The Most Dangerous Place in Town

“I choose free libraries as the best agencies for improving the masses of the people,” said industrialist Andrew Carnegie, “because they … only help those who help themselves. They never pauperize. They reach the aspiring and open to these chief treasures of the world -- those stored up in books. A taste for reading drives out lower tastes.” By the end of his life, Carnegie had given away ninety percent of his wealth, including gifts that funded over 2,500 free libraries around the world. All seven Carnegie buildings in St. Louis still exist, and five of them remain in use as libraries. The St.Louis Central Library is featured in one of the technical tours for CONSTRUCT2015, the CSI national convention held in St. Louis from September 30 through October 3.

The St. Louis Public Library system was founded immediately after the Civil War as a members-only library in conjunction with the St. Louis Public Schools. It opened to the public in 1874 and in 1901, it received a Carnegie grant that provided for the current central library, designed by Cass Gilbert and completed in 1912. A recent major restoration by Cannon Design brought the building into the 21^st Century, while retaining and refurbishing much of Gilbert’s original design.

The selection of Gilbert, in retrospect, seems like a foregone conclusion. After all, his work on the Louisiana Purchase Exposition, especially his design of the new Art Museum, had been acclaimed locally and he had achieved national prominence as the architect for the Minnesota State Capitol and the U.S. Customs House in New York City. One of America’s first celebrity architects, he was entering the prime of a career that would soon include the world’s tallest building, the Woolworth, and would culminate with the design for the U.S. Supreme Court Building.    

But Gilbert was no shoe-in for the commission, which was awarded after an invited competition that included six other architectural firms. Gilbert made the short list and was selected because of his design for the book delivery room, a two-story space centrally located in the plan. The completed building deviates very little from his initial design sketches. Reading and reference rooms and specialized collections rooms were organized around the delivery room, and the art and periodical rooms were located off the entrance vestibule.

Cannon Design’s restoration and renewal project won several architecture and library awards. The original book stacks in the north wing were removed, creating a three story public atrium and new theater and teen rooms. The AIA/ALA Library Building Jury award noted: “Meticulously renovated historic spaces combined with a sensitive combination of new construction within the existing historic shell to create a marvelous set of experiences for visitors.”  

The revitalization added 45% more public space to the building, and made it more inviting to the people of St. Louis. Almost since its inception, the city’s public library system has opened its doors to citizens of all races and ages, and allowed them access to the collected wisdom of the world. Carnegie’s take on libraries, quoted above, is more famous, but I prefer this one from the poet John Ciardi: “The public library is the most dangerous place in town.” Enjoy the danger at CONSTRUCT 2015 - visit a place where active minds are at work.

Getting there from CONSTRUCT: If you signed up for the technical tour, a bus will be provided.

Walking: 10 minutes, 6 blocks. Head west on Washington Avenue to 13^th Steet, turn south and the library is 2 blocks on your right.

Bus: Downtown Trolley (99 Bus) loops around downtown.  The trip from Convention Center to the Washington and 13th is 4 minutes. The fare is $2.25 each way.

Taxi: Budget $5 each way.

Blogs About Buildings and Food (OK... just food)

St. Louis has long had an exemplary culinary reputation based on wonderful restaurants and exquisite world-class cuisine. For example as far back as 1842, when an English travel writer of some note, Charles Dickens, visited St. Louis and stayed at the Planter’s House, he commented favorably about the meals, including one that his wife and he consumed in their room. Dickens was astonished to have “…counted sixteen dishes on our table at the same time.” Still, Dickens left no record of the contents of that meal. Rather, it was a local delicacy sampled on a side-trip through neighboring Lebanon, Illinois that seemed worth a specific mention: “…buffalo’s tongue – an exquisite dainty, by the way.”

Even in Dickens’s day, it wasn’t the fine dining but the oddball and quirky dish that set our region apart. Here are some of the St. Louis-centric foods you might – or in some cases might not - want to try when you are here for CONSTRUCT 2015.

Toasted Ravioli: Other than the golden brown exterior appearance of the pasta shell, there is nothing “toasted” about this legendary bar-food appetizer from St. Louis.  The t-rav allegedly was created when a plate of otherwise normal ravioli was dropped into a deep-fat fryer. Every Italian restaurant “on the Hill” claims credit for the genius invention or the happy accident. The former Oldani’s on Edwards Street provides a plausible history on their website. Traditional toasted ravioli has meat filling, although cheese filled is a common variation, it’s lightly breaded before frying, and it’s served with marinara dipping sauce and Parmesan cheese.

The St. Paul Sandwich has nothing to do with our Mississippi River upstream neighbor in Minnesota – it’s only available in St. Louis and some other Missouri cities, at Chinese-American carry out restaurants. The ingredients don’t vary: an egg foo young patty, pickles, onions, lettuce, and tomato, with mayonnaise, on white bread. Your only choices are the meat: pork, beef, shrimp, chicken, or “special” – a combination of some or all of the above, depending on the restaurant, the day of the week, and the mood of the chef. NPR’s opinion: “…truly, shockingly tasty. We fully expected to be grossed out by this thing, but it's amazing. And cheap.”

The Slinger: For my generation, the slinger is synonymous with the O.T. Hodge Chili Parlor. Alas, Hodge’s is no longer with us, a victim of an ugly internecine feud several years ago, although several other local diners serve versions of the slinger. The traditional slinger starts off simply enough: two hamburger patties, preferably topped with a slice of cheese. Cover these with hash brown potatoes, then with two eggs cooked any style (personal preference: sunny-side up). Drench the whole composition with chili - add grated cheddar cheese and chopped raw onions if you wish. It’s the go-to meal for those times when your cholesterol count is dropping lower than you’d like.

Brain Sandwiches, an old standard from when St. Louis was a major meatpacking center, became a lunch favorite of the generation that grew up during the Great Depression. Thinly sliced calves’ brains are mixed with milk, eggs, flour, and other spices and formed into patties that are deep fried and served on white or rye bread with raw onions, pickles, and spicy mustard. Surprisingly fluffy and delicately flavored, the fried brain sandwich fell into disfavor during the mad-cow disease scare in the 1980's, and the few taverns around town that still serve it now use pig brain instead of calf. Still, it’s worth seeking out if you are adventurous.

Pork Steak: This inexpensive cut from the shoulder of the pig is the staple of St. Louis style barbeque – pork steaks on the grille, a Budweiser in hand, and the Cardinal’s game on the radio were the three essential ingredients of a successful 1950’s weekend. The origin of the cut is explained in this magazine article, along with instructions for how we natives can improve our technique, although most of us won’t take kindly to suggestion. St. Louisans know the secret is in the sauce – lots of it – and what’s in each person’s special sauce is usually kept secret. Pork steaks are readily available in St. Louis, but almost impossible to find elsewhere.

St. Louis Style Ribs, on the other hand, seem to be ubiquitous everywhere but St. Louis. We’d seen them on menus in other cities, and had no idea what they were, until this newspaper article explained it all. It turns out "Pork Ribs, St. Louis Style" is an official USDA standard, and has been for years. But don’t try asking a native about St. Louis style ribs, because you’ll likely get a blank stare in return.

Gooey Butter Cake takes the toasted ravioli tradition of a lucky mistake to the dessert menu. A novice baker at a south St. Louis bakery in the 1930's botched a cake recipe. Fortunately for taste buds throughout the region, it was the Depression and the master baker didn’t condone waste. He put the mess in the oven anyway, and invented the gooey butter cake. Over the years, flavor variations evolved – pumpkin is a personal favorite – and true sugar addicts are not afraid to try it á la mode when the cake is fresh from the oven and still warm, along with your preferred beverage - in this case, coffee stout.

Ted Drewes: Founded in 1930, Drewes has served frozen custard to generations of St. Louisans and to visitors from around the world. The Chippewa location has been a Route 66 landmark since 1941, famous for its concrete, a milk shake so think it can – and will – be turned upside down before you receive it. Although you can buy prepackaged strawberry and chocolate Ted Drewes in grocery stores, at the custard stand everything is vanilla – the flavor comes from the plentiful and varied toppings. Full disclosure: it’s been decades since I’ve had a concrete – I usually get seduced by one of three favorite sundaes: the Dutchman, the Hawaiian Delight, or a “simple” hot fudge, marshmallow, and butterscotch.

So, that’s the story on St. Louis specialties – lucky accidents, misnamed oddities, economical cuts of meat, and mysterious origins. One thing these exquisite dainties have in common, they are all truly, and sometimes shockingly, tasty.  We’ll have a few of these treats on the menu at the Greater St. Louis Chapter’s “Night of Mirth, Mystery, and Mayhem” at City Museum on October 1^st, along with other St. Louis themed foods and drinks. Hope you can join us.

A Night of Mirth, Mystery, and Mayhem

On October 1, the Greater St. Louis Chapter of CSI will host a party at City Museum – and for the past several months even our most experienced specifiers have struggled to find adequate words to describe the experience that awaits our colleagues who visit us during CONSTRUCT 2015. It’s an indoor/outdoor playground for kids of all ages. It’s a warehouse of salvaged architectural ornament. It has a ten-story spiral slide in the middle of the building, two airplanes as part of an outdoor jungle gym, and a school bus on the roof. And it all started out 105 years ago as the headquarters for the largest of several manufacturers that made St. Louis the focus of footwear during the first half of the 20^th century.

The latter part of the 19^th century saw St. Louis transition from  distribution hub to manufacturing center, and no industry, except perhaps brewing, dominated our economy more than shoemaking. International Shoe, formed by a merger of Roberts Johnson & Rand Shoe Company with Peters Shoe Company in 1911, headquartered at the corner of Washington Avenue and 15^th Street in an ornate stone office building designed by Theodore Link, architect of St. Louis Union Station.

In 1930, a 10-story brick building was added behind the office to house a shoe factory, one of 91 the company would ultimately own, and warehouse space. Due to its size and production capacity, International Shoe manufactured most of this country’s military issue footwear during both World Wars, and continued to increase production and profits during the prosperity of the early 1950’s. International Shoe made four out of every five pairs of shoes made in America – Red Goose, Poll Parrot, and Florsheim are some familiar brands.  But when economic conditions drove manufacturing overseas, International Shoe became a more diversified company, Interco, divesting itself of many of the original shoe labels.

By 1983, both office building and factory were mostly vacant – neglected, deteriorating, and water damaged – when sculptor Bob Cassilly purchased the two building complex for 69 cents a square foot. Cassilly had owned a fiberglass and cast stone fabrication company specializing in architectural and landscape ornamentation that merged traditional motifs with his own unique artistic perspective. This led to a series of creature themed installations: Turtle Park Playground in St. Louis, Hippo Playground in New York, a 45-foot-long squid for the St. Louis Zoo, and a giant giraffe for the Dallas zoo.

Cassilly pioneered the redevelopment of the Washington Avenue commercial strip, a deteriorated area of downtown without much hope for the future. The International Shoe office building was renovated and repurposed, but it was in the factory that Cassilly and crew did their most creative work. Using mostly salvaged and surplus materials, they began transforming a rather non-descript industrial building into a wonderland. Fiberglass strips used by Boeing in airplane fuselages became icicles hanging from the first floor ceiling. A stainless steel cooling tube from an Anheuser-Busch beer tank was transformed into a huge Slinky. Walls were created using discarded cafeteria serving line pans, milk bottles, and other construction and industrial odds and ends.

In 1997, the building opened to the public as City Museum and it has added new areas and attractions ever since: MonstroCity, Enchanted Caves and Shoe Shaft, Vault Room, and Architecture Hall. With over 700,000 people visiting the museum each year, it can get quite boisterous and crowded. But on October 1, the Greater St. Louis Chapter of CSI will have exclusive use of the facility for a five-hour long private party for our friends visiting CONSTRUCT 2015. Registration is available at this website [www.constructshow.com]. We’ll be serving St. Louis themed food and drink in the Vault Room and in Architecture Hall, we’ll have local musical entertainment, and we’ll send you on a scavenger hunt if you so desire.

Come explore this most unique museum, funhouse, labyrinth, junkyard – it’s a work of art and a labor of love. Our dress code for the evening: “playground casual.” And surprisingly for a building that once led the world in the variety and number of shoes it manufactured, there is a strict limitation on footwear: only “sneakers or closed-toe, closed-heel shoes” will be permitted. There will be no limits, however, on fun.

 

Getting there from CONSTRUCT 2015:

Walking: 15 minutes, 8 blocks. Head west on Washington Avenue to 16^th Steet, turn north and the museum is a block up on your right.

Shuttles: The Greater St. Louis Chapter will be running a school bus shuttle to the museum. Check with our desk at the convention center for details.

Bus: Downtown Trolley (99 Bus) loops around downtown.  The trip from Convention Center to the museum is 5 minutes. The fare is $2.25 each way.

Taxi: Budget $7 each way.