Sunday, February 7, 2010

The Old Cathedral

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That's what we call it. Officially, it's the Basilca of St. Louis, King of France. It sits at the western edge of the Arch's park, a bit overwhelmed by the downtown buildings on one side. The first church on this site was a log cabin built in 1770. The current building was completed in 1834. You can read about its history here and here.

The Arch is not far off to the right of this picture. There are some interesting views of the monument from inside the basilica, like this one from a post two and a half years ago.

6 comments:

Chuck Pefley said...

Bob, I really like these diminutive and beautiful relics of bygone splendor surviving within the concrete canyons. And you're so right about the interesting view from within, outward to the arch. The echo of the arched window mimicking the Big Arch is very nice.

Fernando Lipina said...

Coincidence... I just posted our old Cathedral too (Buenos Aires). Great grays, Bob.

cieldequimper said...

I'll need to stop there some day. It's such a small cathedral, the size of a church. It looks good against the buildings though, in fact, it looks so much better than the buildings...

Virginia said...

It looks like the big boys are trying to squeeze her out. Maybe they are.

The church/arch shot was spectacular. Glad you included that link since that was BV.
V

brattcat said...

This has such a weightiness to it. Feels so solid and substantial.

Anonymous said...

Visited my child, a freshman at SIUe this weekend. Had some free time, so we went to the Cahokia Mounds Interpretive Center and climbed to the top of Monk's Mound. We discussed this daily photo blog site while we were up there. Cold, freezing, and feeling on top of the world on a gray and very windy day.