THE VILLE (57)
Click [ HERE ] for the PDF version.

LOCATION
The Ville is situated just northwest of downtown St. Louis, and covers a roughly nine-by-five-block area. This area is bounded by Taylor Avenue on the West, St. Louis Avenue on the North, Sarah Street on the East, and Martin Luther King Drive on the South.

HISTORY
The Ville traces its name back to when the area was called Elleardsville after a prominent resident of the area, Charles Elleard, who once owned the Ville land. St. Louis annexed this area in 1876. Originally home to German and Irish immigrants and a small proportion of African Americans, the Ville is most widely recognized for the strength of the African-American community that developed in the neighborhood by 1930. The Ville’s rise to the status of St. Louis’ premier African-American neighborhood was due partly to the great institutions and business that were locating in the Ville area, but also largely to the shaping forces of racial restrictive covenants in parts of St. Louis. At a time when these covenants barred blacks and other minorities access to purchasing homes in much of St. Louis, the Ville was able to withstand these pressures and its population rose in response to 95% African-American. The Ville, at this point in time, was a neighborhood that educated, housed, and entertained a stable cross section of economic classes within the African-American community. Since the 1948 Supreme Court ruling that restrictive covenants were unconstitutional, the population in the Ville has suffered from steady decline. Between 1950 and 1970, the total population in the Ville dropped by nearly 38 percent.

CHARACTERISTICS
The Ville is proud of the overwhelming diversity in its housing stock. To pigeonhole the Ville as primarily two- and four-family structures or single-family or multifamily is impossible. To speak of a theme in the style of housing or building patterns as such would also be futile. The Ville is truly a neighborhood that has the advantage of offering a variety of housing options in city living.

The Ville suffers incredibly from low real estate value in comparison to St. Louis’ other seventy-eight neighborhoods. The neighborhood ranks second lowest in the value of single family residences and ninth in the value of its two- and four-family structures, which together represent 95 percent of the neighborhood’s housing options.

INSTITUTIONS AND ORGANIZATIONS
The neighborhood benefits greatly from the impassioned commitment of its community members, schools, churches and social service organizations. These combine to create a close-knit, supportive community.

The St. James African Methodist Episcopal Church was organized in 1885 and further established an African-American presence in the community. As part of a "turnkey" project, St. James A.M.E. helped finance a home for the elderly, known as James House, across the street from the church, at the former site of Poro College. Other religious organizations that act as neighborhood anchors include the Antioch Baptist Church, incorporated in 1884, and the St. Matthews Catholic Church. On the National Register of Historic Places, St. Matthew’s renovated its old school building to serve the community as housing for the elderly.

Prominent in the community is the Annie Malone Children and Family Service Center, an institution for orphans or neglected and dependent children. The center also houses medical and social services for the community. A major project the Center completed was the rehabilitation of the former Homer G. Phillips Hospital nurses’ residence as housing for an independent living project.

As a United Way member agency with a holistic approach to service delivery, Northside Community Center offers services to neighborhood clients in three major program areas: elderly, housing, and children/youth. Its youth department offers several services, including job training, a parent support group, food pantry, social service referrals, delinquency and substance abuse prevention, leadership development, after-school tutoring, field trips, recreation, and social and academic counseling. Neighborhood seniors benefit from the following programs at the Center: nutrition education, health management, safety, coping skills, tax assistance, daily nutritious meals, and social events. Since 1974, Northside Community Center has been active in the rehabilitation of vacant houses in the community for rental to low-income families. The Northside Community Center was scheduled to open the doors on the first phase of a new Youth Building the week of September 20, 1999.

Cote Brilliante, Farragut Elementary School, William’s Middle School and Community Education Center, Tandy Community, Sumner High School, Turner Middle School, and Simmons Elementary round out the wide selection of educational opportunities in the Ville neighborhood. Sumner High School opened in 1875 as the first African American high school west of the Mississippi. The school is named for Senator Charles Sumner, who in 1861 became the first prominent politician to call for full emancipation. Originally located downtown, Sumner acquired its present location in the Ville in 1910. The John Marshall Elementary School has served the area as an elementary school since 1927. Additionally, the neighborhood has preschool opportunities at various churches and at Learning Tree, Inc.

There are various institutions that serve the community civic life and recreation. One such place is the Tandy Community Center and park. The center is a meeting forum for neighborhood watch programs and improvement associations. The Park includes a basketball court, a tennis court (where Arthur Ashe once played), a playground, and a large field.

Throughout the neighborhood an overwhelming concern is the future of the old Homer G. Phillips hospital. The hospital originally opened to provide both adequate care for black hospital patients and training for black doctors. Homer G. Phillips Hospital opened in the Ville in 1937, but was forced to close its doors in 1984. A section of the hospital was developed into the A Ambulatory Center which continues to serve the community today. Fifteen years after its controversial closing, the hospital remains a focal point of the neighborhood. Towering over the neighborhood in its six stories, the hospital had a 177-bed capacity and employed 800-900 people. The hospital was named for a lawyer and community leader who lived near the Ville. He is associated with the successful passing in the 1920s of an $87 million bond issue that included a million dollars for an African-American hospital. The future of this landmark is one of the top priorities for some neighbors in revitalizing the Ville.

PLANNING AND DEVELOPMENT
The City took an important step in recognizing the importance of the Ville neighborhood by erecting a monument at Martin Luther King Drive and Sarah that commemorates the famous people who hailed from the Ville.

An important step in the redevelopment of the Ville area came in 1985 when The Ville Apartments complex was completed. This 110-unit building gave the neighborhood a good start on rehabilitating its housing market. In collaboration with RHDC, the Northside Community Center has added a Housing Development Specialist to its staff this year. The Housing Development Specialist recently finished a comprehensive neighborhood plan for the Ville and Greater Ville area.

Members of the community and congregation of St. Matthew the Apostle have formed a neighborhood movement called "Revitalization 2000." This community-based organization produced a 1999 report outlining a community development strategy, describing the conditions of land use, and mapping the neighborhood’s assets. The report focuses on using the neighborhood’s program and spiritual resources in transforming the neighborhood’s physical elements into an attractive and safe community. Specifically, the plans include the acquisition of housing as well as vacant land. The strategy calls for demolition of some housing stock and revitalization of other. Outlined in three phases, Revitalization 2000 identifies the use of land for building a community garden, expanding the Parish Center, designating space for recreational purposes, building a facility to educate at-risk middle school youth and building a new single family home. Renovation of housing stock will focus on single family homes for sale to low- and moderate-income families and a site for the community outreach ministry.

Already an area enriched by educational institutions, the Ville is soon to be the home of St. Louis Public School's Multimedia Electronic Graphic Arts (MEGA) magnet cluster. Students at Marshall and Simmons Elementary, Turner Middle, and Sumner High will acquire computer animation skills that will encourage learning experiences that lead to academic success.