History of St. Louis’s Delmar Loop Told in New Book

MT. PLEASANT, S.C. - May 6, 2013 - PRLog -- The newest addition to Arcadia Publishing’s Images of America series is St. Louis’s Delmar Loop from local author M. M. Costantin with a foreword by Joe Edwards. The book boasts more than 200 vintage images.

In 1902, magazine publisher Edward Gardner Lewis needed greater space for his thriving business, then based in downtown St. Louis. He headed west, out Delmar Boulevard a mile past the city line and bought five acres of open land adjacent to the loop in the trolley tracks that sent the 10D streetcar back downtown.

By 1903, Lewis was building a complex that included the Woman's Magazine Building, a five-story octagonal tower with an eight-ton searchlight in its dome. In 1906, University City was incorporated and Lewis became its first mayor, serving three terms. In 1913, Lewis went west again, this time to found the utopian colony of Atascadero, California. His octagonal dazzler is now University City's City Hall. In 2007, in its first such list, the American Planning Association named the Delmar Loop one of the country's "Great Streets"--it's a long story.

Available at area bookstores, independent retailers, and online retailers, or through Arcadia Publishing at (888)-313-2665 or online.  

Arcadia Publishing is the leading publisher of local and regional history in the United States.  Our mission is to make history accessible and meaningful through the publication of books on the heritage of America’s people and places.  Have we done a book on your town?  Visit http://www.arcadiapublishing.com/.