increased from $17,720 to $26,520.

Between Fifth and Sixth Streets:

Mary F. Barrett, 71 feet front ; increased from $82,140 to $94,860.

John H. Beach, 23 feet front ; from $20,570 to $23,180.

Alford Bradford, 70 feet; increased from $94,800 to $105,- 800.

Charles Bradford, 30 feet ; from $43,200 to $48,200.

State Savings Association, 27 feet ; from $19,280 to $21,000. Between Sixth and Seventh Streets :

Ames' estate, 90 feet; from $87,200 to $100,000.

New Lindell Hotel Company, 182 feet; from $474,150 to $587,000.

Between Seventh and Eighth Streets :

Gerard B. Allen, 235.feet; from $94,580 to $138,080.

George W. Bull, 22 feet ; from $17,930 to $22,240.

Between Eighth and Ninth Streets :

First Methodist Church, 94 feet; from $35,880 to $38,000.

Between Ninth and Tenth Streets :

Esther Collins, 24 feet ; from $32,330 to $37,500.

Olive Street.

Between Fourth and Fifth Streets :

Third National Bank, 37 feet ; from $97,000 to $103,750.

Between Sixth and Seventh Streets :

Provident Savings-Bank, 25 feet; from $39,500 to $44,500.

John B. Sarpy, 50 feet; from $46,330 to $52,900.

Between Sixth and Seventh Streets :

Alice Bacon, 25 feet; from $13,870 to $15,200.

Between Seventh and Eighth Streets :

T. Benoist, 44 fect ; from $33,040 to $40,000.

Between Eighth and Ninth Streets:

Laura A. Blossom, 25 feet ; from $12,290 to $15,450.

Odd-Fellows' Hall Association, 127 feet; from $54,000 to $60,000.

Between Ninth and T'enth Streets':

Gerard B. Allen, 100 feet; from $70,500 to $92,500.

Pelagie Berthold, 50 feet; from $23,500 to $26,500.

Between Tenth and Eleventh Streets:

Mary A. Calhoun, 24 feet; from $8250 to $12,250.

1036

HISTORY OF SAINT LOUIS.

Between Eleventh and Twelfth Streets : Daniel Catlin, 24 feet ; from $8720 to $9720. Nathan Cole, 29 feet; from $11,410 to $12,800.

John Byrne, Jr., the pioneer, perhaps, in what has grown to be the colossal real estate business of St. Louis, was born in New York City, Aug. 3, 1805. His parents were John Byrne and Margaret O'Don- nell, both natives of County Donegal, Ireland. Little is recorded of his boyhood, except that he was edu- cated at Georgetown, D. C., leaving school in 1819 and removing with his parents to Mobile, Ala., where, although a mere boy, he was immediately associated with his father in mercantile pursuits, for which he early exhibited a special aptitude.

On the 5th of March, 1832, he was married to Sarah M. Fitzimmons, a native of Asheville, N. C., and of Irish parentage. This union has proved a long and happy one, and on the 5th of March, 1882, the cou- ple had the pleasure of celebrating their golden wed- ding, amid the congratulations of a large company of their friends in St. Louis.

The ruin wrought by the panic of 1837 compelled Mr. Byrne to seek a new location. Accordingly he removed to St. Louis, where he established a modest dry goods house on Market Street. Few of those then engaged in business in St. Louis are now living, but one of the few is Eugene Kelly, who kept a store within a few doors of his, and who is now a wealthy banker of New York.

In 1840, Mr. Byrne opened a real estate office in a little building on Chestnut Street, near Fourth. Although the honor has been claimed for others, he was perhaps the pioneer in this business, and H. W. Leffingwell appears to have been the next person to engage in this as yet untried field.

Mr. Byrne's industry and fidelity to the interests of his patrons were speedily recognized, and he soon had the satisfaction of seeing his business established on a substantial basis. Its increase has been singularly uniform, a result due perhaps to his conservatism, which prevented his engaging in the wild speculations that proved so ruinous to others in the real estate trade. This caution begot confidence in him and gained him custom, and some of the largest estates in St. Louis have passed through his hands. It is now forty-two years since the business was inaugurated, and the generous competence which Mr. Byrne is now enjoying in the evening of his days is the fitting reward for years of watchful and incessant indus- try.

Although not a politician, Mr. Byrne has not de- clined to serve the public when called upon. At one time he was a member of the Board of Education,

serving with Chancellor Eliot, and proved himself a progressive friend of the public school system.

He is a devoted member of the Catholic Church, and was one of the founders of the St. Vincent de Paul Association. When he arrived in St. Louis he says the population was only eighteen thousand. The court-house was the only public building, and that was unfinished. The only Catholic Churches were the cathedral and the chapel of the St. Louis Uni- versity, and the only two Catholic institutions were the St. Louis University, under Father Ellet, and the Convent of the Sacred Heart.

Mr. Byrne was a director in the Central Savings- Bank, and when it failed he lost his investments and the deposits of his house. He is now a director in the Safe Deposit Company.

Mr. Byrne has had two children. Mary Elizabeth was born in New York in 1833, and in 1856 was married in St. Louis to Dr. F. L. Haydel, of St. James Parish, La. Dr. Haydel has been associated with his father-in-law for many years as superintend- ent of his business.

The fate of James Fitzsimmons Byrne was a tragic one. He was born in St. Louis, May 27, 1842; at- tended school at Antwerp, Belgium, for four years, and on June 8, 1864, was drowned in the Rhine at Bonn, Prussia. He was a young man of exceptional promise, and his sudden death fell with crushing weight upon his parents.

Although now considerably beyond the Scriptural limit of " threescore years and ten," Mr. Byrne has not until lately exhibited any marked decay of body or mind. He appears occasionally at his business, and attends to many details, and still manifests con- siderable interest in affairs. Of a retiring nature, he has always shunned publicity, and would prefer, if judged at all, to be judged by his dceds. According to such a standard, there are few of the business men of St. Louis who have accomplished morc, not increly in winning success in business, but in demonstrating the fact that enduring success is the natural result of patient, painstaking, and unostentatious labor.

Marcus A. Wolff, another prominent real estate agent, was born in Louisville, Ky., May 14, 1831. His father was born in London, England, of Polish parents, and came to this country when only nineteen years old. He was a mechanic in moderate circum- stances. Eventually he married Miss Susan Frank- lin, of Kentucky. The elder Wolff was a man of sound common sense, and, so far as he was able, gave his son a good common-school education. When the boy was only ten years of age, however, necessity compelled him to leave school, in order to contribute

LIBRARY Of THE UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS.

LIBRARY Ot THE UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS.

ST LANTS BANK NOTE COMPANY

Porphy Marcus atif

1037

THE MISSISSIPPI RIVER AND ITS TRIBUTARIES.

to his own support and to that of the other and younger members of the family.

Hoping to better his condition, his father removed to St. Louis, and Marcus found employment as a newsboy and in various capacities in the newspaper offices. The papers of the city then werc the Mis- souri Republican, the Evening Gazette, the Missou- rian, and the Reveille. For several years he was a carrier on the Evening Gazette and the Reveille, and in 1847 he went on the Republican, working at the press and carrying papers. The chief incidents of the latter engagement were the fire that destroyed the office of the paper and the cholera epidemic of 1849. While the malady was raging young Wolff gave a signal display of energy : three of the carriers of the paper were stricken down, and he insisted upon deliv- ering the papers on their routes in addition to his own, and for some time did the work of four men, beginning at one o'clock A.M. and walking continu- ously until noon. Such service won the gratitude and respect of his employers and the admiration of his acquaintances. In this eminently practical school Mr. Wolff completed his business education.

In December, 1852, he married Miss Eliza J. Curtis, of St. Louis, and about the same time obtained a po- sition as teller and clerk in a private banking-house, in which position he soon acquired the reputation of being the best judge of bank-notes in the city, a dis- tinction to be proud of, for in those days there were about twelve hundred banks throughout the country issuing notes of differing denomination. By judicious investment of his savings he was enabled in 1859 to establish himself in business as junior member of the real estate firm of Porter & Wolff. The house soon became known as one of the most successful in St. Louis. In 1868, Mr. Porter retired, and Mr. Wolff continued the business, having purchased his partner's interest. In 1872 the firm of M. A. Wolff & Co. was established. Under Mr. Wolff's energetic man- agement the business grew rapidly, and has long been perhaps the largest and most prosperous of its kind in St. Louis.

Pre-eminently a business man, Mr. Wolff has never held office, although a stanch Democrat, and often solicited to allow his name to be used. But recogniz- ing the fact that his own prosperity depended on that of the city, he has always taken a deep interest in whatever promised to advance her progress. He was one of the original stockholders in the Boatmen's Savings Institution, and holds or has held an interest (mostly as director) in the following institutions : Second National Bank, East St. Louis Elevator Com- pany, Hope Mutual Insurance Company, St. Louis

Distillery Company, Rapid Transit Company, South St. Louis Street Railroad Company, and Real Estate Exchange. Generally, it may be said that no legiti- mate enterprise promising the advancement of the city and State has yet been inaugurated in which he has not manifested a deep interest.

Mr. Wolff is of a social nature, and is a Mason, Knight Templar, Knight of St. Patrick, and a mein- ber of the St. Louis Legion of Honor and other so- cieties. Throughout his life he has been industrious, prudent, and saving, and as a consequence has amassed a handsome competency. His residence at Côte Bril- liante is one of the most attractive in the city.

Still in the prime of life, Mr. Wolff has lost none of the spirit and dash that characterized his early career, and appears good for many years to come.

CHAPTER XXVI.

THE MISSISSIPPI RIVER AND ITS TRIBUTARIES.

As the commercial metropolis of the Mississippi valley, St. Louis lays under contribution not only the great Mississippi River, but all the numerous streams which swell this mighty current. Situated twenty miles below the mouth of the Missouri and one liun- dred and seventy-four miles above the mouth of the Ohio, St. Louis holds, as has been frequently pointed out in this work, the key to the industrial develop- ment of that vast and fertile region which is drained by the Mississippi, the Missouri, the Ohio, and the numerous smaller rivers, and her commercial existence is indissolubly linked to that of the great valley.

" Many years ago the late Governor Clark and my- self," says Hon. Thomas H. Benton,1 " undertook to calculate the extent of boatable water in the valley of the Mississippi; we made it about fifty thousand . miles ! of which thirty thousand were computed to unite above St. Louis, and twenty thousand below. Of course, we counted all the infant streams on which a flat, a keel, or a bateau could be floated, and justly ; for every tributary of the humblest boatable character helps to swell not only the volume of the central waters, but the commerce upon them. Of this im- mense extent of river navigation, all combined in one system of waters, St. Louis is the centre and the entrepôt, presenting even now, in its infancy, an astonishing and almost incredible amount of com- merce, destined to increase forever." The Missis-

1 Letter to the St. Louis delegation to the Chicago Convention, dated June 20, 1847.

1038

HISTORY OF SAINT LOUIS.

sippi, the conduit of them all to the ocean, must ever remain the central figure in the group. Rising in Lake Itasca, about three thousand two hundred miles from the Gulf of Mexico, near the " divide" which turns the water-fall of that country into the Red River of the North, it flows for over one thou- sand miles through a rich and abundant land, until its waters are broken by the Falls of St. Anthony, near which the thriving cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul are located. The river at these falls is eighteen hundred feet wide, and its waters are precipitated over a ledge of limestone rock seventeen feet in height, forming a dam, the water of which supplies power to many manufacturing establishments in Minneapolis, the chief of which is that of flour. For continuing the improvement of these falls, twenty-five thousand dollars was appropriated by the River and Harbor Act of 1882. St. Paul, near these falls, is seven hun- dred and ninety-eight miles from St. Louis, and is the head of steamboat communication with St. Louis, though the river is navigable far above the falls.

Not the least of the remarkable features of the Mississippi River are the physical characteristics which it has stamped upon the delta which it has created and through which it flows. The scientists who have made a study of this river regard the delta of the Mississippi as beginning near the village of Commerce, about twenty-eight miles above the mouth of the Ohio, where the rock in situ is first en- countered on both sides of its channel, and supposed to underlie its bed. If that be assumed as a fact, it involves the further assumption that at some remote period there existed a cataract or rapids of far greater descent than that at Niagara somewhere above the mouth of the Ohio River. The elevation of the low- water surface of the Mississippi about Cape Girardeau is two hundred and eighty-five feet above the level of the ocean, and if ever the level of the sea extended up to that point, the Mississippi must then and there have precipitated its waters over a ledge two hundred and eighty-five feet high. If we imagine a great plane, extending from the mouth of the Ohio, six hundred miles in length and thirty to forty in width, with its northern extremity elevated two hundred and eighty-five feet, we shall have some idea of the delta which the river has created in the progress of time. This plane, containing forty thousand square miles, has been formed in the course of ages from the ma- terial washed down from the uplands by the river and its tributaries. The river has therefore raised above the sea the soil which constitutes its own bed, and flows down this plane of its own creation in a serpentine course, frequently crowding the hills and

bluffs. The actual distance from the mouth of the Ohio to the gulf is in round numbers five hundred miles, the length of the Mississippi from the same point to the gulf is eleven hundred and seventy- eight miles, and the average descent at high water is three and a quarter inches per mile. The course of the river is therefore lengthened out nearly seven hun- dred miles, or more than doubled by the remarkable flexures of its channel, and the rate of descent is re- duced by these flexures to less than one-half the in- clination of the plane down which it flows.

The Mississippi bears along at all times, but es- pecially in the periods of the floods, a vast amount of earthy matter suspended in its waters, which the cur- rent is able to carry forward so long as the water is confined to the channel. But when the water over- flows the banks its velocity is checked, and it imme- diately deposits the heaviest particles which it trans- ports and leaves them upon its borders, and as the water continues to spread farther from its banks, it continues to let down more and more of this sus- pended material, the heaviest particles being deposited on the banks, and the finest clay conveyed to positions more remote. The consequence is that the borders of the river which received the first and heaviest particles are raised higher above the general level of the plane than the soil which is more remote, and that while the plane of the delta dips towards the sea at the rate of eight inches per mile, the soil ad- jacent to the banks slopes off at right angles to the course of the river into the interior for five or six miles at the rate of three or four feet to the mile. The lands immediately on the borders of the river are extremely fertile, and often highly cultivated, but as they are all subject to inundation during the high floods of the river, they are guarded by artificial em- bankments. The water pressing upon these embank- ments often produces breaches or crevasses through them, and rushes in a deep column into the low grounds, and sweeps over every improvement. The width, depth, and area of cross section of the Mis- sissippi below St. Louis will be found in the following table, from the memoir of Charles Ellet, Jr. :

Points on the River.

Width, Feet.

Depth, Feet.

Area of Cross Section, Square Feet.

At Cape Girardeau, 112 miles above ...

2500

66,5

105,544

Above mouth of Ohio, 2 miles ..

1530

77.5

Below mouth of Ohio, 1 mile.

4031

71.3

235,333

Below Mempliis, 16 mile.

2830

102.5

143,212

At Horse-Shoe Cut-Off.

2940

72.8

161,221

Above Arkansas River, 3/4 mile.

2810

81.5

171,190

Below

34 mile

3730

81.0

196,300

At American Bend, upper side

3365

103.6

170,160

= lower side.

3285

79.1

187,170

Terrapin Neck. 66 66 lower side.

3540

102.1

168,130

Above Vicksburg, 7 miles.

3513

120.0

160,164

Below

4400

84.0

207,800

Above Palmyra Bend ...

4048

96.3

187.220

Below

5613

91.3

256,292

3440

87.6

178,220

1039

THE MISSISSIPPI RIVER AND ITS TRIBUTARIES.

Points on the River.

Width, Feet.

Depth, Feet.

Area of Cross Section, Square Feet.

Above Grand Gulf, 4 miles.

3644

105.5

175,773

Below

5900

76.5

264,797

Above Red River, 12 mile ..

2545

118.0

194,530

Burlington

259

In Racourcl Cut-Off ..

1761

107.0

148,790

At Tunica Bend.

3323

87.7

233,892

Baton Rouge ..

2500

212,500

Above Plaquemine, 112 mlies ..

2170

123.5

181,500

Below

2790

128.0

199,280

Above Donaldsonville, 1 mile

2483

117.5

200,250

3553

103.2

114,580

Bonnet Carré Bend, above Crevasse ..

2925

107,9

198,734

below

2983

76.4

152,443

Sauvé's plantation ...

2375

135.3

182,031

McMaster's plantation

2425

100.0

166,172

The average area of high-water section of the whole from the mouth of the Ohio to New Orleans is two hundred thousand square feet. The estimate for the discharge of high water by the Mississippi at the top of the flood of 1854 was one million two hundred and eighty thousand cubic feet per second.

At the time of the Revolution there were able men who conceived that the Atlantic States, hemmed in by the sea and by a chain of mountains, embraced too great a diversity of surface and products, and were too widely scattered not to present discordant elements and jarring interests, which could only be reconciled and held in check by a powerful centralized govern- ment. They could not imagine that the barriers of the mountains would be overleaped, and that other States would spring up in the remote West; that their descendants would intermingle on the Pacific coast with the people of Asia, and claim the Sand- wich Islands for their neighbors ; that Mexico would present but a feeble barrier to their interminable progress, or that States would flourish. in the Missis- sippi valley, in which one of the States, Missouri, unexplored at the period of the Revolution, has a population, resources, and wealth greater than all the original thirteen when their independence was achieved, and a city, St. Louis, is more populous, wealthy, and enterprising than all the cities of the Atlantic coast at the same epoch.

The distances from St. Louis to points on the upper Mississippi are as follows :

Miles.

Total.

To mouth of Missouri ..

Alton .

Grafton

Cap au Gris.

Worthington

Hamburg.

Clarksville

105

Louisiana

117

Cincinnati, Ill.

132

Saverton

140

Hannibal

147

Marion ..

157

Quincy.

167

La Grange

185

Ste. Genevieve ..

Tully.

187

Warsaw.

207

Pratt's.

Keokuk

212

Kaskaskia

Montrose

224

Chester

3665

128.0

268,646

Oquawka.

15 274

Keithbury

286

New Boston

8 294

Port Louisa

306

Muscatine

324

Rock Island

354

Hampton

366

Le Clair

6 372

Camanche

390

Albany

392

Fulton

402

Sabula

420

Savanna

422

Galena

452 477

Dubuque ..

25 12

489

Waupaton

497

Buena Vista

503

Cassville

507 517 539

McGregor.

Prairie du Chien

542

Red House Landing.

545

Johnson's Landing.

Columbus

Lansing.

Winneshiek

585

Victory.

Warner's Landing.

Wild Cats' Bluffs

La Crosse

Black River.

Fortune's Landing.

Montoville

Winona

Wabashaw Prairie.

Honie's Landing Hall's Landing ...

Wabasha.

Nelson's Landing.

Reed's Landing

711

Lake Pepin ..

712

Wells' Landing.

726 734

Bullard's Landing.

Red Wing.

742

Point Prescott

764

Point Douglas.

765

Hastings

790

Crow Village

793

St. Paul

798

Falls of St. Anthony.

806

Mendota

812

Fort Snelling.

813

Itasca ...

850

Sauk Rapids

899

Fort Ripley

46 945

The distances from St. Louis to points on the Mis- sissippi to Cairo are as follows :

Mlles.

Total.

To Cahokia.

Carondelet.

Jefferson Barracks.

Sneck's Landing ..

Widow Waters' Landing ..

Sulphur Springs.

Rattlesnake Springs

Harlow's

Platin Rock

Selma.

Rushtower

John Brickley's

Fort Chartres ..

177

Canton ..

St. Mary's

10 70

Fort Madison.

236

Pontoosac.

242

Dallas

2 244

Below “

Guttenberg

546 579 577

590 601 613 629 641 647 651

658 662 672 682 707 709

Will's Landing.

Miles. Total.

1040

HISTORY OF SAINT LOUIS.

Miles.

Total.

Maynard.

Fort Perry.

Liberty ..

Underhill's

Herring's

Baily's

100

Wilkinson

105

Linhoop

106

Wittenburg.

120

Sellers

121

Grand Tower.

122

Birmingham.

128

Hines .....

129

Preston's

130

Bennet's

131

Neeley's.

132

Vaucil's

133

Willard's

135

Bainbridge.

136

Clear Creek

145

Cape Girardeau

150

Thebes.

160

Commerce ..

163

Thornton's

168

Price's ..

170

Lane's .

173

Hunt's ...

174

Rodney's

189

Cairo

194

Mouth of Ohio.

194

Ohio City

194

The river system of the Mississippi valley, of which St. Louis is the centre, the entrepôt, may be summarized as follows :

Miles.

Mississippi from St. Anthony's Falls to

the Gulf of Mexico

2,200

Red River to head of navigation.

1,100

Arkansas to Neosho River.

600

White River to Batesville ..

400

St. Francis River

100

Missouri River

2,000

Osage River.

300

Kansas

300

Other tributaries

600

Des Moines.

300

St. Peter's ...

300

Yazoo

100

Ohio

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History of Saint Louis City and County, from the earliest periods to the present day: including biographical sketches of representative men, Part 12

Author: Scharf, J. Thomas (John Thomas), 1843-1898 Publication date: 1883 Publisher: Philadelphia : L.H. Everts Number of Pages: 1358

Author: Scharf, J. Thomas (John Thomas), 1843-1898
Publication date: 1883
Publisher: Philadelphia : L.H. Everts
Number of Pages: 1358