I’d long spotted Salem United Methodist Church just north of Highway 40 at the Lindbergh Boulevard exit, so I decided to look more in depth about its history. It turns out its story goes way back to the first decades of the Nineteenth Century in St. Louis. Founded by Dr. Ludwig Jacoby in 1841, its first sanctuary was rented in an old Presbyterian church at Seventh and Biddle, and then they moved to Wash and Eleventh streets in 1842. Then in 1873, they moved to the church above in the Carr Square neighborhood. In 1905, they moved to the church at Page Boulevard and Pendleton Avenue, which I’ve looked at before in October of 2021.
After a stay at Kingshighway and Cote Brilliante, they moved to the current location in Ladue in 1958.
Perhaps its most prominent feature is its round spire, which while a legitimate form in the Colonial Revival, is rare in the St. Louis area.
The original chapel opened first, and cost $300,000 and was designed by Study, Farrar and Majers; the general contractor was Richard Wright. In 1960, the same architects’ design for the $125,000 education wing to the north was constructed. Newspaper articles show that the larger sanctuary was designed along with the earlier buildings, and was built when the congregation and finances grew in size.
