Built St. Louis
Historic Downtown

The Veterans Administration Building
415 Pine Street
Built: 1907
Architect: unknown.
Status: Status: demolished some time between 1970 and 1975. Site was a parking lot until a garage went up in 2003.

The VA building was built as an addition to the National Bank of Commerce; the federal government purchased it in 1936. It was vacated in 1970 and demolished half a decade later.

Image notes:
1 - Postcard view circa 1910. The building at left is the Third National Bank Building (demolished), located on the present site of Metropolitan Square.

2 - View circa 1910, from background of a postcard of the Times Building. I'm not sure if the building was really cream-colored, and was badly in need of cleaning by the 1970s, or if the hand-tinted postcard is simply radically miscolored. Either possibility seems likely -- postcard tinters often deviated from reality, and early 20th century St. Louis was notorious for its coal smoke-infested air.

3 - Image from the Globe-Democrat. The smaller buildings immediately north of the Veterans building are the Lutheran Building and the Chamber of Commerce Building, and were torn down along with it.

4- The VA is the dark building at left-center. Image from Inland Architect, June 1977 issue, p. 7.

5- The VA is left of center, with the green roofline. Postcard image circa 1970.

Image circa 1970; taken from "This Is Our St. Louis", Harry Hagen, Knight Publishing Co., St. Louis 1970.