Gateway Arch National Park
Long before European settlers arrived in St. Louis, Mississippian people lived here and built large earthen mounds between 1050-1200 AD. Most of the mounds were platforms for homes and ceremonial sites, while others were for burial. Their largest city was just across the river, at a site now called Cahokia, which once supported a community of close to 20,000 people. On a limestone bluff just to the north of downtown St. Louis, as many as 26 mounds once surrounded a large plaza overlooking the river were up to 2,000 people lived. Centuries later when European settlers arrived, they initially left the mounds alone, but later leveled the land for agriculture.
In 1763, Louisiana’s French governor, keen on expanding trade with the Mississippi River Indians, granted a charter to the Maxent, Laclede & Co. to establish a fur trading post on the western bank of the Mississippi River. They traveled up the river from New Orleans and landed on a bank near a large limestone bluff which offered protection from flood waters. Initially the settlers built a trading post, then a village, and finally a city along the banks of the most important waterway in North America. They named their new settlement after King Louis IX, the crusader saint.
The city of St. Louis quickly became the most important city in the very lucrative North American fur industry. Trappers and Indians would bring their furs to St. Louis to sell or barter with prior to the furs being shipped downriver to New Orleans or upriver to Montreal. The historic Louisiana Purchase in 1803 finally brought the Mississippi River Valley and territories west under the control of the United States. Immediately, St. Louis became a bustling western outpost with increased military presence and rapid expansion of the city. The Lewis & Clark Expedition of 1804-1806 originated and concluded in the city of St. Louis. By the mid-1800s, steam powered paddleboats ruled the Mississippi River making St. Louis one of the busiest ports in the nation and strategically important during the Civil War. The city was also key to the nation’s westward expansion as pioneers prepared their covered wagons in St. Louis before traveling west.
Built in 1874 for rail traffic, the Eads Bridge spanning the Mississippi River became the world’s first steel-truss bridge. The golden age of riverboat traffic in St. Louis was giving way to the railroads. By the 1930s, St. Louis’ once vibrant waterfront was ugly and ran-down. In 1933, a prominent St. Louis attorney named Luther Ely Smith proposed the idea of a memorial to celebrate the city’s role in westward expansion to help revitalize the waterfront. Support for the proposed Jefferson National Expansion Memorial grew in St. Louis with a local bond issue and federal funds secured for the project. The National Park Service was chosen to manage the memorial and, between 1939 to 1942, 40 blocks of the once-proud riverfront district were razed.
Following World War II, a design competition was held in 1947 attracting some of the world’s leading artists and architects. A panel of seven judges selected the design of architect Eero Saarinen which called for a stainless-steel faced arch in the shape of an inverted catenary curve. Although Saarinen’s design was selected unanimously, no one thought that the structure could be built. After delays caused by the Korean War, President Eisenhower signed a bill authorizing the memorial in 1954. Groundbreaking for the Gateway Arch, as it was now to be known, took place on June 23, 1959 with the MacDonald Construction Company of St. Louis beginning work on the concrete footings for the structure.
The first stainless-steel section of the Gateway Arch was put in place on February 12, 1963. The Gateway Arch was constructed in two legs which were erected simultaneously. Each of the 142 sections of the arch is an equilateral triangle with sides measuring 54 feet wide at ground level, tapering to 17 feet at the top. Lower sections of the arch were lifted by cranes on the ground, while upper sections weighing as much as 50 tons were lifted by creeper derricks attached to the back of the arch. Up to the 300-foot mark the space between the walls is filled with reinforced concrete. Beyond that point steel stiffeners are used. Once the arch reached 530 feet a temporary stabilizing strut was placed between the legs to ensure their stability. The final section of the arch at a height of 630 feet was welded in place on October 28, 1965 to much fanfare.
If the Gateway Arch wasn’t enough of an engineering marvel, it was also designed with a unique transportation system to the top. Two passenger trams, one in each leg, carry visitors to the observation room at the top of the Gateway Arch. Each tram has eight capsules, which hold five persons each. Passengers board the trams in the base of each leg for the 4-minute ride to the top. Electric motors keep the capsules level as they ascend and descend. The arch opened to the public on July 24, 1967 and takes one million visitors to the top annually. The views from the observation room stretch for miles east and west over metropolitan St. Louis.
The Jefferson National Expansion Memorial was redesignated Gateway Arch National Park in 2018. Also included in the 90-acre park is the Old Courthouse which was the site of the historic Dred Scott case where he sued for his freedom in 1847. The subterranean visitor center lies below the Gateway Arch and underwent a major renovation when the site became a national park. A world-class museum is housed in the Visitor Center that tells the history the city of St. Louis, westward expansion, and the construction of the arch. There is also an excellent film in the theater which celebrates the engineering feat of building the Gateway Arch. Inside the cavernous lobby of the Visitor Center is also where you board the trams to the top.
