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- The humanist philosophy of Lester Mondale (3/12/24)1
- Cape Osteopathic Hospital opens its doors (3/5/24)
- 8 killed and a million dollars damage done in 1924 tornado (2/27/24)1
- Jackson's militant priest, county recorder at odds over marriage licenses (2/20/24)
- Streaking fad comes to Cape (2/13/24)2
St. Louis writer bemoans the loss of Cape's Civil War-era farm
Big changes were coming to Cape Girardeau in 1972, and one of those changes caught the eye and ire of George McCue, urban design critic for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.
McCue berated the town's citizens and government for doing "too little, too late" to preserve a piece of Cape Girardeau's Civil War heritage: the rural estate of the Burrough family.
As early as July 1970, Cape Girardeau developer A.D. Price petitioned the City Council to rezone the Burrough farm in the 2200 block of Bloomfield Road from R-2, residential, to R-4, multiple dwelling, for an apartment complex. A Southeast Missourian article from Oct. 22, 1971, revealed Price's plans for the land, as principal contractor Cloverleaf Development Co. of Indianapolis, Indiana, prepared to begin construction of the complex.
The article noted, "The complex will center around the old two-story home on the property. It will be converted into a community building with adjoining laundry and maintenance garage... According to preliminary drawings, several long-standing trees on the stately property will remain, although most will have to go with construction. The apartments will be air-conditioned and located along Spring and Sheridan. The complex will consist of 16 one-bedroom apartments, 49 two-bedroom and 36 three-bedroom."
Judging by the lack of subsequent articles about the proposed development, Girardeans did not object to the plans, and it was left to McCue in January 1972 to condemn the development.
Missourian columnist Beverly Hahs wrote about the house's history in 2019.
Below is another history of the property published Nov. 23, 1971, in the Heritage Review newspaper, a yearly publication by the Historical Society of Greater Cape Girardeau. McCue's article from the Post-Dispatch, re-printed in the Southeast Missourian, follows.
The main house of the Burrough farm, on Bloomfield Road in Cape Girardeau. (Southeast Missourian archive)
Published Nov. 23, 1971, in the Heritage Review:
THE BURROUGH ESTATE
By Mrs. Keith Deimund
The Burrough estate on Bloomfield Road in Cape Girardeau... is situated on a 17-acre tract of land studded with a stately grove aged walnut trees. A full block from the busy road, the 14-room, two-story red brick mansion rises in quiet reminder of its 112 years of history. It is one of a handful of structures in our city which can be dated to the antebellum period. It was built in 1860. The carriage house precedes it, and the ice house on the property is also in its original state.
The original owner of the property was Samuel Caruthers, who was a great admirer of Henry Clay. It was his dream to copy Clay's home, Ashland, in Lexington, Kentucky, which was designed by Benjamin Latrobe, also of Lexington. He was the superintendent of the completion of the U.S. Capitol in Washington and designed the exterior porticoes of the White House.
The Burrough estate is still in its original form and until early October even the inside furnishings were original. The home's floor plan and the wood designs are a copy of Ashland. It was adapted and built by the architect, E.B. Deane, who designed and built the Ellis-Wathen-Ranney home in 1839-40, also a landmark of Cape Girardeau. This home was lost in the 1960s. The Glenn home on Spanish Street was also designed by Deane, and it is presently being restored by the (Historical Association of Greater Cape Girardeau).
The house has been involved in Cape Girardeau's history almost since its erection. The estate reflects even earlier history with an aborigines' burial mound located on it. The land was originally part of Don Louis Lorimier's grant. Samuel Caruthers bought it from his estate.
Samuel Caruthers, for whom Caurthersville was named, was our Congressman from the 7th District, serving in the 33rd, 34th, and one session of the 35th Congress. He was a lawyer and practiced law in Cape Girardeau from the late 1840s to his death July 20, 1860. He was a close friend of Gen. Nathaniel W. Watkins of Jackson, who was a half brother of Henry Clay and looked much like him. Through this friendship, Caruthers was prompted to structurally show his interest in Henry Clay by copying his home.
The first building erected by Samuel Caruthers was the carriage House. This is a uniquely structured, well-built stone and brick building dating back to 1857-58. The stone is hand-chiseled and set. The brick is hand-pressed and fired in a kiln on the place by Caruthers' indentured men. The carriage house is built in an A-frame design with three levels, two entered from ground level. The lower level housed the slaves, and feeding troughs on the north and south ends. The middle level was also entered from the ground on the higher slope of the home side. From the drive carriages and animals could be driven into the shelter of the barn. The top loft, of course, housed the hay. Hinged doors on the second floor allowed hay to be pushed into the lower level manger. The blacksmith also lived in the house.
All of the wood in the home was cut from trees on the property. The uprights are of poplar and the finishing trims are of walnut, cherry and oak. The home is built in an "L" shape with porches lining the inside of the L to the back. Here, it is said, slaves were auctioned and the area residents came to buy. The men were given room on the lower porch while the women sat on the upper porch off the second floor.
The home has a winding stairway rising from a large entry hall. On either side are large rooms, one a library and one a living room or parlor. Of courses, as was the design of that time, each room has a fireplace.
Samuel Caruthers passed away in 1860 before he could build his "Ashland," so the wings that we see in Ashland are not on the home in Cape Girardeau. Jacob Burrough did not finish it as completely in the detailed protocol or elaborate wood workings around the doors or windows. It still remains an example to our citizens young and old of antebellum architecture.
When Samuel Caruthers passed away, Jacob Burrough moved on to the place with one cow valued at $20 in 1860. He, too, was a lawyer from Philadelphia and came to Cape Girardeau in 1853. He became prominent in city affairs and was a captain in the Missouri State Guards during the Civil War. He served as provost marshal of Cape Girardeau during the war and after the war he became a promoter of the (Third District) Normal School. He served as the first president of the board of regents and remained in office until his death in 1883.
Jacob Burrough had a more than passing acquaintance with Mark Twain. It could be assumed that (Twain) visited in the home as he traveled the Mississippi River. We know hey corresponded, because we have two letters saved by the family and placed in Kent Library at Southeast Missouri State College. They were written to Jacob Burrough by Mark Twain.
The property was also involved in Cape's history from the very beginning. In our only battle in the Civil War that involved Cape, the Burrough's house had a part. On April 27, 1863, rebel troops approached the city from the west. The battle was fought in an area from Bloomfield Road north through the Town Plaza (Shopping) Center to the Junior High School. Three large homes lay on the edges of the battle. To the north the Haas estate, which has been torn down to make way for our Junior High. To the east and on a high hill, the Thilenius home is still standing. This home was Union headquarters and from this point one could see the Burrough estate on the south. Here the Confederate troops led by Gen. George Carter held up and took shelter before joining Gen. Marmaduke. This group of soldiers was shelled from above from Fort C and evidence can still be found in the structure of the carriage house where the cannon ball entered. The records of a Union staff correspondent show this statement, "A large brick residence in which some of the enemy took shelter wears the marks of our cannon balls. One large hole through the kitchen could be seen a mile off."
The history seems limitless. Even the modern owner, Kenrick Burrough, has much charm. He was a well-known lawyer. He graduated first in his class from Yale undergraduate school and was encouraged to go to Harvard Law School. His classmates included Harold Gallagher, law partner of Wendell Wilkie. He was responsible for the establishment of Marquette Cement Company in Cape which until recently was one of our main industries. He was a Latin and Greek scholar. He used his abilities to record a diary in Greek and to read the Bible first hand without translation. He disliked reading the translated form.
Re-published Jan. 18, 1972, in the Southeast Missourian:
CITIZEN ACTION TOO LITTLE, TOO LATE
PLOW UNDER HERITAGE ON BURROUGH PROPERTY
(By George McCue in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch)
On the agenda this week was a report on the book, "Lost America," a sampling of more than 300 houses, inns, bridges, stores and government buildings of particular merit that have bitten the dust in the eastern half of this country.
Then there came along, from Cape Girardeau, a case history that is just about classical in its demonstration of how America gets lost. The Cape Girardeau case involves the Burrough farm, an intact pre-Civil War house, beautifully crafted barn and brick ice house with hand-made iron door latch, all in a grove of fine old trees on 10 upland acres. Members of the park board had hoped to acquire this tract for a city park, and to keep the well-preserved buildings. But now many of the trees are being torn out in the clearance for 125 units of two-story moderate-income housing. The barn is in the area marked on the site plan for a "tot lot," and it will have to go. The ice house is right in the middle of a strip to be dedicated as a new city street, Spring Avenue, and it will soon vanish. Plans are still being made for conversion of the two-story brick house as a community center. Tentatively, it is to be provided with a sauna bath, a room for pool tables and other conveniences, and a self-service laundry will be in a wing attached to one side. Next to that will be a gasoline station. This is the kind of preservation that can hardly be distinguished from destruction.
* * *
Cape Girardeau, one of this state's oldest and most pleasant towns, was founded as a river landing, and has extended itself inland over scattered hills. The highway approach is lined with the usual motels, hamburger places, shopping centers and a bargain barn. This is Kingshighway, part of it following the historic Camino Real route, and from it Broadway meanders its way into town and to the Mississippi River.
Downtown, Broadway has a sprinkling of century-old buildings with first-floor shops and upper-floor dwellings, and it has a gem of an old opera house, converted into a fine restaurant.
Gleaming over this scene is the new tall building of the KFVS television and radio center. Parallel with the riverfront are the town's earliest streets, with some beautifully maintained old houses, especially on Spanish Street. The most prominent landmark in this area is the mellow, high-towered Common Pleas Courthouse of 1854, which also houses City Hall and a museum.
The Burrough place is out on Bloomfield Street. Construction of the house was begun by Samuel Caruthers, for whom Caruthersville was named, in 1859. He died before it was completed, and it was bought and finished by Jacob Burrough, president of the first board of regents of the then Southeast Missouri Normal College. In the Civil War, a band of Confederate troops took shelter there.
Some townspeople had the impression that Burrough's last male descendant had bequeathed the property to the city, but when he died it went instead to a cousin in Kentucky. Two years ago, the city council agreed to a zoning change of two portions of the property from one-family to multi-family, but this didn't attract attention around town.
James F. Hirsch, chairman of the city's Parks and Recreation Board and member of the prominent Republican family that owns KFVS, had hoped to add the Burrough property to the park system. Mayor Howard Tooke had appointed a Historical Sites Committee to identify landmarks as a means of safeguarding those of special importance. Five citizens organized themselves as a committee to try to reserve the property so deeply rooted in Cape Girardeau history, for public use. They are Mrs. William Stacy, whose sister is Mrs. Warren Hearnes, Missouri's first lady; Mrs. Milton George, whose husband, a druggist, is on the zoning board; State Rep. A. Robert Pierce Jr.; Mrs. Keith Deimund, Hirsch's sister, and Hirsch. Mrs. Stacy is a Democrat, the others are Republicans.
It happened fast. "We knew in midsummer that something was happening," Hirsch said, "and discussed doing something about it. About two months ago, the last part of the property was rezoned, and at about the same time we heard that an option had been taken. That was the first word we got about development. There was a petition with about 300 signers against rezoning, but it went through. The park board had just acquired a 78-acre tract not far from this one for $2,700 an acre. Most people think that around $4,000 an acre is top price for land here, but we had heard they wanted $10,000 an acre for the Burrough place, and we didn't have that kind of money. It was just one of those things, and the people were not aware of how urgent it was to do something."
The Historical Sites Committee, one of whose members represented the Burrough property estate, never met.
The new owner of the property turned out to be Clover Leaf Construction Co., of Indianapolis which had arranged with the Department of Housing and Urban Development for a Section 236 program -- rents reduced by the difference between 1% interest and the market rate on FHA financing.
"This project has been in the HUD office since May," Elmer E. Smith, area director, said. "There was no rushing through of anything. The city never indicated any intention of making any use of that property. Everything was carefully reviewed. This is one that we thought everybody was solidly behind."
HUD issued a firm commitment Nov. 24, and grading was underway by Christmas week. "We put pressure on several developers to get under construction by Dec. 30," Smith said, "because that's the way we measure housing starts."
Cape Girardeau turned down public housing in two elections, and now it has private housing for moderate-income tenants on one of the finest sites imaginable. It is losing what Patricia Holmes, Sate Park Board architectural researcher, has called one of the state's best examples of a pre-Civil War homestead.
It is the old story of citizen action that is too little and too late, of the public caught unawares by a bit out of its patrimony, of governmental agencies more firmly geared to economic than to cultural development. Communities with historical site commissions had better keep them busy -- unless they believe they no longer have anything to lose.
The original phase of Cape LaCroix Apartment Complex -- now known as The District in Cape -- opened Oct. 15, 1972.
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