Soulard Market, Finally

Soulard Farmer's Market was created when Julia Cerre Soulard donated two undeveloped half-blocks of her real estate to the city of St. Louis in the year 1838. Her instructions dictated that the donated property by used as a public marketplace in perpetuity, lest it be reclaimed by her heirs.

One can look at this donation in two ways. Was the land donation the act of an incredibly generous city benefactor? Or was it a calculated move by a shrewd businesswoman to increase the value of her surrounding, adjacent land, just conveniently surveyed into building lots? Certainly a public market was a nice selling point for lots in her 2nd Addition (1838) and 3rd Addition (1840), the land which today forms the north-of-Geyer-Avenue portion of the Soulard Neighborhood.