Sunrise under the Arch

A sunrise on the Mississippi River felt like the right way to experience the St. Louis Arch. 

Downtown St. Louis sat empty on Sunday morning, Even in the early light, a handful of people milled around the Arch, photographers like me looking for fresh vantage points to capture the symbol of western expansion. The only problem was the cold. The clouds kept the temperature in the mid-30s and I left a stack of coats, hats, and gloves in the car several blocks away. 

But there I stood, the arch soaring above me. Designed by architect Eero Saarinen in the late 1940s, the arch took two years to construct and opened in 1967. The waterfront had been targeted for an expansion memorial for decades, with the area becoming the first national historic site created as the Jefferson National Expansion Memorial in 1935. 

Only in 2018 did it become Gateway Arch National Park, the nation’s smallest national park at less than 200 acres. The next smallest – Hot Springs in Arkansas – clocks in at 5,500 acres. 

In truth, the arch feels less like a national park and more like a city park. A few step climbers walked up and down from the levee. Joggers circled through the park. 

 While the riverfront has change immensely, it was a hive of activity in the early 19th century. Prior to the railroad, St. Louis was the country’s inland trade hub. Steamships came up the river and could travel as far upriver as Montana on the Missouri River, which joins the Mississippi a little north of the Arch. Traveling into the Louisiana Territory lands required a permit, and that required passage through St. Louis. Ships still ply the river, albeit in much lower volumes. Industry churned on the east bank in Illinois, some light barge traffic sat along the river. 

Before I started shooting pictures, I had to touch the arch. There’s no barrier at the base of the arch (it goes way deeper, with its actual base 20 feet into the bedrock). The coolness of the stainless steel was the only physical moment I needed with the monument. Just as a redwood demands one touch its bark to prove 30—foot trees exist, so does the arch. 

Photographing the arch became a game of angles. I walked the full length of the park multiple times, I watched reams of visitors photograph themselves on the arch’s west side, unaware that the eastern face took on a golden glow when the sun slipped through the clouds. 

Flocks of ducks and geese occupied the reflecting pools on either side of the arch. While not part of the park, the Old Cathedral (officially the Basilica of Saint Louis, King of France) stands just outside the boundaries. Completed in 1834 and the only Catholic parish church in St. Louis until 1844, the old cathedral is still an active church and prepared for mass on the last Sunday of Advent. 

 At 9 a.m. I could finally return the feeling to my hands as the massive underground visitor center opened. Security was tight as an airport, unsurprising since the museum lies below the arch and and trams in each arm depart from this base. Sitting in a windowless car to visit the little observation deck with porthole windows held no interest for me. I don’t mind heights; the experience just felt underwhelming to me. 

The massive underground visitor center felt more like the Smithsonian and other tourist spots in Washington D.C. than a national park. If it was all a bit Disney-fied, at least it was thorough and not yet whitewashed like other National Park sites. 

As a student of American history, I didn’t run into much I had not seen before. At the moment, it seeks the tell the truth of westward expansion, that white settles displaced Native tribes or force them onto reservations constituting a fraction of their historic territories. Like most Midwest and Southeastern states, Missouri has no reservations, all its Native tribes removed to Oklahoma. I had a surprisingly good breakfast at the cafe then departed. 

A block from the Arch stands the Old Courthouse, which dates to the late 1830s. The Dred Scott case originated there more than a decade before the Supreme Court ruled against Scott and every American of African descent, setting the stage for Civil War. A statue of Dred and Harriet Scott stands outside the courthouse. 

Due to its Midwest crossroads location, I expect to visit St. Louis again, so I saved for courthouse for a pass through the Gateway to the West. I also couldn’t quite get the iconic shot of the Old Courthouse beneath the arch – a winter festival took over the park west of the courthouse, and temporary structures blocked every spot for that shot. 

Even with its prominence, American’s largest monument quickly disappears behind the rest of the St. Louis skyline, a ribbon towering over the Mississippi waterfront.