Broadway ends where St. Mary’s commences
This photo of Enoch L. Hall is posted upon his Find A Grave site. He lived at 2512 St. Mary's in the 1920s, when the house's address was changed to 2512 Broadway. Photo posted on his Find A Grave site, contributed by PH.
MARY LOU MONTGOMERY
Heading west, where does Broadway end and St. Mary’s Avenue begin?
The answer to that question varies as to what decade you are referring to.
There is a small frame house located on the north side of the road, just to the east of the Lamb street intersection.
In 1905, the address was 2118 St. Mary’s.
In 1912, the address was 2512 Broadway.
In 1923, the address was 2512 St. Mary’s.
In 1930, the address was 2512 Broadway.
Since 1930, the address has remained the same, 2512 Broadway.
The answer is, today, the division line is roughly the intersection of Lamb and Broadway. Across the street to the north, the house to the left of 2512 Broadway is 2600 St. Mary’s Avenue.
Hall family
The Enoch L. Hall family lived in the house at 2512 Broadway, across from the Lamb Avenue intersection, in the 1920s and into the 1930s.
In January 1917, Enoch, a mild-mannered insurance salesman, was among the 800 citizens of Marion County, Mo., who owned an automobile. His car of choice was a Ford, probably the famed Model T.
He was 36 years old and still a bachelor in 1917, when he registered for the draft in anticipation of the U.S. entry into the European war. He listed as his next of kin his mother, Ellen Hall, who lived in Louisiana, Mo. In 1917, Enoch Hall was living at the Windsor Hotel, 127 S. Main St.
In 1919, he was married to Tilda Lindberg in Adams County, Ill., and within a year they purchased the aforementioned house.
Each week day his automobile likely would be parked nearby to the Hornback Building at 500 Broadway, where he worked as an agent for the Missouri Life and Accident Insurance Company.
His office, from 1917 until 1930, was in room 32, on the third floor of this noteworthy Hannibal building, owned by Dr. Edward T. Hornback, a pioneer eye, ear, nose and throat specialist, with offices on the first floor. (By 1937, Hall’s former office had been incorporated into the work suite for Roy Hamlin, noted attorney who would later serve as Speaker of the House in Jefferson City.)
Enoch’s new bride was about a decade younger, and they quickly started a family: a daughter, Virginia, born in 1921, and a son, Kenneth, born in 1923.
When first married, they lived with Tilda’s mother and brother, Christina (widow of Gus) and Joseph Lundberg, at 321 South Arch Street.
Shortly thereafter, they settled into the cozy frame house located at 2512 Broadway, an area which had only been annexed into Hannibal’s city limits a few years prior. Their large yard supplied plenty of green space for their children to play, trees for shade, and the house was positioned far enough from the busy corridor and street car tracks to allow a peaceful setting. In addition, the property contained a garage, in which Enoch Hall could park his automobile - the aforementioned Ford, or the Coupe he purchased from the Glisson Motor Co., in Palmyra in 1924.
By 1925, Hall’s hard work had paid off, earning him a promotion to district manager for the Missouri Life and Accident Insurance Co. Each week day, he climbed the two flights of wooden stairs situated in the Hornback building’s core, in order to reach his third-floor office.
But then, as the new decade began, things changed. The state of his health began to decline. He died at the age of 52, in Levering Hospital, on Oct. 23, 1930. The primary cause listed on his death certificate was pancreatic cancer. He also had tuberculous in both lungs.
His physician was Dr. James C. Chilton, whose offices were located on the first floor of the Hornback Building, across the hall from Dr. Hornback.
Unique intersection
Early maps of Hannibal show the westward flow of Broadway intersecting at the Lamb street intersection, where an almost forgotten section of Broadway veers south and westward for a few blocks, ultimately parallel to Chestnut Street. It is at this point, traditionally, where Broadway goes west, and where St. Mary’s Avenue begins.
While the Broadway/St. Mary’s passage is continuous, it makes little difference to travelers as to whether they are passing on St. Mary’s or Broadway. But it does matter, when identifying houses and businesses along this corridor.
Many of the buildings that still stand along this curve where the traffic lanes veer from westward to northwest, were constructed in the years leading up to, and following the beginning of the 20th century.
An observation: A few of the houses have stone foundations, a popular building material pre-1900. Other houses have concrete foundations, suggesting post-1900 construction.
Addresses along this portion of the roadway, as well as the occupants of those homes, changed frequently during those early decades. Adding to the confusion is the fact that these houses were not included in the Sanborn fire prevention maps published between 1885 and 1913, because this neighborhood was not within the city’s limits. And, no historic inventory was made on this neighborhood, due to the fact that the houses were in a rural area.
In addition, street numbers were not assigned to these houses and buildings until the beginning of the 20th century.
Several owners
The same small house where the Hall family lived was occupied by Silas T. Gregory in 1906, when it was numbered 2118 St. Mary’s. At the time, Gregory, working as the manager of an express company, lived in this house on St. Mary’s Avenue with his wife, Cora Alice Balthorpe Gregory, and their son, Walter.
In 1911, the William A. Decker family occupied this house, which was still numbered 2118 St. Mary’s. A year later, the address changed to 2512 Broadway.
William Decker’s family included his wife, Pauline Raymond Decker, and their four children.
Just a year after moving to this address, William A. Decker, a carpenter by trade, died, at the approximate age of 77. His wife, some 14 years his junior, continued to live in this house, through 1920. She died in 1937. They are buried at Mount Olivet Cemetery.
Enoch L. and Tilda Hall were at home at 2515 Broadway by 1923. Enoch died in 1930, and Tilda remained in the house at least through 1937.
In 1959, Tandy E. Hayes owned the property.
The house is still standing.
This house, at 2512 Broadway, was occupied in the 1920s by Enoch L. Hall and family. Hall was district manager for the Missouri Life and Accident Insurance Company at the time of his death, in 1930. Google Street View, August 2019.
This sketch, based upon a Sanborn fire prevention map circa the 1930s, shows the location of houses along the 2500 block of Broadway. While street numbering has changed over the years, these addresses represent circa 1930. Illustration by Mary Lou Montgomery.
Mary Lou Montgomery retired as editor of the Hannibal (Mo.) Courier-Post in 2014. She researches and writes narrative-style stories about the people who served as building blocks for this region’s foundation. Books available on Amazon.com by this author include but are not limited to: "The Notorious Madam Shaw," "Pioneers in Medicine from Northeast Missouri," "The Historic Murphy House, Hannibal, Mo., Circa 1870,” “Hannibal’s ‘West End,’ and the newest book, “Oakwood: West of Hannibal.” Montgomery can be reached at Montgomery.editor@yahoo.com Her collective works can be found at www.maryloumontgomery.com
