Most of the first floor of the Old Courthouse contains historical exhibits and it’s very well done. This room is about the building itself. I mentioned that it had been constructed in phases. This model shows the small original structure surrounded by a clear plastic model of what exists now.
Looking straight up in the rotunda of the Old Courthouse. I need to go back with a fish eye lens. I like the gradations of color and how it reminds me of a cross section of the Large Hadron Collider.
The statue of Dred and Harriet Scott I posted yesterday is outside the building we call the Old Courthouse. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Old_Courthouse_(St._Louis). It was built in stages during the 19th Century and became the seat of state and federal legal proceedings. It is now part of the National Park system and underwent a big restoration recently. The view is inside the rotunda from the first balcony, which is as far up as they let you go.
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Most Americans have heard of Dred Scott, although I’m afraid that many don’t know the story. Scott and his wife Harriet were enslaved people who had lived in St. Louis when Missouri was a slave state. Their owner moved them for some years to Illinois and the Wisconsin Territory, where slavery was not recognized. Upon their return here they sued for their freedom. It became known as the Dred Scott Case. Its long, complex process resulted in one of the most horrifying decisions in the history of our Supreme Court (although there are modern competitors). See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dred_Scott. This statue stands before the local courthouse where the litigation began.
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St. Louis Union Station is across the street from the fountain and sculptures seen yesterday. It was opened in 1894 and was at the time the largest railway station in the world. (We used to be somebody.) Passenger rail service is long gone. Much of it is now a fancy hotel. Out behind contains restaurants and amusements. We are grateful that it has been preserved.
