Cherokee Street Early German Settlers Homes

This set of two small homes on Cherokee Street are among the oldest houses in the area, outside of the Chatillon DeMenil mansion. Likely built between the mid 1850s and early 1860s, they are two examples of what early German settlers homes looked like in the years leading up to the Civil War. The house on the right was probably built first, as it features flat wooden lintels and tall thin windows with checkered window panes. This suggests that this structure was built before 1860. The structure on the left was likely built a few years later, around 1860, as it’s built in the Federal transitional style and features slightly arched windows, and a Baltimore chimney roofline, which was very common in early period St. Louis architecture. Unlike most houses built at the time, these two structures were built with the roof pitched to the side instead of facing the street. When these houses were built, Cherokee Street was a rural area, and major urban development didn’t arrive until the 1880s. Today, the houses stand in the Cherokee Antique Row district, along with several other houses and buildings which date to the mid and late 1860s.