FEATURE Review by Jeffrey Dunlap
City Of Arnold:
Diamond In The Rough Celebrating 50 Years The city of Arnold, the largest city in Jefferson County, is celebrating its Semicentennial this year. Arnold’s pioneer heritage dates to 1774 when German immigrant John Hildebrand built a fort called the Meramec Settlement. In 1776, a French surveyor, Jean Baptiste Gamache, built a ferry across the Meramec River for a land grant from Spain’s King Charles III. The ferry operated where Telegraph Road crosses the Meramec today at Arnold’s Flamm Park. Ron Counts, Arnold’s mayor since 2009, explains why the City incorporated, and praises its progress. “Post-war population growth in the 1960s burdened public services,” he said. “Subdivisions were opening, schools expanding. People wanted good water, better sewers, a bigger fire department and a police department to reduce pressure on Jefferson County sheriffs.” In 1970, petitioners gained enough signatures to require the Jefferson County Court to call an election for a proposal to incorporate. When six local villages merged – Beck, Flamm City, Maxville, Old Town Arnold, Ten Brook and Wickes – Arnold incorporated in 1972. “With incorporation, Arnold became better positioned to improve community services, attract new businesses, jobs, cultural and recreational amenities,” said 6
theReview January/February 2022
Mayor Counts. It more easily qualified to apply for federal and state grants to fund new programs and improvements.
Who Named Arnold? In 1925, a businessman named Ferd Lang, Sr. built a general store, tavern and gas station on land he purchased from a farmer named Louis Arnold. Lang was so pleased that he called his land Arnold. A few years later, locals officially validated Lang’s name of choice. When Arnold incorporated as a City in 1972, Lang’s son, Ferd B. Lang, Jr. became the City’s first mayor. Arnold’s population today of about 22,000 originated mostly from French, German, English, Irish, Scots, and Swiss immigrants who arrived after Jefferson Barracks opened in 1826. The garrison’s role was to vanquish fierce Native Americans inhabiting what French trappers called “The Missouri Territory.”
The Algonquian term Missouri means “people with canoes made from logs.” French families who settled St. Louis obtained about 6,000 acres of land in the rural area, selling parcels to immigrants who wanted farms. In 1833 two men in Germany formed the Giessen Emigration Society to live in colonial America. In 1834, more than 500 Germans emigrated to the area because it portrayed Germany’s Rhineland region. Allen Flamm of the Arnold Historical Society is vice-chairman of the City’s Historic Preservation Commission. He characterizes Arnold’s evolution from rugged frontier to modern City this way: “In 1836, my great grandfather Wilhelm Flamm arrived from Merseburg, Germany, to farm and plant orchards. He married a French girl related to Jean Baptiste Gamache, an early settler. By 1920, my grandfather John H. Flamm owned 320 acres that spread to the Meramec River. He planted more orchards growing apples, peaches, pears, plums, grapes and raspberries. My father Alvin Flamm was born in 1915. I remember my father and grandpa selling our products in south St. Louis. In 1937, a butcher named Leo Ziegler opened a store nearby. He wanted people to find it, so he called
