Webster Groves House History
The city of Webster Groves has many houses that have stood for a hundred years or more. The Library often gets inquiries from residents looking into the history of their home, so we have compiled the following list of resources available from the Library that such researchers may find useful. Also, feel free to contact the Reference Librarian, John Egel, by email at jegel@wgpl.org to set an appointment for one-on-one help researching your home’s history.
Online resources
City of Webster Groves building permits and property tax records, digitized from the microfilm held by the Library. The building permits run from the first year they were issued in 1908 to 1996. Real estate tax records cover the full period the City of Webster Groves kept its own records: from incorporation in 1896 to 1947.
- Index to building permits. To assist with locating specific building permits, we have created a searchable index to them. This is a work in progress, currently covering permits from 1908 through 1930. *RECENTLY UPDATED*
Hodgdon’s Directory of the City of Webster Groves, 1907 and 1908-1909
A large collection of St. Louis County and City directories, including Gould’s, can be found at Missouri Digital Heritage.
St Louis County Department of Revenue Real Estate Information. This site is important for looking up the legal description and other information about your property.
The Kate Moody Collection consists of over 10,000 historical documents assembled by Katherine Twining Moody, a Webster Groves resident and librarian with St. Louis Public Library from 1895-1945. From the 1880s until her death in 1950, she collected photos, newspaper articles, genealogical records, hand written oral histories, correspondence and other documents dealing with the history of Webster Groves, St. Louis County and St. Louis City. As a joint project of Webster Groves Historical Society, which owns the collection, the Webster Groves Public Library, has digitized the collection and made it publicly accessible in a searchable format as part of the Missouri Digital Heritage program. Search for your address or for names of past owners of your home. You may be surprised at what you find.
The Missouri Historical Society’s House History Resources. Offers a variety of resources to help you research the history of your St. Louis City or St. Louis County home.
HeritageQuest provides U.S. Census data and other genealogical data. This service can be accessed from home with a WGPL card number.
Our Ancestry Library Edition account provides access to over 30,000 collections containing 11 billion individual records. Some features of Ancestry.com, such as user-created family trees, are not available. This service is only available within the Library, either through our public computers or through your own laptop or mobile device connected to our public Wi-Fi.
With the Library’s Newspapers.com account, you can access the following Webster Groves newspapers: The Webster Times from 1896-1898; Webster Groves Times from 1909-1914; Webster News-Times from 1912-1961; Webster Advertiser from 1963-1971. This service is only available within the Library, either through our public computers or through your own laptop or mobile device connected to our public Wi-Fi.
FamilySearch is a free genealogy website created and maintained by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. It requires that you set up a user account with an email address and password. The site has a massive repository of documents including court records, deeds, directories and newspapers. With your account you can also use the FamilySearch Labs Full Text Search capability to find documents related to your house.
Maps of Webster Groves
Click here for an online collection of Webster Groves historical maps. Included are the 1862 and 1870 Julius Hutawa Atlases of St. Louis County, the 1878 Pitzman Atlas of St. Louis County, the 1893 Atlas of St. Louis County and the Northwest Publishing Co 1909 Plat Book.
A four volume Atlas of St. Louis County, published by the St. Louis Plat and Record Co. in 1909 is available on the St. Louis County Library and Missouri Historical Society websites. Webster Groves is found in volume 3. You will need to view the Index to find the blue page numbers for the areas within Webster you’re researching. This atlas provides ownership information to the lot level. It’s important to note that this atlas covers the 1909 city limits and does not have information for areas (e.g., south of Glendale Rd) that were later annexed.
In the Reference Area downstairs the Library has a collection of historical maps showing Webster Groves and surrounding areas that can be viewed within the Library. Some of these maps are on loan from the Webster Groves Historical Society. See this index for details.
Reference books
We also have a variety of local history book in our reference section, including histories of the city, neighborhoods, and churches, along with books about century homes and even some early residential and business directories. Copies of some of these items are also available to check out.
Century Home Plaques
Do you own an old home in Webster Groves? Is it over 100 years old? That makes you eligible to join over 500 of your Webster Groves neighbors who take pride in their historic homes and have had Century Home plaques placed on their homes. Century Home plaques are a project of the Webster Groves Historical Society, which is a non-profit organization whose mission is to promote, preserve and enhance the historical heritage of Webster Groves, including the management, operation and preservation of the Historic Hawken House and the adjacent Historical Archives and Hearth Room event space.