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Memories of "Katz"
From the Stuff we save in the "Junk" drawer
Hi! My name is Bob and I was born in 1930,
just outside the City Limits of St. Louis, Missouri, in an
unincorporated area called Wellston. This story is not about
me, but about saving things. . . .Actually it is about saving “stuff ‘n
such”
Seventy seven years later, it is now
February 2007, and my seven year old grandson ask me for some
more of those things he can stick over a hole he punched in
paper for a note book he is making about dinosaurs. So we
began the search through the drawers where we keep office
supplies. We have an abundance of various “junk” drawers of
stuff.
Found them, they are Brunswick Gummed Reinforcements made by the Dennison Manufacturing Co., USA. We
have 28 left from the original 150. 150 for 10 Cents is
imprinted on the box.
Caleb has his paper repaired now, and is on
his way to school.
I still have the
slide open box with 27 remaining tiny white doughnut
shaped circles, in my hand. A serendipity that is hard to put
down. In addition to the ten cent price on the box, there
is a price sticker… It is marked in ink .10 for ten cents on a Katz Drug Store blue
price tag. I found it amazing we still had the memorabilia and our
grandson was the one using it. The wonder of saving stuff.
His mother used it when she was in school just as his
grandfather and his great grandmother also used it!
Over six decades for one little box.
Katz Cut Rate Super Drug Store was on the
ground floor of the four story
Loop
Building at Hodiamont and Easton Avenues in Wellston next to
the Wellston Streetcar Terminal. I was born two years after
the Loop building was completed. I left the area when the
building was about 23 years old.
Now in 2007 , Easton Avenue has
been renamed Martin Luther King Jr. Drive. Wellston
suffered like many urban areas and is just now, recovering from
mass post war exodus to suburban living. Population
shifted, businesses and industry moved, the town almost became
an urban ghost town. Many, far too many good homes and buildings
were razed.
The Katz store is gone as well as the four
story Loop Building with the fine terra cotta decorations.
I wish we had saved more stuff,
eaten more ice cream swung on more ropes, rode more streetcars,
taken more pictures, and stopped to smell the flowers.. "Saving
more is a good thing"
I remember
shopping with my mother and friends in the late 40s and
early 50s at Katz in Wellston. The memories have been
saved.
I wonder if my
grandchild will ever know how much joy I found in helping him
today.
Visitors to the new St. Louis City Museum
will know about "saving stuff" .... as the
designers have salvaged
and reused parts of the Wellston loop Building, as well as parts
from other long ago structures.
It is a
neat experience to walk through the same doorway again..
Caleb's been there too!
Rob Powers has more
great Photos of the Loop Building!
http://www.builtstlouis.net/wellstonloop01.html
http://www.builtstlouis.net/wellstonloop02.html
Thanks Rob for all your
web sites! - -
- RCH Webmaster
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