In underwriting the competition to design the memorial, Smith challenged contestants to develop something “transcending in spiritual and aesthetic values,” which would symbolize American history and culture.² The Gateway Arch is the fulfillment of Smith’s dream. Although he never lived to see the actual monument built, Smith approved of Finnish-American Eero Saarinen’s winning design in 1947.³ Smith wrote to Saarinen and stated, “it was your design, your marvelous conception, your brilliant forecast into the future, that has made the realization of the dream possible – a dream that you and the wonderful genius at your command and the able assistance of your associates are going to achieve far beyond the remotest possibility that we had dared visualize in the beginning.”⁴

Architectural engineer Hannskarl Bandel’s unique construction design brought Saarinen’s design to life. Bandel’s developed a series of steel triangles that narrowed in size as they near the top. Each section was twelve feet in length and doubled-walled. Once installed, each unit was filled with concrete and covered with stainless steel sheets.⁵ The Arch is composed of 142 sections of these prefabricated stainless steel-covered triangles. The Arch weighs over 17,246 tons and is over 630 feet high and 630 feet wide at the base.

From its inception in 1933 until its completion in 1967, the Arch project was controversial. The 40 city blocks along the Mississippi riverfront envisioned as the location of the future memorial was densely populated and held hundreds of historic buildings. Smith’s commission planned to raze the buildings using the city’s power of eminent domain to acquire the property rather than purchase it directly from the owners.⁶ The resistance to the project and the lawsuits ensuing from the commission’s plans and approach to the land acquisition delayed the start of construction and approval of matching federal funds needed for site preparation. Legal suits to prevent the issuance of city bonds to fund the project paralleled the landowner suits against government acquisition and impeded progress. Then, the 1933 financial crash compounded the delay. Still, by 1942 with all property owner suits and appeals resolved, and questions over the issuance of bonds by the city settled, crews finished clearing the 90-acre site.⁷ Although America’s entry into World War II, combined with new lawsuits over the relocation of utilities and the elevated railroad track lines, again postponed construction of the Arch, work on the restoration of the Old Court House and the Memorial Park proceeded. Construction of the Arch finally began in 1961 with the laying of the foundation.

The final cost of the Arch was $13 million, financed with 75 percent federal funds and 25 percent city of St. Louis funds. Additionally, the Bi-State Development Agency funded the $2 million Arch transportation system.⁸ The total cost of the entire project including acquisition and demolition of buildings on the site, site preparation, restoration of the Old Court House, construction and landscaping of the surrounding park, the parking facility, underground museum and exhibits, visitor accommodations, building of the new train tunnel and moving of the railroad track, exceeded $40 million; again this was funded approximately 75 percent by the federal government and 25 percent by the city of St. Louis.⁹

In addition to political and financial delays, protests and labor disputes plagued the Arch’s construction. Civil rights activists saw the Arch project as a symbol of a perpetuation of racial discrimination in the building trades in a highly unionized city. Although African Americans worked as day laborers, none held positions in the skilled building trades hired to construct the monument. Black workers took action and protested the construction company in mid-1964. Then, on July 14, 1964, Percy Green and Richard Daly, two members of the Congress of Racial Equality, climbed the north leg of the Arch and remained there for four hours to protest the exclusion of Black contractors and laborers from the project. A group of protestors gathered in support and stayed while the demonstration lasted. Racism was also at the root of a demonstration on January 7, 1966, when members of the AFL–CIO walked off the job, refusing to work with plumbers affiliated with the Congress of Industrial Unions (CIU). The protesters claimed that the Black plumbers the CIU represented did substandard work. Given that the federal government funded a significant portion of the construction of the Memorial Park, the protests initiated a series of events that led to intervention of the U.S. Justice Department. The Justice Department filed a suit against the St. Louis AFL-CIO and four of its member unions. The cases were the first filed under the 1964 Civil Rights Act, which governed equal employment.

The Arch’s visitor center and museum opened in 1967. In that same year, the tram to the top of the Arch, opened to the public. The National Park Service assumed responsibility for management of the entire complex, which became known as Gateway National Park.¹⁰ The Park Service designed the museum, located under the Arch, to provide historical information about Thomas Jefferson, the American colonizers who played a role in expanding the West, and the First Nations peoples who populated the land that white Americans confiscated. The goal was to help visitors understand the complex intersection of diverse wants, needs, dreams, methods of attainment, and rationalization of consequences that drove western expansion. The Old Courthouse of St. Louis, notable because of its association with the Dred Scott case, is also located in the park and open to the public.¹¹

While most visitors to the Park are attracted by the beauty of the edifice and the history it memorializes, the Arch has also attracted daredevils since its completion. In addition to parachutists flying through the legs of the monument, there have been multiple attempts to climb or parachute off the Arch. The first and most deadly incident occurred in November 1980 when 33-year-old Kenneth Swyers attempted to parachute from a plane to the top of the Arch and then base jump using his reserve parachute. Unfortunately, the wind blew Swyers sideways after landing, and he slid down the leg to his death.¹² A month later, a local St. Louis television station reported that a parachutist wearing a Santa Claus costume jumped out of an airplane and landed on the Arch. The supposed stuntman reportedly grasped a beacon on the monument and then used the parachute to support his glide down the Arch’s leg. Police later determined that the report was, most likely, a hoax.¹³ In 1986, professional stuntman Dan Koko, who earned $1 million when he successfully dove 110 meters off the Vegas World Hotel in 1984, proposed free-diving off the Arch into a giant airbag, seeing this as the ultimate stunt. St. Louis officials nixed Koko’s plans.¹⁴ Then on September 14, 1992, John C. Vincent, who parachuted off the World Trade Center in May 1991, performed a successful climb of the Arch. The 25-year-old used suction cups to ascend the leg and then parachuted safely back to the ground after resting on top for over an hour. Vincent was arrested and charged with two misdemeanors.¹⁵

Rather than risk parachuting onto the structure, visitors can reach the viewing room at the top of the Arch in trams that travel inside the legs of the monument. Once there, visitors can see east across the Mississippi into East St. Louis, Illinois, and west into downtown St. Louis, Missouri, and the sprawling suburbs of the greater St. Louis region. With exception to the Mississippi River, little remains of what Lewis and Clark saw as they set out to chart America’s western territory in 1804. The Arch stands as a complicated representation to the nation. For some, the arch stands as a glorious testament to western expansion and progress; to others, the Arch represents the physical embodiment of displacement and racism. Which begs the question, how can progress be an equitable endeavor for all involved?

In the aftermath of the Civil War, Kansas City began to emerge as an important railroad hub. This was largely due to the completion of the construction of the Hannibal Bridge, the first railroad bridge across the Missouri River, in August of 1869. Urban Historian Charles Glaab observed that this first bridge, “has served as the city’s special symbol…the key to its success and a tribute to the bold resourcefulness of a small group of inspired city fathers.”¹ Boosters of Kansas City in the tension-filled decade prior to the outbreak of the Civil War, as well as in the chaotic postwar period, pushed for railroad construction as a means of building their community.² As a result of the completion of the Hannibal Bridge, Union Station’s predecessor, Union Depot, opened in Kansas City’s West Bottoms district in 1878. Over 180 trains passed through the depot daily. Union Depot’s location, however, quickly became a problem. While its site in the West Bottoms facilitated the transportation of cattle and other goods, the area was prone to flooding and the station was surrounded by “less desirable” landmarks such as gambling saloons and brothels.

The various issues with the West Bottoms location led city officials to decide to build a new train station in a new location. The station found its new home when twelve conjoining railroad companies committed to the project.³ The valley at 25th Street and Grand Avenue was chosen for the station due to its central location and high floodplain. Construction began in 1911, spearheaded by designer Jarvis Hunt, a trailblazer of the City Beautiful Movement.⁴ The building was designed in Beaux-Arts style with large arches throughout the grand hall to brightly illuminate the area. Other features included marble floors and ornate decoration. Construction took three years and heavily relied on the work of immigrants. Many Irish immigrants spent countless hours laying down railroad tracks and excavating the needed land. Without the help of immigrant labor, the station would not have been completed so swiftly.

Union Station opened on October 30, 1914. The 850,000 square footage building included nice floors of offices, a grand hall, ticketing stations, shops, and restaurants, including the Harvey House. The main headquarters for the Harvey House chain, which was founded by Leavenworth resident Fred Harvey and included restaurants and hotels along rail lines throughout the western United States, was located in Union Station.⁵ The building featured 95 foot high ceilings engraved with ornate moldings and showcased three chandeliers that weigh over 3,500 pounds. Three large arches defined the grand hall, with a grand central clock hanging from the ceiling in the middle of the station.  The clock was a prominent meeting point for both Kansas Citians and visitors. These spectacular architectural details are still on display today. The station boomed with the sounds of thousands of passengers and guests, peaking during World War I with 79,368 trains passing through the station. For instance, in one day, 271 trains journeyed through the station. Soon, it became the heart of railway transportation for the entire Midwest. During this time period, Union Station in Kansas City was the second busiest train station in the entire country, only after New York City.

Unfortunately, excitement for the popular station and its attractive architecture was quickly met with tragedy. On June 17, 1933, the station became the site of what became known as the Union Station Massacre. Two FBI agents and the chief of police from MacAlester, Oklahoma apprehended Frank Nash, an infamous bank robber with links to organized crime who had escaped from the United States Penitentiary in Leavenworth, Kansas, two and a half years earlier.  They transported him by train from Fort Smith, Arkansas to Kansas City, where they planned to turn him over to Reed E. Vetterli, the special agent in charge of the Kansas City FBI office.⁶ Kansas City policemen were present to reinforce them as they moved through the station and made the transfer. As the law officers loaded Nash into a waiting Chevrolet parked in front of the station, gangsters fired shots toward them in an attempt to free Nash. The suspected shooters included Charles “Pretty Boy Floyd” Arthur, Vernon Miller, and Adam Richetti.  Their attempt to free Nash failed when they killed him along with four law enforcement officers in the shootout. Gaining national attention, the incident led Congress to grant more protective power to the FBI.⁷ This resulted in the agency being permitted to carry protective firearms and make arrests.

Union Station became an important site during WWII. The station began to grow throughout this time as it was vital in Kansas City’s mobilization for war, just as it had during World War I. In 1945, passenger traffic hit a record 678,363 passengers as thousands of soldiers were traveling home from war.

The evolution of transportation in the postwar years shifted the role of Union Station. As air travel, the interstate highway system, and Americans’ love of owning cars became more prevalent and popular, railway travel began to decline. Similar to other train stations across the country, Kansas City’s Union Station lost its appeal and need. By 1973, only six trains operated, transporting about 32,842 passengers daily.⁸ With less foot traffic, retail shops and restaurants such as Fred Harvey Company, the Westport Room, and the Lobster Pot closed. In 1985, Amtrak ceased its services out of Union Station, ushering a period of decline and deterioration for the building.

In an effort to save the station, Kansas City officials partnered with Trizec, a Canadian firm, to redevelop the structure and the surrounding freight house area that was also facing decline. This proved to be unsuccessful, as Trizec made no meaningful improvements to Union Station. As the abandoned building continued to deteriorate, many advocated for its demolition. Union Station, a site that once represented the pride of Kansas City, became an “eyesore” in the city’s skyline.

Kansas Citians, however, did not give up on saving this once-thriving building. In order to save and redevelop Union Station, Kansas City approved a first of its kind, a “bi-state” tax which included five Missouri and Kansas counties in the Kansas City metropolitan area. This initiative raised funds for a $250 million renovation completed on November 10, 1999. The newly unveiled Union Station included shops, restaurants, theaters, exhibits, and Science City, which is a children’s science museum.⁹ Union Station has since hosted world-class exhibits, civic organization offices, live televised programs, and community events. The restoration of the building also attracted the railway company Amtrak to return and operate their routes through the station.

The history of Union Station provides a glimpse into Kansas City’s story as well as reflects national trends: a booming transportation hub, a city facing postwar urban decline, and recent revitalization efforts in cities across the United States. Union Station is beloved by Kansas Citians residents and has become a nationally recognized historic landmark and one of the defining sites of Kansas City. Today, Union Station still functions as one of the most utilized train stations in Missouri. Whether dropping off a loved one on their train departure to seeing a thrilling exhibit, everyone who steps into Union Station has a story of their time there, as did the millions before them.

Lindbergh was born in Detroit, Michigan, to Charles August Lindbergh (1859-1924) and Evangeline Lodge Land Lindbergh (1876-1954). The couple separated after his birth, and Lindbergh spent most of his childhood moving between Little Falls, Michigan, and Washington D.C. His father often created tests to develop Lindbergh’s moral and physical strength and to teach him self-reliance and personal discipline; characteristics that would prove essential to his career as a skilled pilot.¹ His mother, a schoolteacher, encouraged these same traits, as well as cultivated a strong interest in science and its applications.² Lindbergh worked as a farmer in Minnesota as he entered adulthood. Later, he decided he wanted a career “in which his work with machines was not constantly interrupted, as it was with farming, by long stretches of dull physical labor.”³ This desire pushed him to enter the University of Wisconsin–Madison as an engineering major in 1920.

Lindbergh intended to earn his degree and become an airplane pilot; however, college life did not suit him, and he dropped out to enroll at the Nebraska Aircraft Corporation’s flying school in Lincoln. While at Nebraska Aircraft Corporation, Charles worked as a barnstormer⁴ and airplane mechanic to gain experience and earn tuition. After a year of barnstorming, he joined the United States Army Air Service in 1924 to receive more detailed training and graduated at the top of his class a year later. The Army did not need many active-duty pilots after the end of WWI, however, so Lindbergh returned to civilian aviation. He was hired by the Robertson Aircraft Corporation, headquartered in St. Louis, as chief pilot on the new CAM-2 contract airmail route. Lindbergh’s role as a chief pilot provided ample experience for his famous transatlantic flight.⁵ While waiting for the negotiation of his job, he worked as a barnstormer and flight instructor and continued to do part-time military flying as a reserve officer in the 110th Observation Squadron of the Missouri National Guard, stationed in St. Louis.⁶

The strong presence of the developing aviation industry in pre-Lindbergh St. Louis resulted from multiple factors. The city was a major manufacturing center due to its access to rail and water transportation, as well as its central geographical location.⁷ It was also home to Scott Field (now Scott Air Force Base), which had been used to train WWI balloonists, as well as Lambert Field, which was a hub of air traffic after hosting the 1923 Air Races.⁸ It was in this growing aviation community that Lindbergh learned of a $25,000 prize offered by Raymond Orteig to the first pilot to fly nonstop from New York to Paris. Orteig, a French immigrant, and wealthy hotel owner loved aviation and believed that his patronage would create the next great aerial spectacle.⁹ Lindbergh convinced nine St. Louis businessmen to finance his attempt to secure the prize money. Unable to buy a suitable pre-made plane, the group partnered with the Ryan Aircraft Company of San Diego to build a custom model, which was designed jointly by Lindbergh and Ryan’s chief engineer. Lindbergh named the plane the Spirit of St. Louis in honor of his sponsors’ hometown.¹⁰

From May 20^th through the 21^st, Lindbergh completed his successful transatlantic flight. This flight catapulted him into the international spotlight and is often seen as “the first incarnation of media-driven celebrity in the twentieth century.”¹¹ Thanks to the press, his face and accomplishment was spread across the globe, making him the star of countless parades and parties wherever he traveled, both in the U.S. and internationally. Lindbergh, at first, “acquiesced to this popular mania… deciding to exploit his unique status” to further causes he believed in, such as aviation and American isolationism.¹² His fame contributed to the “Lindbergh Boom” of aviation, and his ideas regarding commercial passenger transportation “became the standard for aviation in the United States and, subsequently, around the world;” Lindbergh even helped design the modern airport.[enf_note]Berg, 189.[/efn_note] However, his prominence was not something Lindbergh enjoyed and it proved to be a double-edged sword. This was evidenced in the infamous kidnapping and death of his son, Charles A. Lindbergh Jr. Additionally, his struggles with Franklin Delano Roosevelt would cast long shadows over his life, leaving scars that Lindbergh struggled with for the rest of his life.

Despite his personal struggles, Lindbergh’s promise that his success “would be a terrific boost for St. Louis… whose stature would shine with a nonstop transatlantic flight” was also proven true.¹³ Lambert Field (renamed the St. Louis Lambert International Airport in 1971) became a major flight hub for civilian and military aircraft.¹⁴ Various airlines, including McDonnell Douglas (later Boeing), TWA (Lindbergh served as chairman of their technical committee), and American Airlines all used St. Louis as an important hub in their operations because of its central location and newfound prominence in the industry. Later controversies, including his praise of the Nazi air force after a tour of aviation facilities in Germany and white supremacist beliefs, resulted in the inevitable fall of Lindbergh’s prestige, but the boost he provided to commercial aviation had a positive impact on modern aviation development.

Charles Lindbergh’s legacy is complicated by his argument for American neutrality in the lead up to WWII and his support for white supremacy, but his role in aviation and its evolution is undisputed. In a time in which aviation was still a dangerous occupation, Lindbergh’s seemingly impossible achievement gave incredible power to the aviation industry of St. Louis, transforming it into an international hub of commercial flight. Today, the St. Louis Lambert International Airport is the largest and busiest airport in Missouri and hosts millions of passengers each year. It is a testament to Charles Lindbergh’s vision, and a tangible reminder of the strength of the determination and human spirit he displayed when he and the Spirit of St. Louis made their mark on history.

One such traveler, future governor Meredith Miles Marmaduke, detailed his 1824 expedition along the trail in journal entries, which the Missouri Intelligencer reprinted. The caravan was the largest yet to follow this route and comprised 81 people, which consisted  of white traders and enslaved people, more than 150 mules and horses, and nearly two dozen wagons.² After camping in Franklin, Missouri to prepare for the journey West, the caravan traveled to Blue Springs along the Missionary Road, a path likely forged in 1821 by missionaries sent in an attempt to convert to the Osage peoples. From there the group traveled into largely unmapped territories of the West. Among the challenges faced during their two-month long trip were the roaming buffalo who repeatedly frightened away the caravan’s horses, and a desperate paucity of water, which led to the deaths of other livestock.

The party arrived in Santa Fe with about $30,000 in trade goods, which likely included brightly colored clothing and fabrics, jewelry, sewing pins, and hand mirrors.³ William Becknell observed that New Mexican consumers preferred merchandise of considerable quality. However, Marmaduke worried that due to systemic conditions, many customers of Mexican descent in the region suffered from poverty. Therefore, Marmaduke was concerned that this could prevent traders from moving their goods at a profit.⁴ However, such ventures, nonetheless proved so lucrative that some American agents tried to warn away potential rivals back home lest an excess of sellers harm their own prospects. The silver coin that merchants brought back to Missouri helped to stabilize the fluctuations of a frontier economy in which specie often ran short. In addition, Missouri farmers were eager customers of the mules purchased in New Mexico. These reliable and versatile draft animals, which were a cross between a female horse and a male donkey, became an important Santa Fe Trade trade commodity.⁵

The trade’s growing profitability caught the eye of a famous Missourian, U.S. Senator Thomas Hart Benton, who saw that Missouri’s strategic location made it a valuable gateway to the West. Anyone who wished to journey the Santa Fe Trail had to start in Missouri. Aided by Missouri trader Augustus Storrs, Senator Benton was a key component in sponsoring legislation to mark a road to Santa Fe. Storrs previously traveled the route in 1823. Benton and Storrs were also assisted by Alphonso Wetmore, a paymaster stationed in Franklin, the small town where the trail originally began.⁶ Once the bill passed through Congress, three commissioners oversaw the surveys of the road: Benjamin H. Reeves, Colonel Pierre Menard, and George C. Sibley.⁷ The men hired Joseph Cromwell Brown, an experienced surveyor who had been responsible for determining several key meridians and state boundaries in the past. In 1825, Brown began work charting out the Santa Fe Trail and produced a map spanning the entire length of the route later that year.⁸

The town of Franklin became an important trade center from 1822 to 1826, a marketplace where traders could buy merchandise at 20 to 30 percent above the prices in Philadelphia and take them to Santa Fe for a profit of 40 to 100 percent. Such bright prospects drew many people to the area near Franklin, but a series of floods through 1826 shifted the course of the Missouri River, which soon washed away the town altogether. Later, the town of Independence in western Missouri replaced Franklin as the starting point of the Santa Fe Trail.⁹ As the Santa Fe trade prospered in the subsequent decades, steamboat traffic increased significantly on the Missouri, Mississippi, and Ohio Rivers; goods brought up from New Mexico via the trail moved eastward to St. Louis and beyond. There were also Mexican traders who traveled the Santa Fe Trail in reverse to buy American goods from sellers in Missouri.¹⁰

However, the prosperity of the Santa Fe Trail did not last. After Mexico gained its independence from Spain in 1821, years of political instability followed. Albino Perez, the federally appointed governor of New Mexico, became increasingly unpopular after he imposed sharper regulations on trade within the province, including on the Santa Fe Trail. Widespread anger among the people of the area erupted into an uprising known as the 1837 Chimayo Rebellion. The rebellion resulted in the killing of the governor, but collapsed the following January. The Santa Fe trade soon shrank to levels witnessed in decades prior to 1821. The Trail assumed renewed importance with the outbreak of the Mexican-American War, which served as a vital corridor for the Army of the West and later represented an important link between the United States and the southwestern territories acquired in the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo.¹¹

Several factors contributed to the decline of the Santa Fe Trail in the early 1840s. The Oregon and California trails commanded greater attention and siphoned away some of the people and wealth that poured into the West. The emergence of mines in Colorado and Nevada reduced the demand for Mexican silver, and several Americans–many of them in Missouri–began to breed mules that were superior in functionality. Heightened dangers threatened the fewer numbers of traders who continued to use the Trail.¹² The fear of attacks by Indigenous raiders was a concern by the white traders. Additionally, during the Civil War, there was a legitimate concern by traders of small bands of Confederate guerrillas, as they attacked Independence and other provisioning towns in Missouri for political and economic reasons. Traders moved as many as 50 million pounds of freight along the Trail in 1865, yet by this time, the Trail had become nearly out of use.¹³ Soon, railroads spanned across the trans-Missouri West and took most of the region’s traffic with them. Once the first trains reached New Mexico in 1880, the Santa Fe Trail finally became obsolete.¹⁴

Advocating for Statehood

Missouri newspapers first demonstrated their powerful influence during the path to statehood. In 1817, the Gazette published a petition submitted by citizens to Congress, hoping to establish what would become Missouri’s borders. Many newspapers strongly supported the territory becoming a state and urged Missouri citizens to demand representation in Washington, D.C. Others provided a glimpse at the sectional politics that eventually resulted in the Civil War. The controversy surrounding Missouri’s statehood was centered on slavery and if the predominantly pro-slavery population of the new state would be allowed to continue the barbarous practice of owning humans. In 1821, the central Missouri city of Franklin’s Missouri Intelligencer published an article celebrating the territory’s “prospective” entrance into the Union. Citing the admittance and the view that states should get to decide the fate of slavery on their own terms, the article declared, “we consider ourselves rescued from the hands of our Eastern Friends in a manner to us satisfactory, to them disgraceful.”²

In the decades following statehood, Missouri experienced rapid expansion in publishing. Before the mid-1840s, newspapers across the state were plagued by timely access to current news and often included stories copied from other publications, written lectures, and poetry. However, with the invention of the telegraph in 1847, papers became increasingly focused on current news events, as they provided more up-to-date information to readers. A boom in the number of people living in the state and technological innovation resulted in a large growth of publishing newsworthy information in Missouri. The population had grown from around 65,000 in 1820 to almost 1.2 million by 1860, and the number of newspapers increased with it, growing from 5 to 148.³ The expansion of publications connected Missourians to regional, national, and even international news. In Clay County, the Liberty Tribune began its 171-year run in 1846. The first year of printing included articles about the Mexican American War, as Colonel John Hughes sent letters to Liberty, Missouri that covered the conflict.⁴

During Missouri’s early statehood, newspapers were heavily biased. They were often the organs of political parties that vied for power and influence. Throughout the first half of the nineteenth century, parties like the Whigs, Democrats, and Republicans were not legally recognized by the government and lacked institutional structure. As historian Jeffrey Pasley describes, parties had little staffing and day-to-day management. Political factions also had no formal way to communicate about the latest issues being debated around the country; thus, partisan newspapers stepped in. Local newspapers were established by parties and became their voice on the ground, connecting voters, holding the party together between elections, and communicating its stance on regional and national issues.⁵ By the Civil War, political parties had become more organized, but the stances of newspapers continued to hold great influence among their readers.

Politicizing Newspapers

The onset of the Civil War resulted in many newspapers intensifying their political voice and expressing their opinions about where Missouri should fall in the North-South conflict. The St. Louis Globe-Democrat, the only major pro-Union newspaper in a slave or border state, was influential in preventing Missouri from seceding. The publication first began printing in 1852, holding a pro-Republican stance in its early years and later flourishing as a gateway of information between Washington D.C. and the developing West.⁶ During the war, President Lincoln recognized the power of the Globe-Democrat, famously stating that the newspaper was worth ten regiments of Union troops.⁷ Other publications followed the Globe’s lead, like the Osage Valley Star, which expressed a pro-Union slant throughout the war. There were a few newspapers that took an opposing stance. The St. Louis Bulletin, one of the most notable pro-Confederate publications, advocated for secession and the preservation of slavery. However, the Federal army’s presence in Missouri soon brought an end to all anti-Union publishing. Throughout the war, Lincoln worked to suppress newspapers in Union controlled areas that supported the Confederacy, as his administration claimed that these actions were militarily necessary. In Missouri, Lincoln gave his commanders ample leeway in establishing press suppression policies, as they tried to influence coverage of the war and prevent publication of newspapers that spoke ill of the Union.⁸ Censorship left the press to debate the politics of loyalty. Staunch Unionist newspapers like the Globe-Democrat advocated for a full commitment to the US federal government, putting country over the state, adopting the values that made St. Louis a pro-Union stronghold. Many pro-slavery publications also supported the Union, but with much less vigor, as their loyalty was contingent on Missouri remaining a slave state at the end of the war.⁹

German Language Newspapers

German language newspapers emerged as some of the strongest supporters of the Union.  Missouri has a long history of non-English speaking newspapers that correlates back to the large number of German immigrants who flocked to the state in the early 1800s. German immigrants began moving to Missouri in vast numbers during the 1820s, following the publication of Gottfried Duden’s widely read A Report on a Journey to the Western States of North America. Duden was a German writer, and his book highlighted the new state as a particularly promising destination for immigrants. German-language newspapers played a critical role in these communities, helping immigrants protect their linguistic and cultural identities and form a sense of community. German immigrants and their American born descendants who wrote in these papers were often outspoken in their disdain for slavery. This was exemplified by one of the earliest German publications, the Licht-Freund, which began printing out of Hermann, Missouri in 1840 and advocated for the abolition of slavery. Although Missouri Germans were diverse in their political and religious beliefs, ranging from radical ‘48ers who supported the European revolutions of 1848, to the religiously conservative Saxon Lutherans, most German immigrants in Missouri adopted an antislavery stance. Many German immigrants joined Unionists groups in the state during the Civil War. American-born Missourians often viewed German immigrants as outsiders and some even discriminated against them, but despite this, a majority in the German community were forthright in their loyalty to the US. As the slavery debate raged in the border state, many fought for the Union. Following the Civil War, German-language newspapers continued to flourish for decades in cities like Jefferson City, Booneville, and St. Charles. However, the 1910s saw the forced collapse of the German-language press in the state. The advent of World War I resulted in a strong disdain for German American heritage across the country and increased concerns about their loyalty in the war against Germany, which caused the shuttering of numerous newspapers in Missouri.¹⁰

Newspaper Consolidation

In the second half of the nineteenth century, Missouri witnessed the founding and merging of some of its most prominent newspapers. Publications in cities such as Kansas City, St. Louis, and Springfield, emerged as the dominant newspapers in each urban area. The Springfield News-Leader printed its first edition on April 4, 1867, with O.H. Fahnestock acting as the paper’s first publisher. In 1947, a fire destroyed much of the mechanical plant where the paper was printed, resulting in a major adjustment to its production location, as the News-Leader was printed in Tulsa, Oklahoma and trucked to Springfield every day for months until a new plant was completed in 1948. The paper outlasted that inferno, mergers, and Depression-era financial struggles, and continues to publish daily editions. Today, the News-Leader still serves as the preeminent newspaper for the state’s third largest city and the wider Ozark region.¹¹

In 1878, Joseph Pulitzer purchased the 15-year-old Dispatch and merged it with the Post to form the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.¹² The paper quickly took on Pulitzer’s progressive attitude, fighting for reform and justice. The Post-Dispatch officially embraced these values in 1907 when Pulitzer wrote “The Platform.” Similar to those adopted by political parties, “The Platform” acted as a moral guide for journalists working at the paper in its early years and is still embraced today. It makes a commitment to “the public welfare” and “never being afraid to attack wrong,” which resulted in journalists promoting racial justice and women’s rights in the early twentieth century. “The Platform” also gave Pulitzer and the paper an ethical foundation as they challenged powerful institutions. This included clergy in St. Louis who were pushing for prohibition and even President Theodore Roosevelt, who was exposed for corruption relating to the Panama Canal.¹³

The Kansas City Star was first printed in 1880, with the name alluded to in its evening publication schedule. Early versions of the paper faced competition from the Times and Journal in the morning and the Mail in the afternoon. Issues were available for two cents a copy and focused on local events. William Rockhill Nelson, one of its two founders, saw the Star as a chance to profit and make a difference. The paper soon began campaigning for improvements such as municipal parks and a boulevard system. Nelson bought the Kansas City Times in 1901, creating a news empire that he labeled the “24-hour Star.” That 24-hour cycle allowed the paper, and Nelson, to dominate the region politically, and would continue until the Star became a morning-only daily in 1990.¹⁴

Black Owned Newspapers

Though the Post-Dispatch and Star took over the press in Missouri’s two largest cities, they often lacked coverage of the state’s Black communities. Thus, African American newspapers stepped in. Since the nineteenth century, Black Missourians have published their own newspapers. For instance, Advance and Welcome Friend operated out of St. Louis in the 1870s and 1880s and served the state’s growing Black population. Black newspapers covered local and national news that was relevant to African American communities and featured advertisements for Black businesses. The newspapers were often published in predominantly Black neighborhoods. For example, in 1919 Chester Arthur Franklin founded The Call, which was established in, and still operates out of Kansas City’s 18^th and Vine District. African American papers did not exist only in Kansas City and St. Louis, however. During the first half of the twentieth century, newspapers such as The Searchlight, Southeast Missouri World, and the Home Protective Record were prominent in Sedalia, Sikeston, and Hannibal. In an era in which white newspapers typically neglected to report on news in the growing Black communities and often perpetuated racist stereotypes when they did, Black publications served a valuable purpose for Missouri’s Black communities. Today, The Call, the St. Louis American, and other African American newspapers carry on that legacy of amplifying the voices of Black communities in Missouri.¹⁵

Newspapers as Facilitators of Change

Newspapers of all kinds, white and Black, held a critical place in conversations happening in Missouri during the twentieth century. They played a major role in the day-to-day lives of Missourians, providing important and timely news updates for their readers. Debates over national matters such as the fight for Black civil rights played out in small towns and major metropolitan areas across the state. Thus, newspapers were central to shaping public opinion. The Civil Rights Movement was in full force in the early 1960s and activists spoke out and took action in many American cities. One of the most significant events in St. Louis was the Jefferson Bank demonstration, where protesters marched outside of the financial institution hoping to gain attention for ongoing labor disputes. Numerous St. Louis newspapers covered the protest, and columnists debated the effectiveness and validity of the demonstration. Coverage varied based on if it was a white or Black owned newspaper. For example, an editorial in the Post-Dispatch from October 25, 1963, called for an end to the protests in the name of “public peace and progress.” While in the same month, the American took the opposite stance and supported the actions of the civil rights protesters, saying, “let the solemn picketing continue.”¹⁶

Throughout the twentieth century, newspapers have played a vital role within Missouri municipalities and hundreds of publications operated in the state. Although nightly television news and later twenty-four-hour cable news broadcasts gave Missourians other outlets to gather information, local newspapers still served as reliable institutions in cities and small towns. Missouri newspapers maintained a continued significance to their communities. This is evidenced by the natural disaster in Joplin, Missouri in 2011.  An F-5 tornado ripped through the city, and the Joplin Globe acted fast. Staff of the Joplin Globe continued to go to work, even after some lost their homes, as they understood the responsibility they had to their community. The next day’s paper was only an hour late off the presses, as journalists at the Globe helped the city digest the disaster immediately after and for weeks to come.¹⁷

Print Newspapers on the Decline

Over the last twenty years, the expansion of high-speed internet has led to a decline in newspaper publication across the United States. Many people now get their news from social media and other online sources. Advertisers, once the backbone of the newspaper industry, have turned their attention from print to digital. This new reality has not passed over Missouri. According to the University of North Carolina, there were 256 newspapers published in Missouri in 2004 and as of 2019, that number dropped to 220. There has also been a 25 percent decrease in newspaper circulation across the state from 2004 to 2019 and it now has fifty-three counties with a single paper.¹⁸ Even with a decrease in publication, newspapers continue to publish for the people of Missouri, as they have done for two centuries. Those like the Liberty Tribune, Kirksville Daily Express, and Marshall Democrat News have served a local purpose, while others like the St. Louis Post-Dispatch gained national acclaim. The Kansas City Hispanic News, Kansas City Call, St. Louis American, and Red Latina provides coverage for underrepresented groups such as Black and Latinx Missourians. Similarly, Il Pensiero helps many St. Louisans stay connected to their Italian heritage. Even as the news landscape changes, newspapers continue to hold an important place in the culture and conversations happening around the Show Me State. Missouri has demonstrated a proud history of journalism and acts as a portal into the past and a foothold for future newspapers throughout Missouri.

In Missouri, the entire state was on a wartime schedule. Neither wartime fundraising nor the movement of troops across the country slowed down war production. As a result, public health officials had only a few interventions available to them to fight epidemics, and the most effective was quarantine. Unfortunately, quarantine was very difficult to enforce due to the necessity for factories to keep running to supply the war effort. Still, the cities that effectively responded to the pandemic relied on military principles and organization. Missouri had examples of both an effective response in St. Louis, and an ineffective response in Kansas City, with varied solutions statewide.

State Capital-Jefferson City

The first reported flu case in Jefferson City appeared on October 8, 1918. It affected the secretary of the State Council of Defense, Frank Robinson.¹ On October 10, the State Board of Health ordered schools to close, canceled church services, and prohibited gatherings of more than 14 people. Businesses were ordered to follow special cleaning routines; factories monitored the temperatures of workers, and coughing and sneezing were discouraged in public places. The State Prison reported more than 100 cases. They obtained a pneumonia serum from the “Mayo Sanitarium in Rochester, Minnesota, and quickly inoculated all of the convicts.” ² On November 21, the Board of Health stated that “Cities could remove the drastic measures intended to limit the disease’s spread.” ³ Even though businesses and churches reopened, schools remained closed until December 31.⁴ But Jefferson City still experienced cases well into December. According to journalist Bob Piddy, “by the end of January, the city death toll was at least 34, plus 26 prison inmates.” ⁵

Southern Missouri and the Ozarks

In Joplin, the city held a Liberty Loan Parade on October 8, 1918. The Red Cross began mobilizing nurses and calling for volunteers. On October 9, the Joplin City Council and the commissioner of health and sanitation, Dr. R.B. Tyler, closed all churches, schools, and theaters; this included a ban on meetings of more than 25 people.⁶ By October 18, the Red Cross asked the city “to establish an isolation hospital because of 74 new cases referred to nurses in two days.” ⁷ By the end of October, the sick included at least seven doctors, including the commissioner of health and sanitation; but nothing stopped the celebrations for the end of the war on November 11, 1918. As these celebrations did not seem to have any effect on new cases, the City Council and the doctors ended the bans on November 15. Joplin had a ban in place for 39 days, and “from October 1 to November 7, the Globe reported 386 cases of flu and pneumonia, with 68 deaths.” ⁸

Springfield’s mayor, J.J. Gideon, ordered the town closed on October 1. The broad ban closed churches, schools, libraries, pool halls, theaters, and any public place where people gathered. However, the shutdown mandate didn’t affect businesses. About three weeks after the closings, a pastor was arrested for holding church services, but then released without charges when officials learned that violation of the mayor’s proclamation carried no punishment.⁹ The mayor ended the ban on November 2. The final count of “influenza deaths in the autumn of 1918 and winter of early 1919 hover around 260.” ¹⁰

The Ozarks local newspaper The Van Buren Current Local, reporting in the Van Buren and Ellsinore area, published an article about the Spanish Flu on November 7. This article stated, “There are several instances where whole families are sick in bed at one time as ‘ye correspondent’ and wife and two boys were all down at once with the malady, we are in position to know how it goes. Both local doctors here have been on the go both day and night.” ¹¹ By the end of November, the newspaper editor noted only two deaths and that “the influenza situation here is improving somewhat.” ¹²

Another Ozarks town, Midco, financially benefited from the outbreak of World War I. The U.S. government paid more than half the cost of building a chemical plant for Mid-Continent Iron Company. In return, the plant supplied chemicals to the government. Hundreds of workers were needed to operate the plant, mostly single men; as a result, Midco was a booming town as the flu hit the Ozarks. Gene Oakley, a Carter County historian, stated, “The flu hit the town at a time when the houses were crowded, and there were many men in Midco who had no one to care for them. In some cases, whole families were virtually wiped out. People died by the score in the worst tragedy to ever strike the young town.” ¹³ Midco would not survive much past the end of the war, and by 1921, the company was bankrupt.

College Towns

Columbia closed schools and churches on October 6. On the 7, the University suspended all classes and events, apart from the Student Army Training Corps. The city set up five emergency hospitals and asked for community volunteers to serve as nurses. “Any woman who is willing to help is requested to telephone Dr. Noyes’ (Guy Lincoln Noyes, then-dean of the School of Medicine) office and to tell the number of hours she can work,” an October 9 advertisement in the Evening Missourian stated. “Even those who have had no nursing experience can be used. Mrs. Selbert, then-superintendent of the emergency hospital, will teach them what to do and how to do it.” ¹⁴

On October 12, the death of Poe Ewing, a teenager at the Student Army Training Corps, marked the first loss in Columbia.¹⁵ The Columbia Board of Health closed all public schools, forbade any public gatherings, and quarantined 75 homes that same day. Although the prohibition of public gatherings slowed down the rise in influenza cases, Columbia’s ministers and other leading citizens demanded an end to the ban. On November 16, Columbia resumed its social activities despite the protests and warnings from four doctors on the board of health.¹⁶

When cases continued to increase the board of health tried a stricter quarantine on November 27. All public gatherings were banned, and a limit of 6 people in businesses. All schools shut down again and did not fully reopen until December 30. These measures helped the city and Boone County record only 150 deaths. Established at the epidemic’s beginning, the University of Missouri emergency hospitals also had a very low death rate; over 1000 cases, but only 14 deaths.¹⁷

Schools, churches, and theaters also closed in Maryville on October 12. Public gatherings were limited to 20 people. The Fifth District Normal School in Maryville, one of five state teachers’ colleges across the state (now Northwest Missouri State), closed a day before the city and remained closed until November 26. After reopening efforts began, students attended school on Saturdays to make up for time missed. In addition, “Maryville mandated that homes with positive cases display identification cards so delivery drivers were aware of infections and could limit their exposure.” ¹⁸ The student newspaper, The Green and White Courier, had many articles about the Spanish Influenza that recorded the illness and deaths among the students. It also made mention of a physician stationed in the administration building for prevention and care.¹⁹

The State Normal School, now known as Southeast Missouri State University, was located in Cape Girardeau. In a legislative report from 1919, this was noted:

During the prevalence of the epidemic of influenza this fall, the value of a hospital was fully demonstrated in the experience of this school. For the care of the students of the S.A.T.C. [Student Army Training Corps] Unit in the Normal School, the government required that the school should provide a hospital. The Board of Regents rented a building just on the edge of the campus which will accommodate about 25 or 30 patients at one time. With the aid of this building, and good nursing provided largely by the women on the faculty volunteering to nurse the sick students, the school has been able to handle about 200 cases of influenza, without allowing a single case to develop into pneumonia and without the loss of a single life. Captain Miller, the military inspector who was here yesterday, said that the record of the school in the care of its students during the epidemic of influenza is equaled by that of only one other school in the Ninth Military District of the S.A.T.C.²⁰

Kansas City and St. Louis

Kansas City was under the control of Democratic bosses Tom Pendergast and Joe Shannon. Most Kansas Citians know about Pendergast and his work as the leader of a Kansas City political organization known as the “Pendergast machine.” ²¹ According to the State Historical Society of Missouri, “the Pendergast machine controlled local government and the Democratic Party in Kansas City and Jackson County, Missouri, during the Progressive Era and Great Depression. He finally lost power after a series of political scandals.” Lesser-known political figure, Joe Shannon, considered himself a Jeffersonian Democrat. Shannon’s faction became known as “The Rabbits,” while Pendergast’s group dubbed themselves “The Goats.” According to Shannon’s biography from the Missouri Valley Special Collections, “clashes between the two factions at the primaries caused Shannon and Pendergast to realize that they were splitting the Democrats at the polls, so they devised the fifty-fifty rule.” ²² This divided all city and county patronage between the two leaders. The compromise ensured that a Democrat would be elected mayor, but in return, Pendergast and Shannon shared the appointment of the patronage jobs. Although the bosses shared the jobs, they often did not cooperate with one another. This contributed to the uncoordinated approach upon which Kansas City suffered.

Mayor James Cowgill, Dr. E.J. Bullock, head of General Hospital and Health Director, W.P. Motley, the President of the Health Board, and Dr. A.J. Gannon, head of contagious diseases, were the main figures trying to cope with the epidemic. The city issued the first ban on gatherings on October 7, but after business complaints, the ban was removed a week later. A stricter ban that prohibited public gatherings, was issued on October 17. Dr. Gannon tried to get cooperation from the streetcars, theaters, and business owners, but was met with little success. Since any orders on closings had to come from the Health Board, Dr. Gannon had very little power to enforce the orders. The second ban would last until November 14, when the mayor removed all restrictions. Still, on November 11, when the War ended, over 100,000 people participated in a citywide celebration. Dr. Gannon only remained the head of contagious diseases until November 27. Gannon was fired in a secret meeting of the Health Board by W.P. Motley. By December 5, Mayor Cowgill telegrams the U.S. Public Health Department stating “Assistance is needed at once from your department to help control the influenza epidemic in Kansas City. May we hope for immediate response?” ²³ A federal doctor arrived on December 11, but left on December 18, without doing much. By December 23 all restrictions were ended.

At the dawn of the epidemic, Dr. Max Starkloff was the City Health Commissioner for St. Louis, and Henry Kiel was the mayor. Mayor Kiel “granted unprecedented authority to Dr. Starkloff to implement closures of public places.” ²⁴ The doctor closed schools, theaters, places of amusement, and limited public gatherings to 20 persons by October 7. The additional closures affected every aspect of daily life. There were not any children on playgrounds, nobody in attendance at lodge meetings, no reading at the library, no pool at pool halls, restricted hours at stores, and Municipal Court and churches closed.²⁵

Dr. Starkloff faced pressure to ease restrictions from business interests, the clergy, and the mayor. Finally, Starkloff ended the restrictions for business hours on October 22. Throughout the rest of October and early November, conversations continued about easing the bans, but on November 9, Dr. Starkloff closed “all non-essential stores, businesses, and factories for four days.” ²⁶ On November 12, the bans were gradually lifted over the next seven days, which included the reopening of public schools. All closures ended in St. Louis on December 28.

In discussions of the “the history of the tragic 1918 influenza epidemic, St. Louis is often held up as a model city. Because of the quick and sustained action by its leaders, St. Louis experienced one of the lowest excess death rates in the nation, just 358 per 100,000 people.” ²⁷ However, responses to the 1918 flu epidemic varied throughout the state. In some cases, the government response was more robust than other locations. And while this resulted in slightly better or worse outcomes, the highly contagious disease resulted in a devastating loss at a time with few treatment options.²⁸ As made evident through the varied responses throughout the state of Missouri with the current Covid-19 pandemic, localized responses matter. In the end, it is difficult to control the transmission of epidemic diseases fully.

After Still founded the American School of Osteopathy in 1892, Kirksville became known as the “Missouri Mecca” for alternative medicine in the United States.³ Still and the school published The Journal of Osteopathy, a collection of articles promoting osteopathic cures and enticing students and patients to take a train to Kirksville.⁴ The school grew at an astronomical pace during its first decades, from around 20 total students in the early 1890s to more than 250 annual graduates by 1906.⁵

Student growth came after osteopathy gained legal status in Missouri. Osteopaths competing in the medical marketplace often drew the ire of non-osteopathic physicians, who would occasionally press charges against osteopaths for practicing medicine without a license.⁶ Missouri was the third state to carve out a legal niche for osteopathic practice as the result of sustained advocacy from osteopaths and testimonials from patients.

This slide’s owner was a zealous advocate for osteopathy. Arthur Hildreth (1863–1941) was one of Dr. Still’s first students at the American School of Osteopathy. Hildreth came to osteopathy after watching his father take treatment from Dr. Still. Though the elder Hildreth did not survive his illness, the younger Hildreth left his father’s convalescence with a profound respect for Dr. Still.⁷

In addition to a distinguished career as a practitioner, Dr. Hildreth played a pivotal role in spearheading the osteopathic lobbying efforts in Jefferson City. Like Still, Hildreth used osteopathy’s efficacy as its primary argument for legality. Patient testimonials illustrated the successes of osteopathy. This patient as advocate role extended all the way to the Missouri house and senate – Hildreth offered free treatments to skeptical lawmakers to convert them to the osteopathic cause.⁸

Hildreth’s sustained efforts were ultimately successful. Elite pushback derailed the first attempts at legalization when Governor William J. Stone (1848–1914) vetoed an osteopathic bill in 1895. Stone was concerned that osteopathic medical education was not as scientifically rigorous as regular medical education.⁹ In 1897, a new osteopathic bill found a new governor, Lawrence “Lon” Vest Stephens (1858–1923), who enthusiastically signed the bill legally protecting osteopathy. The reason for his enthusiasm? Stephens and his wife were both satisfied patients of Dr. Still.¹⁰

Still promoted women as practitioners at rates significantly higher than mainstream medicine. Male-dominated medical establishments limited women to supporting or care-focused professions, like nursing. In contrast, Still encouraged women to become osteopaths, and it was common for husband-and-wife pairs to matriculate at the university and practice together.¹¹ Women’s participation did not necessarily mean equality, however, as the faculty at the American School of Osteopathy were overwhelmingly male. Women’s advertised practices also tended to focus on treating other women, while male osteopaths confidently expressed the desire to treat both men and women.

For all his noteworthy efforts to engage with women, Still and his school mirrored racial prejudices of the time. Women were included in the first class at the American School in the 1890s, but the first Black osteopath – Dr. Meta L. Christy – would not graduate from osteopathic medical school in Philadelphia until 1921.¹²

Osteopathy’s journey from its initial focus on manual adjustment to modern therapeutic equivalency with other medical practices resulted from its ability to grow and change with the times. The American School hired traditionally trained medical doctors to teach the anatomical, chemical, and biological sciences to students.¹³ This contrasted with chiropractic, another mode of midwestern manual healing, which mostly hired trained chiropractors to teach its students. As a result of their acceptance of medical knowledge and authority beyond Still’s teachings, Osteopaths incorporated laboratory and evidenced-based therapeutics earlier and more often than chiropractors.¹⁴

Learning from diverse authorities meant that osteopaths could expand their treatments and keep pace with increasingly effective laboratory-based medicines and surgical procedures. Students in Kirksville still learn Osteopathic Manual Manipulation, but today graduates go on to work side by side with medical doctors at hospitals and clinics nationwide.¹⁵ Osteopathy is the only American alternative medical practice to gain widespread legitimacy and afford its doctors practice rights on par with medical doctors.

Despite the expansion into medicines and other treatments that their founder rejected, modern osteopaths pride themselves on a holistic orientation focused on treating the whole patient, not just a cluster of symptoms. Dr. Still – ever pragmatic and patient-oriented – would approve.

“Western steamboats from the beginning were common carriers in the service of the general shipping and traveling public,” wrote historian Louis Hunter.¹ The waterways were busy highways and steamboats were the freight trucks, operating as the US Post Office, UPS, and Federal Express does today. Over the years, government and private companies have worked together to improve infrastructure and modes of transportation in an effort to facilitate people’s mobility and increase commerce. Hence, similar to our consumer needs for modern-day freight lines, innovations in steamboats occurred because it was critical to successfully ship tons of merchandise and tens and thousands people to the West in the fastest and less expensive way possible.

The first steamboats navigated the Mississippi Valley region around 1811 and the stakeholders were fur traders and the US military. The interests of these two parties were intertwined, and both took advantage of the steamboats’ ability to move both up and down rivers for moving troops, provisions, and merchandise for forts and trade purposes. The American Fur Company used steamboats to transport western furs to market.² The U.S. military’s Indian agents, one of whom was Robert Campbell a fur trader and commission merchant from St. Louis, also contracted steamboat firms for transporting goods to fulfill treaty agreements with Indigenous groups for land use or purchase.³ By the 1850s, the population of Missouri had grown as settlers had moved to the state in the preceding decades to take advantage of low cost land and economic opportunities. The demand for steamboat shipping was at its peak in the years before the Civil War. Missouri residents relied on steamboats for transportation and to ship agricultural products to market as well as to gain access to consumer goods from the East and Europe. As with all expansion, government land was offered from east to west. Business increased yet again as the land west of Missouri was opened open for settlement by the Kansas and Nebraska Act in 1854. The U.S. government promoted urban growth in the West by establishing a new shipping route from eastern manufactures to Pittsburgh and then down the Ohio River and up the Mississippi to St. Louis wholesalers. These middlemen sent merchandise to the commission merchants in Missouri and Mississippi river towns, where it was forwarded further inland to the rural country merchants.⁴  

Steamboat firms were ready to risk the loss of their boat for the high profits gained from shipping freight and passenger travel on the Mississippi and Missouri River, but first some stumbling blocks had to be remedied or at least lessened. The steamboat industry worked to overcome structure modifications and natural hazards on the river, sometimes pressing the government to aid them in promoting safer riverboat travel. Steamboats had some design flaws and could be death traps and the rivers themselves included hazards that could sink a boat. In 1840s, books and newspapers generated public attention to the dangers of steamboat travel and this led to regulations to protect live passengers and the establishment of the Steamboat Inspection Service.⁵ Boats typically were brought down by two of the greatest threats to steamboat travel: snags and explosions.

There were few details about the loss of the Steamboat Bedford. The boat “struck a snag and sank in five minutes,” possibly on a dead tree at the bottom of the river. “It is unknown how many drowned while traveling south on the Missouri River on April 27, 1840. However, the only one worthy of being named was Mr. Moore who was a revolutionary soldier. It was noted that “All passengers lost their baggage.” The Steamboat Arabia also hit a snag on the Missouri River near Parkville, Missouri, on September 5, 1856. It was heavy with 200 tons of cargo destined for communities in the newly opened Kansas and Nebraska territories. The passengers had time to safely disembark but the cargo and a mule sunk to the bottom of the Missouri River.⁶

Snags a leading cause for a steamboat loss. This led to the innovation of snag boats⁷ that removed debris from the riverbed, but this was an ongoing and frustrating task and there was frequently political conflict over the federal government’s role in paying for “internal improvements.”⁸ Unlike the ocean ships with a deep hull for a cargo deck below, western steamboat’s key innovation was a flat hull, often called a flat bottom, which eliminated a deep hull for freight and allowed safer travel. By the end of the decade and into the 1850s, steamboats were improved to ply in shallow rivers, many boasted in water only two feet deep. The inland rivers rose and dropped based on rain and mountain snow melts, which made safe traveling geographically unpredictable. It was generally thought that the season of navigation for the Missouri River commenced with the May rise and possibly through September when the rivers were often less than two feet deep. With such a small window of time, each summer many boats heavy with St. Louis freight travelled to the western border of Missouri, Kansas and Nebraska Territory, and Iowa along the Missouri River. The Mississippi also had the same dilemma, but its travel season was far longer so that made St. Louis a perfect place for a wholesaler market.

As seen by the next steamboat accident, explosions were the greatest threat for steamboats. Most incidents were caused by problems with the engine works. The engine had a boiler that was fueled by either wood or coal. To prevent an explosion the boiler had a second cavity wrapped around it that kept the boiler cool by pumping a continuous flow of water from the river. The devise was called a doctor and when these were clogged by the muddy water, an explosion could occur. This problem gave rise to a new government agency called the Steamboat Inspection Service that opened an office in St. Louis in 1853. They enrolled steamboats and inspected the hull, engine, and pilots according to the new regulations to protect human passengers.

From 1826 to 1848, the western rivers had 171 explosions and 1,381 deaths compared to the Ohio Valley that had only 42 explosions and 491 deaths.⁹ Many chemists sought to produce stronger metal that could withstand pressure and this saved many lives.  Another type of accident with the boiler was caused by human error as seen by this story of the explosion on the steamer Belle, in which two hundred passengers survived. The incident occurred while traveling to St. Louis, when the boat stopped to pick up fuel for the boiler at a woodyard a mile above Liberty, Illinois. A fire started, which may have been due to the captain’s decision to increase the pressure on the boiler to blow out excessive cinders from the stacks. This ignited the gun powder stored on the boat, completely blowing up the vessel and all its valuable cargo. “It is doubtful whether an individual would have escaped, had not the boat lay close by the shore, thereby enabling the passengers to leave previous to the explosion.”¹⁰ The chances of an explosion were highest when coming to dock. From these incidents and witness testimony, regulations banded transporting gun powder, but very likely this rule was ignored. 

In another gruesome explosion, possibly due to a similar action as described above, twelve deck passengers and four crew member were killed. This explosion occurred on the steamboat Dubuque’s trip from St. Louis to Galena on August 15, 1837. The starboard side flue (stack) collapsed on twenty-three passengers as a resulted of the explosion . It was described that “the force of the explosion literally cleared it of freight, and everything which stood in its way. The deck passengers and several of the hands were dreadfully scalded. Many of them, in their agony, fled to the shore, stripped, themselves of their clothes, taking off with them much of their skin. It was several hours before any of them died.” The report made sure to state that the wealthier cabin passengers “escaped with little or no injury,” while passengers from the lowest social class died.¹¹

In spite of the dangers, steamboat travel and transport continued into the late 19th century when it was overtaken by railroads and was made obsolete by the invention of cars and airplanes. Today, paddlewheel steamboats are relicts of the past and only ply the waters of the Missouri and Mississippi Rivers to transport tourists or entertain casino gamblers. Even so, the rivers still serve as important avenues for commerce. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers have heavily invested in flood control and river dredging operations to protect the people who live along the rivers’ shores and to keep the rivers open for commercial barges that still transport products to market.

Homer G. Phillip’s history begins with the first calls to better Black healthcare in St. Louis. In the early 1900s, African American patients faced discriminatory care at City Hospital No. 1, where they were often turned away or committed to an overcrowded segregated ward. At the same time, few residents could afford care offered by private Black physicians who operated at a higher cost with limited space. In 1914, a committee of seventeen Black physicians implored the mayor to recognize the lack of training opportunities and inadequate facilities for African Americans at City Hospital No. 1.³ City officials responded by purchasing the abandoned Barnes Medical College for $87,000 and renovating the facility to care for St. Louis’ 70,000 Black residents. Opened in 1919, the 177-bed medical center became known as Hospital No. 2.⁴

Within a few years, City Hospital No. 2 became inadequate to meet the growing demand of the African American population. In 1923, local attorney Homer G. Phillips led a campaign to acquire a civic improvements bond issue for the construction of a larger hospital. He claimed that since City Hospital No. 2 was built, the Black population had grown considerably due to continuous migration to St. Louis from rural Missouri and the South. The bond issue was passed for 87 million, with one million slated to fund a new hospital.⁵ The city refused to allocate the funds toward the construction of the hospital, arguing that a separate and independent facility for Black patients was completely unnecessary. Instead, they suggested adding a white-run annex for African American patients to Hospital No. 1.⁶

Although morally opposed to segregation, Phillips understood that Black doctors and patients could not receive equitable care or training at Hospital No. 1, where they faced exploitation at the hands of white doctors. Thus, he argued against the annex proposition and pushed for the separate hospital plan to move forward. Over the next decade, Phillips fought alongside other groups like the Colored Committee of the St. Louis League of Women Voters, until 1932, when the ground was finally broken for the construction of the Homer G. Phillips Hospital.⁷ Unfortunately, Phillips would never see his dream realized as he was tragically killed the year before. The circumstances of Homer G. Phillips tragic death remain contested. In the morning hours of June 18, 1931, 51-year-old Phillips, left his home to wait for the streetcar. According to a witness account, Phillips was approached by men who shot him 6 times. Two teens were eventually arrested and tried for his murder, but the jury found them not guilty. Many theories exist as to why Phillips was targeted, all of which are overshadowed by the reality that the police never solved the crime.⁸

Homer G. Phillips was dedicated in the morning hours of February 22, 1937.⁹ Designed by architect Albert A. Osburg, the Hospital was constructed for 3.16 million dollars in an H form with art deco features.¹⁰ The seven-story medical center had a central administration building with four wings extending from its core. Facilities included an additional service building and a nurses’ home with accommodations for 146 nurses and 24 interns. ¹¹ With 685 patient beds, Homer G. Phillips became the largest and most equipped Black-run, Black-serving hospital not only in Missouri but in the country. In its first year of operation, the hospital served 100,000 patients.¹²

Located at 2601 Whittier Street in the Ville, Homer G. Phillips quickly became a pillar of St. Louis’ Black community. Just northwest of downtown, the Ville was a residential, business, and cultural center for Black St. Louisans. At its peak, the hospital created nearly a thousand jobs for physicians, nurses, aides, ambulance drivers, and other workers living in the area.¹³ Alongside the Sumner High School, Antioch Baptist Church, Annie Malone Children’s Home, and other Black-run businesses, the hospital fostered stability in the Ville during the years of segregation.¹⁴

Homer G. Phillips Hospital also became the premier hospital for teaching Black physicians in the region. For over 20 years, 75% of African American doctors in the United States were interns at Homer G.¹⁵ Helen Elizabeth Nash, a former intern, recalled, “Well everybody came to Homer G. It was one of the best places. They took the largest number of interns, and you could be sure of getting a residency.”¹⁶ After receiving training at the hospital, Nash became the first Black woman on the pediatrics staff at St. Louis University and an activist for African American healthcare.¹⁷ Like Nash, many Homer G. Phillips graduates went on to have successful careers at renowned institutions at a time when discrimination prevented Black and women physicians from holding high-ranking positions.

Alongside doctors, the hospital trained nurses and other medical professionals. One nursing student, Lula M. Hall, came from Little Rock, Arkansas to study at Homer G. Phillips. After graduating from the hospital’s nursing program in 1959, she worked as an acute and psychiatric nurse in St. Louis until her retirement in the 1990s.¹⁸ Before the last graduation of nursing students in 1968, the hospital had trained hundreds of nurses like Hall. The hospital also had laboratory and x-ray technician programs and educated foreign doctors who were denied training at other hospitals because of their race or ethnicity.¹⁹

Homer G. Phillip’s leadership extended to quality patient care. By 1945, the hospital ranked in the top 5 largest general hospitals.²⁰ Over the next two decades, the hospital led the development of the practice of intravenous feeding and treatments for ulcers, burns, and gunshot wounds.²¹ The hospital also saw gains in infant care.

For all its successes, the hospital still faced unfair and discriminatory funding which negatively impacted the institution. The Comptroller’s Department did not afford the hospital the same funding as Hospital No. 1, and many departments at Homer G. Phillips were not in control of their own finances. These conditions led to supply shortages, loss of appropriated funds, and insufficient wages for physicians, nurses, and staff.²² As a result, the hospital struggled to recruit medical students, ultimately ushering a decline in the quality of care.

Homer G. Phillips experienced radical changes in mid-twentieth century. Rising costs had spurred St. Louis Mayor Raymond Tucker to order that city hospitals desegregate in 1955, a decision that effectively signaled the end of an era for one of the most successful Black hospitals in the United States.²³ In the fall of 1964, newspapers began reporting that the city intended to relocate departments and possibly close Homer G. Phillips. After a 15-year fight to keep the hospital open, Mayor Vincent Schoemehl and Judge James Conway mandated Homer G. Phillips close and transfer its departments to Hospital No. 1 in 1979.²⁴ Community members protested the hospital’s closure, citing cultural significance and the continued need for a medical facility to treat Ville residents. The protests were unsuccessful, and Homer G. Phillips operated only as an outpatient and emergency care unit until 1985.²⁵

Despite its closure, Homer G. Phillips Hospital remains one of the best examples of Missouri’s segregated hospitals. At times, Homer G. Phillips Hospital was among the best Black-run, Black-serving medical centers in the nation. The care that African American patients received was far better than they could access at most public hospitals, and the educational opportunities afforded to Black doctors, nurses, and staff were innumerable. Nevertheless, care and education were never entirely equal due to the limitations of segregation.    

Homer G. Phillips was not the only segregated hospital in Missouri, but rather part of a network of Black serving facilities across the state. In 1924, Kansas City’s General Hospital No. 2 became the first public hospital in the United States to be staffed and operated solely by African Americans. Six years later, a new General Hospital No. 2 opened in the city and became one of the nation’s most equipped segregated hospitals for the treatment and training of African Americans.²⁶ Black-run medical facilities emerged in Missouri’s other cities, such as the Bartley-Decatur Center in Springfield, Wheatly-Provident in Kansas City, and General Hospital No. 2 in Sedalia. Although smaller, these hospitals were equally essential to providing equitable care for their respective communities during years of segregation.

Like Homer G, these hospitals were never given the same financial and technological resources as white-only hospitals, and their success rested heavily on corrupt politics and external factors. For all their achievements, segregation still limited these important institutions.