Lafayette Square lost one of its best restorationist pioneers and ambassadors on June 27th. Tom Keay died following a long illness. He is survived by his wife, Lynne and a son and grandson in Chicago.
The Keays were originals; the type who could look at a brick pile and imagine a mansion waiting to be reclaimed from that rubble. They weren’t of fabulous means. Tom was a history teacher at Roosevelt High School and Lynne was a computer programmer. They saw 1532 Mississippi Avenue in 1970, and spent the next nine years in reclaiming it.
Tom and Lynne picked up the two story wreck for $6,000. The giant 1896 tornado sheared off its third floor, which went unreplaced. Tom related that, “my mother, usually a garrulous lady, was speechless for thirty minutes after first seeing the house.”
It wasn’t just the parents, either. Those were times when there were few kindred spirits in the Square. Realtors ignored houses there, insurers wouldn’t cover them, and banks wouldn’t finance them. Residents worked day jobs, then filled their evenings and weekends with hard and dirty effort. Much work was co-op’ed, with new rehabbers helping each other out with various acquired skills. Overcoming shared adversities forged bonds that still tie the old-timers of the area to each other.
Tom and Lynne spent their first six weeks simply trying to clear the parlor; an initial area from which to work. The place was most recently a five unit boarding house, so a multitude of fixtures were carted away. Much of the millwork was missing and required resourcing. Being period specific, it was difficult to find suitable materials, and the Keays either salvaged or custom made much of it. A multitude of wallpaper layers were steamed and scraped away. They estimated that the result involved 75% of their individual sweat equity.
And yet, by 1971, the time of the second Lafayette Square house tour, Tom and Lynne enthusiastically volunteered to show their work in progress. They were eager to demonstrate the potential of this neighborhood to visitors who might “catch the rehabbing bug.” They later got around to rebuilding a third floor onto their home.
This experience might satisfy anyone’s desire to restore an old home, but the Keays would often look out the back of 1532 at a run-down pair of properties on Vail Place. In 2001, they made their move, buying one, then the other, and setting out to connect them into a new home. They pulled that off, too, winning a city award for restoration.
Tom became the de-facto historian of Lafayette Square. He wrote tour booklets for Lafayette Park and Benton Place, happily sharing the deep wealth of time that the Square holds. He and Lynne remained consistent champions of both Lafayette Park and the downtown Campbell House, in addition to the Lafayette Park Methodist Church.
You can count their friends by counting the residents of the Square. As Tom put it, “our closest friends are here and even our church. We can’t imagine living any other place.”
And they never did. Fifty-four years takes in a lot; Tom was a vital resource for others, and an inspiration for all those in the area who thought they might do a little restoration themselves. He is already missed. The Square is here today through the efforts of people like Tom and Lynne. They swam upstream all the way, creating a revitalized neighborhood in the process.
Note
For a look at 1532 Mississippi today, the fruit of all the effort Tom and Lynne, followed by equally intrepid Larry and Andrea Heugatter put in, check out the photos in this link: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/1532-Mississippi-Ave-Saint-Louis-MO-63104/2945672_zpid/
Here is an article from the Daily Journal of Flat River, MO; May 21, 1971, with some detail about the Keay’s on home tour that year. The headline errantly credits Tom’s parents for the home, but we know better.
A service will be announced soon, to be held at Lafayette Park Methodist Church. Donations can be sent to the church, in addition to Lafayette Park Conservancy and Campbell House.
