What are the challenges involved with managing a small rivertown? And how does a dyed-in-the-wool Northeasterner and international business consultant end up living in a small town on the Mississippi River in the middle of America? That’s the path Philip Stang has followed to Kimmswick, Missouri, where he has served multiple terms as Mayor. In this wide-ranging interview, we pull the curtain back for a look at what it takes to manage the historic community. We talk about his old career as a corporate consultant, his current life as an artist, and his entry into local politics. We discuss challenges that include fighting floods that are increasingly threatening and looking for ways to diversify the small town’s revenues. And we do it all with plenty of laughs along the way. In the Mississippi Minute, I offer a few tips for visiting Kimmswick, including what to expect when you visit for one of the city’s two big festivals.
Show Notes
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Transcript
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
city, apple butter, work, mayor, flood, mississippi river, town, good, river, louis, place, year, put, people, run, day, historic, number, art, mississippi
SPEAKERS
Mayor Stang, Dean Klinkenberg
Mayor Stang 00:00
Kimmswick is an ideal situation for a person who likes to sit and think about things and who admires the way things were done in the past, antiques, history, etc. This is the perfect location.
Dean Klinkenberg 00:43
Welcome to the Mississippi Valley Traveler Podcast. I’m Dean Klinkenberg, and I’ve been exploring the deep history and rich culture of the people in places along America’s greatest river, the Mississippi, since 2007. Join me as I go deep into the characters and places along the river and occasionally wander into other stories from the Midwest and other rivers. Read the episode show notes and get more information on the Mississippi at MississippiValleyTraveler.com. Let’s get going.
Dean Klinkenberg 01:15
Welcome to Episode 20 of the Mississippi Valley Traveler podcast. We’re going deep in this episode into Kimmswick, Missouri, in a conversation I have with the city’s mayor Phillip Stang in his office, which is why you’ll hear a little bit of background noise in this episode. Mayor Stang talks about his path to living in Kimmswick, he grew up in Rhode Island which you might pick up from his accent, and his entrance into politics. We talked about the reasons he chose to stay in Kimmswick, even after traveling around the world and living in Florida for a few years, and some of the challenges faced by the community in the past few years, and how they’re looking ahead toward the future. He’s a gregarious man and loves to tell stories and laugh, so he was a lot of fun to chat with. Kimmswick is an old community in Jefferson County, about a half hour’s drive south of St. Louis. The area has been populated for 1000s of years. Some of the earliest people hunted mastodons in the area, and later people processed salt from Little Rock Creek near the Mississippi River. The town’s namesake, Theodore Kimm, moved into the area from St. Louis in 1850. When a railroad built tracks nearby, he saw an opportunity and platted a town. That was a good decision. And less than 10 years the village had attracted middle class St. Louisans, most of them German immigrants, who opened stores, a brewery, mills, a copper shop, and greenhouses that sent flowers up to St. Louis. Kimm retired in 1872 and moved away but the town kept going. In 1880, Montesano Springs Park opened and that quickly became a popular destination. People traveled down there for mineral springs, for dances, to enjoy a merry go round and tent shows, and other diversions. They got there by steamboat and train back in those days. The park kept going until 1918, at which time it closed down. The middle part of the 20th century was pretty difficult for the town. River traffic declined as did rail traffic eventually. The town got smaller, it had peaked at 1500 residents, which is hard to imagine today since it has fewer than 200 permanent residents today. One person, Lucianna Gladney-Ross, used her wealth and influence to help bring the town back (her father Frank Gladney was one of the founders of seven up). She bought up a lot of property and restored buildings and she really was fundamental in helping the town recover from those darker times. Mayor Stang talks about her efforts near the end of our interview, and he also talks about some of the close calls that Kimmswick has had with a couple of big floods that threatened the city. It’s a wide ranging interview–a little personal, a little bit about the city itself, a little bit about, you know, how a small town mayor has to find creative ways to manage the community and keep it going. In the Mississippi Minute I’ll offer a few tips about visiting Kimmswick, including the weekends of its big festivals, so stick around for that. As usual, thanks to all of you who show some love through Patreon. If you want to get on the Patreon bandwagon, just go to patreon.com/deanKlinkenberg where you can become a subscriber. If that’s not your thing, you can show me some love by buying me a coffee instead by making a one time donation to help support my coffee habit. Go to MississippiValleyTraveler.com/podcast to find out how to do that. Thanks so much and now on to the interview.
Dean Klinkenberg 04:56
Philip Stang is a man who has had multiple careers and has has done well in all of them. He’s an expert in integrated supply chain management, which has taken him around the world to work with large corporations, and also resulted in many publications and high profile speaking engagements. That apparently wasn’t enough, so he took on a second career as an artist. He founded the Out of My Mind art studio, where he’s the resident ceramic artist. His work has been showcased in art shows and galleries, and he’s also found an international audience for his work. And oh, by the way, he’s also the elected mayor of Kimmswick, Missouri. Welcome to the podcast, Mayor Stang.
Mayor Stang 05:34
Wow, thank you very much. It’s a pleasure to be here.
Dean Klinkenberg 05:37
So I would just kind of like to hear a little bit about your career path, like, you are not a native to Kimmwick. How did you, what’s your path that led you here to this village?
Mayor Stang 05:50
Well, to start off with, which some people may pick it up occasionally in my accent, because I drive cars and I park them in parking lot, I was born in Rhode Island and I grew up on the Atlantic Ocean. Back in the… and had planned like most Rhode Islanders to spend the rest of my life in Rhode Island because most Rhode Islanders probably believe that if they leave the state, they need a passport to get back in. So they don’t go. However, back a number of years ago, I had an opportunity to move to the St. Louis area. And I was working for ITT Grinnell. I had finished implementing quite a number of manufacturing facilities on new systems. And I also had done their distribution branches. And so I had basically worked myself out of a job and so did well enough that they wanted to have me at ITT Blackburn. So I moved to St. Louis. And I worked for Blackburn, I worked for a number of other companies. And then I also got into the global consulting business. So I took the expertise that I had developed along the way and had that in looking at companies all over the world and saving not only millions but literally when you start including the major oil companies and you include major military organizations and so on, I got into the billions of dollars in savings. We lived in St. Louis for about 15 years, and then got the brilliant idea that we’d go to Florida. And I stayed in Florida for about, in Naples, Florida for about 12 years, and used that as my base of operations flying around the world. For a while I flew to 2 locations, St. Louis plus Florida, but somehow I forgot about the part whereby I had told my wife that we would, if our condo in Florida got too cramped, we’d build a home, until I was building a home, and then I said, oh I remember that. So we enjoyed ourselves in Florida. But then I retired from my consulting career. And I was doing art at Out of My Mind, our studio, which was mine but also the for the Bonita Art Association, Naples Art Association and so on. And it’s kind of an interesting story. My, my son-in-law is a pie-a-holic. And so we were here for Christmas. Because all my children and grandchildren and great grandchildren all live in this area. After Christmas, the next day, it was his brilliant idea, because he’s a pie-a-holic that they have great pies at the Blue Owl in Kimmswick.
Mayor Stang 09:20
And it’s absolutely true. And then also it’s a good place to give your grandchildren some money and say it’s very safe, just go buy whatever you want. And that way if they hate it, they can’t blame you. Meanwhile, I was looking, I ran into a an art studio that was based, was basically for sale. The previous artist was looking to get out of that. She had other interests, and all of a sudden that sparked a thought process and over a fairly short period of time, the decision came to not only I can do my artwork, I have an art studio, I can renovate the property, I can live there. And all of my children and grandchildren and great grandchildren on the way are here. So that was the impetus behind moving to Kimmswick. Also, Kimmswick is an ideal situation for a person who likes to sit and think about things, and who admires the way things we’ve done in the past, antiques, history, etc. This is the perfect location. And within five minutes, you don’t have to suffer either. Because within five to 10 minutes, you can be at any big box store on the planet, get your food and your hardware, supplies and all of that. So it’s a great blend.
Dean Klinkenberg 09:20
Which is true
Dean Klinkenberg 11:00
So you you kind of skip through this part of the story a little quickly but tell me about the interest in art. When did you begin making art, and you described yourself as a ceramic artist now? Is that what you’ve always done or?
Mayor Stang 11:15
No. I view the world as art and I guess, I guess the thought process was, as soon as I could pick up a crayon, I was interested in art. I took in my youth, I took a lot of classes at the Rhode Island School of Design, things like that. But I did, my father would claim was the only thing I ever listened to, but that’s not true, he said there’s one kind of an artist you don’t want to be, and that’s a starving one. He said, so get another career field and you can always do your art. And that’s what I did. And so once I had been around the world many, many times, I said, let’s take a shot at it. And that was the beat, and I chose, like I say ceramic artist, rather than potter because I do not have a great appreciation myself for useful pottery. So I do a lot of raku. Which, if you, because of the nature of raku, if you were to do something silly, like put water and flowers in it, you run the risk of being murdered by a grandmother because you just ruined your table because it leaks like a sieve. So my art is more more more statuary, statuarial, very unusual stuff. I kind of invented a little technique that I call explosive, explosive Impressionism and so on, and I build a piece, and then I blow it up. And after a while, you get used to the amount of gunpowder that you put into something so that you don’t end up, as I have had neighbors coming over and saying, is this piece of clay on my head, yours? So what you end up doing is you can, certain, certain amounts of gunpowder will cause it to bulge out. Others will blow cup holes and things like that. And you can manipulate the piece after you’ve already built the base. And then it becomes however you want to treat it in terms of glazes and things like that, then it comes out pretty interesting.
Dean Klinkenberg 13:38
So it’s one way to let your neighbors know when you’re working in the studio.
Mayor Stang 13:42
Yes, because I’m in the backyard pulling it up. Sometimes pieces fly over the top of the roof and on their car. Fortunately, I had good neighbors and they can be bought off with some beer and it works good.
Dean Klinkenberg 14:00
So you’ve, you’ve had the chance to travel a lot of the world then and see a lot of different places. How, I don’t quite know how to ask this, but like how does Kimmswick sort of measure up with the impressions you have about different places around the world? What is it about here that stands out for you that attracted you to stay here?
Mayor Stang 14:23
I think it’s its history. I think it’s it’s also very quiet, especially in the evenings because this, the city is very well appointed with small shops with a number of restaurants, a winery. But though… and those are open from depending on the time of the year from about 10 o’clock in the morning till 430 or so, sometimes five o’clock at night Tuesday through Sunday. Monday, because a lot of them are entrepreneurial operations, they have to sleep and rest sometimes. Mondays, nothing happens. It’s actually quiet. Nobody irritates me. It’s great. Yeah. And so like I said before, it’s a very quiet little, little city. You can and I’ve been able to over time, make a difference. And, philosophically, not to get too deep into anything more of my philosophical things is you should always leave a place better than your found it, whether it’s in business, wherever it is. That’s what I tried to do.
Dean Klinkenberg 15:49
Is that one of the things that led to your interest in being mayor or serving community through political office? You didn’t start as mayor, you were you have a Board of Aldermen? Yes. So you started there, and then you became mayor?
Mayor Stang 16:02
Well, it was kind of, it was kind of interesting, because I was from the moment I got here, I was involved. I was a member of the Historical Society. I did, I joined a group of people who work with the Anheuser estate, which is owned by the city, but as other events that go on there, and a variety of other things I was involved in, which, at the time, I did not. I didn’t understand what I was doing. Because when an opening came up on the Board of Aldermen, the last mayor, Mayor Pat Reno, a very unusual, kind hearted, but very unusual character. For some reason, she took a liking to me and I went to all of the board meetings as a fly on the wall, concerned citizen. And when an opening on the board came up, she told me that… she asked me if I’d be interested. And I said, Well, I hadn’t really thought about it. But sure. And and that’s, that’s when it all started because I went to the next board meeting, and found out at that moment that the person had resigned from the board that day. And there was several other people who knew it because they were local people. I was clueless. I went there and she announced that the person had resigned, she said, and then some other aldermen brought up these different people that they want to appoint. And she just stood up and said, I’ve not heard about these people being interested, therefore, I’m appointing Phil Stang. And that kicked off a little opposition there for a few months, because as I was sitting there, she said, do you accept and I said, Yes. I walked up there and sat down at my seat and found out that I already had a nametag placed in front of me. So I may not have known that I was being appointed that day. But she did. And so I served. It was supposed to be a year and eight months. And there were some people that didn’t really want me there. So they went to the board of elections. And so they had a special election after eight months. And I won, and I got… it was a combination of being involved, more involved, and seeing how things are going and looking at things that I thought that I could help and fix. And a little aggravation on my part being that I was up against people who were trying to get rid of you.
Dean Klinkenberg 19:11
So welcome to politics.
Mayor Stang 19:13
I’m trying to flowerpot I’ve been pretty, pretty aggressive if you push me the wrong way. And so rather than, I was asked by a friend of mine, who was an alderman who was running for a two year term, he said, Why don’t you run for the two year term? He said instead of that one year term. I said, No; I’m running for that one. I’m getting that one. He said, he looked at me very slightly and said, Are you going to run for office again? And I said: Absolutely. And he said, Okay, I’ll support you for mayor. I said you got it. You know exactly what I’m going to do. And so I have done that. The term of mayor is two years. I have done that five times. So I’m now I’ve served eight and I’m on my next two years.
Dean Klinkenberg 20:11
Something’s going all right.
Mayor Stang 20:13
Well, we got to adjust, okay. And occasionally people have made a run at it, but they haven’t succeeded so far.
Dean Klinkenberg 20:22
So what have you learned are the like the priorities for folks then for governing a town like this?
Mayor Stang 20:31
The thing that you, I think, that which got me when I first not only got on the board, but when I first became there, I looked at the the way in which this this little city supports itself. And at that particular point in time I was looking at, businesses were off, the entire country’s economy was off, plus the major portion of our revenue, over 70% of our revenue stream, comes from two festivals every year. So to have a sliding sales tax, which of which we only get 1% on the businesses, was very tenuous for me. And so I started looking, what other ways to make revenue. And that’s when I started working with the Port Authority and economic development, to attempt to attract the Delta Queen. And then after that, part of that whole process was to build a port. And so I was able to, I was able to accomplish that task without costing the city any money. That port cost $1.3 million, and we spent nothing. So I then learned a little different twist, because the city of Kimmswick had always been a situation where they would say, we’ve done so much with so little for so long, we could do anything with nothing. And I said that’s an interesting, frugal approach. But I’m going to figure out how to pump more money into this. So we got the port. I then went out myself and attracted boats to come here. And we had the first paddlewheeler stop in the city in 125 years. So what we’re doing something right now, of course COVID and last year’s drought, have put, set that back a little bit, but we’re still well positioned to do that in the future. We’re also started to work… It was interesting, because we went between the previous director of the Port Authority, and the previous County Administrator, the three of us got together and looked into East-West Gateway in terms of a funding opportunity. And what we figured was that we would end up with reply for grant, but the grant, and I had every expectation that we would get to go back. And the idea was that after a couple of times of submitting these grants, we would figure out how to do it. And maybe several years down the line, we getting a bundle. So we agreed that we would apply, and there were 150 cities and portions of cities will apply for the grant. When they cut it to 50, we had not received our grant back. So I said, something’s fishy. It’s got to come soon. So we can see what the red marks are and all that stuff. Then they went to 15 and we still didn’t get it back. Then they went to five finalists, we didn’t get it back, and we won. So that was a half a million dollar consulting grant, of which we had to scrape some money together to cover the 20% matching funds. But we did it. We came up with an outstanding plan. A little city like this. I jokingly said It was founded by Mr. Kimm in 1859. And after Mr. Kimm went back to Europe, he told Joe, this is how to run it. And Joe ran it. And then Joe turned it over to Mary, who turned it over to Harry. And it just grew. So there was nothing. So part of what had to transpire or a number of different things, relaying out the structure of the city, who reports to who and what. In fact, they do all of that. But we also discovered that in 1939, the state of Missouri said every city had to have a comprehensive plan. So in 2016…
Dean Klinkenberg 25:48
You finally got there?
Mayor Stang 25:49
Well, I sent myself and the mayor pro tem, presiding officer, the board, we went to, um, so and we got Chancellor certificates in planning and zoning. So we knew what we were doing. I put together a zoning board. And we were in the middle of writing it when we won the Great Streets money. And so we did the consulting project and merged the two. And even when I get back the Comprehensive Plan/Great Streets, the people that do that, at UMSL said, This is ridiculous. It’s better than the plan for the City of St. Louis. If you’re gonna do it, do it right. There’s only one thing missing from that plan. And that’s how to pay for it. So as an example, a piece of that was how do, how does one pay for that, if you don’t have money. Makes it interesting. So it took about four years, but working with Jefferson County, working with the public works department. So we were able to come to a situation where we were able to designate a number of streets in the city of Kimmswick, as through it. Why, I don’t know. But it’s through it. The good news about throughways is they’re eligible for federal funds. And then by signing an agreement with the county, they would take over those roads, which can be abrogated at any point in time. But by doing that, they pay the 30%. And the government pays, the federal government pays the 70%, and I pay zippo. So to the tune of, I don’t know the exact end number, but it will be… We do the 2025 project which goes from the bridge at one end of the city, up Market Street to Fifth; 2026 goes from end to Market Street across Fifth to Montebello. And then in 2027, Highway K will be extended up being Kimmswick Boulevard. And all of those streets will have improved, vastly improved stormwater systems. Because what you do with the street is many, many years ago, a horse walked down the street, then it got too muddy for the people. So they put some boards on it. And then they put some dirt on top of that and some tar on top of that. So the first thing they have to do is go down to a level where the water will actually drain off. Put it on the stormwater systems, sidewalks. We will also have, and I like to, you can’t see it on your podcast, but I’m holding my hands up on my head like this to indicate the old kind of streetlamps. They’ll be all the way through and up and really fit with the historical motif of the city. And closest I could figure, right now that could be that whole project could be somewhere north of five and maybe $6 million in total. So not bad for a person who has gotten a nickle in it. So. So you asked me about why I’m there. That’s what I like to do.
Dean Klinkenberg 29:22
Right make things happen.
Dean Klinkenberg 29:25
Hey, Dean Klinkenberg Here interrupting myself. Just wanted to remind you that if you’d like to know more about the Mississippi River, check out my books. I write the Mississippi Valley Traveler guide books for people who want to get to know the river better. I also write the Frank Dodge mystery series set in places along the Mississippi. Read those books to find out how many different ways my protagonist, Frank Dodge, can get into trouble. My newest book, Mississippi River Mayhem, details some of the disasters and tragedies that happened along Old Man River. Find any of them wherever books are sold.
Dean Klinkenberg 29:58
So, you mentioned, like 70% of the revenue had come from those two festivals. And I want to talk about those festivals in just a minute too, especially since one of them is coming up. So that’s part of the challenge of managing a place like this is that what’s the population these days? Roughly? Ballpark?
Mayor Stang 30:22
Well, I laugh because if you couple the population question together with festivals, you get a very interesting, you get a very interesting picture. This city is six square blocks with 167 people. And Strawberry Festival has drawn as many as, in June has drawn as many as 75,000 people in two days. And at the end of October is Apple Butter Festival. And we have drawn 150,000 in two days. So when they when they asked me what we’re good at, and I say we the City of Kimmsick, we’re really good at fighting floods, because we don’t flood, we don’t flood. We come close, but we don’t flood. And the other thing we’re really good at is logistics. As we move a lot of people. So anyway, that’s how that works.
Dean Klinkenberg 31:23
That’s two very different sort of, like priorities to manage. And, too, because this is still a community where people live full time.
Mayor Stang 31:30
Absolutely.
Dean Klinkenberg 31:31
And you represent them mostly, I mean, you represent them because they’re the ones who vote.
Dean Klinkenberg 31:36
But you then also have these 1000s you have… Well, today’s a Friday, and when I came in, it was pretty busy. There were lots of people walking around.
Mayor Stang 31:36
That’s correct.
Mayor Stang 31:46
We have over 25 shops. We have 3, 4, 5 restaurants, and one of them being a being a winery, La Chance Winery, which has its vineyards in DeSoto. But their operation here is in the what used to be the Old House. And that is a building, a historic building that was being built and started its operation while the Continental Congress was meeting. And also a young army officer who used to imbibe and have dinner there every once in a while. Adds a little bit of ambiance to the city, because you probably didn’t never heard of the guy, but he was the commanding general of the Union Army and President of the United States.
Dean Klinkenberg 32:52
Perhaps a first name Ulysses.
Mayor Stang 32:54
That’s correct. And then on top of that, we also had a guy who lived up the street, who, as soon as we find the right microphones and put into the into the restaurant, we will have a room named after him, because that will be the rest of the story.
Dean Klinkenberg 33:12
Paul Harvey.
Mayor Stang 33:13
Absolutely. All right. So there are historic many, many historic pieces here that fit together. And as a person who really likes history, I like being involved with the [undecipherable] House, which unfortunately is going to have to be torn down, it’s too much of a disrepair, is the oldest building in town. However, it was pre civil war. And its basement is built of stone. It’s like a catacomb down there. And it was used during the Civil War. The Union army was in that building. And in the basement, it was used to move people from down the Creek, down Market Street, below them on boats and send them north because it was part of the Underground Railroad.
Mayor Stang 33:13
Well, it’s good to be able to, like commemorate that
Mayor Stang 34:17
Yes, yes. And we will do more there so anyway, it’s a, it’s very historic, the other pieces to all this puzzle is that you have to always look at, we’ve tried to look at the infrastructure pieces and the revenue generation attempts by doing things, like the port, add to the city, not only from a practical infrastructure perspective, but also stay with the history by our Great Streets program. Additionally, the city does own the Anheuser estate which is known as the Anheuser estate by a lot of people, because friends for the Anheuser and his wife lived there as a summer home. And it was, but we will refer to it in, in thanks to them, as FredMar farms, because that’s how they did it. Presently, there is a, there is a board that operates that from an economic perspective, even though the property is owed by the city. We have a very close relationship. I sit on that board as the mayor. And we are beginning to take what was the stables, and at one time it was used by Ride on St. Louis, which they outgrew and moved somewhere else. We’re going to renovate that whole thing and turn into a wedding and event venue, and it will be first class. And so we will have another opportunity to generate money not only for the estate and its upkeep, but also for the city. All right,
Dean Klinkenberg 36:16
it’s a beautiful setting, too, right off the Mississippi.
Mayor Stang 36:19
Well, strangely, you may be the first person outside of the city, you may be the first person actually in this city to know that that is going to be the riverfront stables at FredMar Farm in Kimmswick.
Dean Klinkenberg 36:36
All right, I get the exclusive on that one…
Mayor Stang 36:40
You got it, you got it.
Dean Klinkenberg 36:43
Fantastic.
Mayor Stang 36:45
And also, I would say some of the other things that we’ve looked at as of late. One of the things those are, those are big projects that are outside of day to day life. And they take a long time. We’re presently looking at all of our systems within the within the city, all of our computer systems, everything that runs everything. Because it’s all homegrown and grew up over the years. So we have a new city administrator, very, very, very qualified person. We have also switched over our accounting systems to QuickBooks so we can generate reports very quickly. We are presently loading an event management software that will generate and run the festivals for us in a much more intelligent way. Not taking anything away from anybody who was willing in the past, but there was too much paper and so they grew from little bitty things. Still, they’re totally uncontrollable. So we’re working on that. And additionally to that, you haven’t asked me that question, but I’ll tell you anyway. And that is I also serve as the Missouri Chair of MRCTI, being the mayor’s association up and down the river. We have 124 cities on this river, 104 of them in our organization. So additionally, we look to two things from the city of Kimmswick perspective: are there things that we can do through MRCTI and leverage that will allow us to be in better shape to avoid floods like that. Also, since we are such a gigantic metropolis, MRCTI has afforded us and myself the opportunity to spread the word and talk about Kimmswick up and down this entire river. And also every year I make a trip to Washington, and we meet with the Mississippi River caucus. So I go to the Senate, I go to the House of Representatives and I go to the White House. And there aren’t very many people anymore in any of those places that don’t know work or anything about Kimmswick.
Dean Klinkenberg 39:28
MRCTI is the Mississippi River Cities and Towns Initiative.
Mayor Stang 39:31
Correct.
Dean Klinkenberg 39:31
And it’s really a unique and important organization for representing the common interests of communities up and down the Mississippi from the headwaters all the way down to the Gulf. And you being the mayor of 167 people have served as a co chair on this and alongside mayors of Memphis and New Orleans, Baton Rouge, St. Louis.
Mayor Stang 39:55
Exactly, exactly. And I normally, there’s no normal anymore, normally in the past, it was a two year term as a chair of a state. And I’m closing in on a new my fourth year. And I have every reason to believe that I will be moving into my fifth year in that job.
Dean Klinkenberg 40:26
Seems like you kind of have a history of like getting in a position and having a hard time getting out of it.
Mayor Stang 40:32
Well, I don’t try to get out of it. I try though. Yeah. And you know, MRCTI is very concerned about all of the common interest to also include clean water, places to store water, so that isn’t as dramatic during floods. We will be announcing a new, a new initiative, which is an expansion over where we’ve been, which will include MRCTI, it will include the Andrew Young Foundation. And it will include the Government of the Netherlands. And if there’s anybody who knows what to do with water, it’s the Dutch, considering the fact that the entire country is, would be under it if they didn’t know anything about it. So I think that’s a very exciting thing,
Dean Klinkenberg 41:43
And you’ve had struggles in the past decade or so with high water, I forget the exact number. But just like on the St. Louis gauge, something like four of the 10 highest flood crests in history have been in the past 10 years or so. And you’re just down river of that. So I have pictures from here of your temporary flood wall holding back high water from a couple of those floods.
Mayor Stang 42:05
Yep. Absolutely.
Dean Klinkenberg 42:07
So where are you at these days with your plans for your ability to hold back high water?
Mayor Stang 42:16
Same as we always were. I, we basically don’t talk, we used to talk about 500 year floods and all this other stuff. That’s a waste of time, because it’s a completely different world. And as I have, I have said in many, many articles, on television, I’ve said it in radio programs, and I’ve been published and people have come to talk to me, because I’m so nebulous about what I think when it comes to global warming. I have been known to say that anyone who does not appreciate the fact that there is global warming is an idiot. And therefore they might even be too stupid for me to debate. So it’s a different environment. And so there is no 500 year flood anymore. In ’93, we had the highest flood in history to come here. And the only thing that really saved the city of Kimmswick, because it was sandbags on top of the railroad tracks and everything else, was the fact that the levee at Valmeyer, Illinois collapsed. And the water went down about three feet in an hour. So however, a second highest flood was 2018. And we weathered it. The problem with the 2019 flood, when when you look at, for example, there was a winter flood in earlier, and that one came up very, very quickly,
Dean Klinkenberg 44:07
It was 2016, December 2016, January 2017.
Mayor Stang 44:11
Right. Very, very quickly, and so we’re able to move fast. And the good news, if there is any good news of a situation like that is we then become eligible under a state of emergency to recoup about 70% of our expenses, which are considerable. The 2019 flood was like the creeping crud. It came up very, very slowly. So everybody had an opportunity to prepare. So, under the FEMA guidelines, not enough damage. Now that’s a good thing one would think. I think it’s a good idea. Not enough damage was done. The bad news is I put, got $150,000 into flood fighting, and I got zero back. So that plus COVID, between the flood and COVID, this city was really hurting because we had to cancel some festivals and all the rest, but we made it.
Dean Klinkenberg 45:27
I know at one point there was even like a Kickstarter campaign or crowdsourcing campaign going around to help cover some of that loss. I don’t know how successful that was.
Mayor Stang 45:35
But let me tell you how good it was. And this was the one that made me feel good up at the elementary school, which is kindergarten through second grade. They have a program where they call them nests. And they take children from different classes and put them together with a faculty member or the janitor or whoever, and they talk about how to get along better and all that stuff. So they, they adopted me, one of their nests. And there’s a picture on the wall in my office here where I came to the meeting, and they all had cardboard beards. That’s the funny side, the unfunny side that brought tears to my eyes was they called me up and said, the principal called me up and said, the students would like to see you Mr. Mayor and come up. And I did and they were all standing out front. And they gave me a jar with $728 in pennies. Somehow that they had collected to save the city of Kimmswick. So there’s another reason I like it here.
Dean Klinkenberg 46:42
Yeah. People really rallied around to help out.
Mayor Stang 46:45
Yeah, yeah, exactly. Yeah.
Dean Klinkenberg 46:47
And so you’re in a very difficult spot when it comes to fighting floods, because you don’t have like a permanent barrier. So you kind of have to improvise where you prove this point, you probably have a system in place, you know what you’re going to do if they’re if you’re threatened. But that’s something you have to construct for the most part.
Mayor Stang 47:06
Yes. So from where we are today. We always have to validate that the thing is, the strength is still there. The, the flipside of not getting any money. One of the caveats in getting money is you had to take down what you put up, and then you also get reimbursed for the taking down part. Well, since I wasn’t getting reimbursed, it was a very simple answer. No, I’m not taking it down.
Dean Klinkenberg 47:39
Right. And there’s still like an earthen berm, walking in today. So you’ve got a foundation to work with.
Mayor Stang 47:46
Yes, yes. And we know the methodology on how to grow it. And we also take care of it on an ongoing basis. We relocate groundhogs and things like that. They don’t do anything like that.
Dean Klinkenberg 48:04
Right? Further south, they worry about you know, crayfish burrowing into the levees, and here you’ve got groundhogs to worry about. Well, let’s talk a little bit about to festivals, then real quick. So this is a big one coming up. How did, how does Strawberry Fest get to be such a big deal? First of all, how long you’ve been doing it? And what is it and why is it so big?
Mayor Stang 48:28
The real question starts back in the late 70s. It really revolves around apple but apple butter was very small at the start, when the the people from the historical society actually formed the Historical Society. And they utilized a recipe by lady who used to live in town and only passed away recently, Sugar Kramer, she had her recipe and they started doing apple butter as a way of generating revenue for the Historical Society, which they still do. And from there, a few craftsmen came in the following year and it just kept going and going and going and going and now we’ve got to the point where we have in excess of 800 vendors and we have food and you name it, we’ve got food there. Everything for our children, petting zoos,
Dean Klinkenberg 49:50
all kinds of stuff, and apparently some apple butter too and,
Mayor Stang 49:52
and lots of apple butter. As a matter of fact, the historical society, they get up both Saturday morning and Sunday boy, we actually make a pot of apple butter and people who come early enough can help stir it and everything else in big kettles. Obviously when you have that many people it’s not possible to make that much apple butter in a big copper pot. So that’s that those two batches are put in jars and sold. The rest of it using the same formula is made by the Amish. We have lots of it and so we it pretty much gets sold out. Then you asked about Strawberry, Strawberry Fest really was an outgrowth. Well, I’m about to join, so let’s try this because many, many years ago, Kimmswick was not this size. It it was made up of also Kimmswick and West Kimmswick. West Kimmswick seceded since we were the river people, and they were the hill people.
Dean Klinkenberg 51:17
Sounds like something Mark Twain might write about.
Mayor Stang 51:21
Yeah, exactly. And they named it Imperial, because the Imperial Clock Company was there, and their exercise in creating a city didn’t go quite as well as Kimmswick, because they are a census designated area of Jefferson County, and we are a fourth class city. So too bad. But the reason I bring that up is this, the city was in 1859 was a town and its claim to fame was the fact that it had salt deposits. It had, it had a lot of lumber. The fastest point on the Mississippi River is about two miles south of Kimmswick. And so when you make that turn and start going upstream, if you happen to be using wood to drive your boat, you run out pretty quick. And so this river back out here used to be covered with boats. And they, at one time, probably burned down Jefferson County to keep those boats running. They also had lumber yards, they also had a lot of flowers that were grown and sold in St. Louis, and to other cities and strawberries. So that was the resurgence rather than say, well, let’s have a kumquat festival.
Dean Klinkenberg 52:54
Mangoes are nice. Why don’t we celebrate mangoes?
Mayor Stang 52:58
Well, we used to do strawberries, let’s do strawberries again. And so Strawberry Festival grew. All right.
Dean Klinkenberg 53:05
And there’ll be kind of a the have a similar kind of experience, right? The web vendors, craft vendors, there’ll be live music.
Mayor Stang 53:13
Absolutely.
Dean Klinkenberg 53:15
You can come down here for the day. No need to rush out right just come down here and plan to stay for a while.
Mayor Stang 53:21
You should
Dean Klinkenberg 53:23
You gotta gotta get out here very fast anyway
Mayor Stang 53:25
You’re not gonna get in here very fast either. So we we certainly don’t have the parking, all these statements about, you know, stuffing stuff in a one pound bag and all that stuff. But we have it set up fairly well so that we have busing from the school campus. We have busing from a lot of different locations. And it’s just continuous all day long. And so it starts at 10. Or if you’re here at eight, we will not throw you out. We haven’t figured out how to do that yet. And it ends at five on Saturday, sort of, close to five. Sunday it is five because you’re moving all kinds of stuff. Vendor tents and campers, vendor cars that we have to, have that very well orchestrated otherwise. We’ve had an otherwise in the past and otherwise doesn’t work. Even a little bit, right.
Dean Klinkenberg 54:43
So obviously come down here have a good time. But if you can carpool that would be really helpful to reduce the number of vehicles to park and just know you’re gonna probably wait a little while for a bus to get into the city itself. Enjoy yourself hang out for a while, and then
Mayor Stang 55:03
You will have plenty to look at. Yeah, plenty to buy, and eat, and plenty to eat.
Dean Klinkenberg 55:08
And there’s always those pies and probably plenty of pies around here those weekends as lots of pie, maybe even some strawberry pie.
Mayor Stang 55:15
I can’t tell you from year to year because it changes but many of, many of the businesses have strawberry themed food to include. At one point, we had strawberry beer. I’m not a fan, but there were a lot of people thought it was very good.
Dean Klinkenberg 55:38
Yeah. I don’t generally like fruit like that in my beer. No, no.
Mayor Stang 55:44
It might work. It works better as you get towards the end of the day, and you’re running out of the other beer. Right?
Dean Klinkenberg 55:57
Well, I’m kind of mindful of the time. And I want to kind of wrap up me with a couple of thoughts about this, one thing that I was thinking about is one of the things that unique about Kimmswick is you have this little historic community that’s maintained its historic character in an area where you’re surrounded by miles and miles of subdivisions. And I wondered like, what do you think has enabled Kimmswick to keep that historic character over the decades?
Mayor Stang 56:28
Okay, number of, a number of different things. Interestingly enough, I think it has been driven in many cases by individuals and small groups, because in the early 1970s, this place had fallen into tremendous disrepair. And what, what I haven’t talked about is that going back many years to the turn of the century, I mean 1800s to 1900s and through the 1900s, 1930s and so on, not only was there the Anheuser summerhouse but up on the hills, south of the city were some fairly wealthy people who had summer homes and mansions. Because originally there was a three story brick hotel where my house is now. The subdivision park at Kimmswick was Montesano amusement park. People used to come by boat, by train, by wagon, to the city of Kimmswick to escape from the heat and so on on in the city of St. Louis. And you also had, so you ,and you had the wealthy people who had their mansions up in the mountains, up on the hills and stuff over the river. So one of those people who was a little kid back then but returned and was aghast at the condition of the city was Lucianna Gladney-Ross. And so she said, This is unacceptable. So she bought up most of the place, got the houses fixed up, was able to purchase Magrene’s Tavern and found a wonderful person named Mary Hostetter, to start a place there with her pies known as the Blue Owl. And so that was the first rebirth scenario of Kimmswick. the housing and so on were sold off to people. Then along along the way, we’ve had changes in certain ways, the things we’ve done. For example, at one point when we were threatened I won’t go into too much detail, but there was there was a threat that newer structures that, at one time there was also a scenario where there might be gambling casinos, which was fought off by that Pat Reno and a number of other people here. Another scenario was when people come in, they say, Oh, this is nice, but it’s too expensive to fix. An old cabinet’s gonna cost a heck of a lot of money, so we just, we should knock it down and just put a nice new building. Except as soon as that, and you had had people in town who would say well, because it doesn’t have any rules against that so you can do it. Until 24 hours later when all of a sudden it was an ordinance that popped up. That said, any building over 50 years old in the city of Kimmswikc is deemed to be historic and cannot be appreciably changed on its exterior or torn down without the express permission of the mayor. I know that guy.
Dean Klinkenberg 1:00:29
He keeps popping up in this conversation.
Mayor Stang 1:00:31
Yeah. So that’s how we do it. All right.
Dean Klinkenberg 1:00:34
So part of it is that again, it’s easy sometimes to underestimate the impact one person can have. And in Kimmswick’s case, one woman made extraordinary efforts to preserve the community and make it possible for us to see what we see today. But also, there’s sort of a constant vigilance.
Mayor Stang 1:00:56
Yeah. Yeah.
Dean Klinkenberg 1:00:58
So well, all right. Before we started recording, you mentioned how you were, you knew the ocean really well. You grew up in Rhode Island. You were an ocean, you were very familiar with the ocean. You had to learn about rivers after you moved here. So what is, as you gone deep into understanding the Mississippi, what are some of the impressions that have stuck with you about the river or its history or anything about it?
Mayor Stang 1:01:30
Well, I think the first thing that that one looks at and understands all of a sudden is this is the largest highway in the United States. There’s more commerce, transportation on this river than anywhere else. And once you understand that, you need to be able to preserve it to preserve the United States. And as soon as you start to get into that, then you start to wonder why it goes where it goes. Then you read about it and find out it used to go a different way. And then you start to, to when you get involved, like I did with MRCTI. Yes, I learned a lot. I spent a lot of time in our historical society. I learned as much as I could about the city of Kimmswick and its proximity to the river. But as I started to meet more and more mayors, I’m a person who likes to have a conversation with you, kind of an equal basis. And I want to tell you all about my city and then go well, do you know about mine? And they go no, and so I do. I’ve read all, many, many books about river travel, river boats, barges. I’ve been to the places. For example, a good place to as an example is Natchez. So any land in Natchez at the top of the hill, you see the places, historic bar, restaurants and things. So I wonder why they did that. Because I’m inquisitive. And then you find out that people used to come down the river on, that they’re floating boats. And people will be on the shore, offering them liquor and various other things. Other diversion, other diversions. Also people would get them off the river with those diversions, and then steal all their stuff and kill them. So you just keep going through that whole process. And you look at just the area here, when you look at the flow from where did it come from? The people who, I wouldn’t, I wouldn’t say they founded it because it wasn’t lost. Indigenous people were here forever. But then the other explorers come through and you have just in this area, you’ve got the trail with the Spanish cut. And then you’ve got the French that came through. Then you had all the people who lived here who turned to French which was a real revelation for me coming from New England. And my wife happens to be Canadian, French by background and stuff so when you when you start to pronounce things and people look at you like you’re crazy because I walk on the street I go ah, this is Carondelet. No, it isn’t.
Dean Klinkenberg 1:05:02
I made that same mistake when I moved to St. Louis.
Mayor Stang 1:05:06
Yes. So you go, Oh, okay. And New Madrid and things like that you learn. But the good thing about things like that is that they make you wonder why it’s like that. And then you put all the building blocks together and you look at the people who founded these various areas in this area and you’ll find out you know, as I like to say, as I like to say, the, the oldest French city in the United States is San Geneuve, but it can be Sainte Genevieve.
Dean Klinkenberg 1:05:49
Well, thank you so much for having a chat with me today on the podcast, the Mississippi Valley Traveler podcast. What would be the best way for people to keep up with what’s going on in Kimmswick? I don’t know if you’ve got your own social media sites you want to mention.
Dean Klinkenberg 1:06:05
Right. Truth in advertising.
Mayor Stang 1:06:05
Yes, we do, because Kimmswick is kind of unique in terms of there, there aren’t many Kimmswicks around, so and we’re busily actually updating our websites, so that in the future will be, right now they’re for information. We want to make it more entertaining. And we will also be coupling the CityofKimmswick.org with, and expanding that and coupling that with the estate’s website so that we, we capture the whole thing, the whole picture. And we obviously have accumulated some very interesting things that we will be putting up there, like we have, there’s a whole videotaping sessions done around some of the boats and so on so that we can and, for example, when the boats come, the opportunity that we have is people visit the Anheuser estate, FredMar Farms, and they also go to the winery, La Chance Winery, which is by the way the number one winery in eastern Missouri. They can they also get to, go to Mastodon Park and the Kimmswick bone bed. Which obviously, with a name like Mastodon park, you know what used to live there.
Mayor Stang 1:07:45
So, and lots of shopping, lots of shops. And very quaint. We have people all the time. Early in the morning photographic excursions, I believe the last one was called a photographic Safari, so that was, but they come in, there’s a lot of things to take pictures of. We have a historical post office. You can go in there anytime and get the little post boxes, which is quaint. But it also serves as the hub of information for the circular. We have our our library, which is about as big as a dog house. And it sits out in front of the post office. And it’s a lending library. And, or depending on your point of view, it’s stealing library. We ask that if you have any books, you’d like to donate them to us, we’ll put them in there. And if you find a book that you just love, and just can’t bring yourself to bring it back, keep it with our with our best wishes. That’s where we’re heavily into reading. We want you to be smart. We don’t ban any books.
Dean Klinkenberg 1:09:02
So Kimmswick.org would be the center for all
Dean Klinkenberg 1:09:05
CityofKimmswick.org. I’ll post a link to that in the show notes. Do you have Facebook presence or any of the social media sites where…
Mayor Stang 1:09:06
No, we’re in the process of growing that stuff. There’s there’s others that are like goKimmswick.com, but the official city one is CityofKimmswick.org.
Mayor Stang 1:09:06
CityofKimmswick.org
Dean Klinkenberg 1:09:24
All right. Well, thanks so much for your time, mayor. It was a pleasure talking with you, a lot of fun talking with you.
Mayor Stang 1:09:31
It’s the longest we’ve talked.
Dean Klinkenberg 1:09:34
It is. We’re usually, we’re distracted by conversations with other people, at dinner tables and things so
Mayor Stang 1:09:41
And sometimes we got liquor involoved and that’s that’s good.
Dean Klinkenberg 1:09:45
Yeah. Somehow we managed to get through this without having any liquor involved too. So that’s a good sign.
Mayor Stang 1:09:52
All right. Thank you.
Dean Klinkenberg 1:10:00
And now it’s time for the Mississippi Minute. As I mentioned at the top, I’ve got a few extra tips for you about visiting Kimmswick. As we talked about during the interview with Mayor Stang, the city hosts two big festivals every year, the Strawberry Festival and the Apple Butter Festival. There are wildly popular, so when you go–and you should–you’ll be directed to park in places outside of the city like a nearby school and then you’ll just ride a bus in. Buses run continuously, so you’ll never have to wait long. The most important tip I have is just to bring your patience and leave behind any expectations you may have about rushing in and out. Carpooling would also be good. Stick around. Enjoy the vendors, the food, the atmosphere, and you’ll have no trouble finding a shuttle back to your car when you’re ready to go. The Strawberry Festival is the first weekend in June. So as this podcast releases, it’s coming up in just a couple of days. And the Apple Butter Festival, look for that the last weekend in October. Kimmswick ,of course, is open all year, although most of the businesses close on Mondays. Everybody needs a little downtime after all. The town has a couple dozen shops to explore plus a few places to eat, all of them mom and pop shops. The best known restaurant is the Blue Owl Inn where you can enjoy a hearty meal and a slice of pie. Or maybe just get a couple of slices of pie to take home with you. The La Chance Winery outpost in Kimmswick also offers those expected wine tastings and a nice place for a full meal as well. Stop in to the Kimmswick Historical Society for an overview of the community’s history. And then when you’re finished head on down to the old Anheuser estate just outside of town, which is also known as FredMar Farms. You’ll find really good views of the Mississippi, a gorgeous estate historic house. And if you’re there on a Thursday afternoon between April and November, you can tour the house. Just a few miles northwest of Kimmswick, Mastodon State Historic Site traces the history of those large beasts that once roamed the area. Excavations from a nearby quarry provided the first solid evidence that human beings coexisted with and hunted mastodons 12,000 years ago. Kimmswick is fine place to enjoy a day trip pretty much any time of year. Just remember that most businesses close by late afternoon or early evening. Just take your time. Park, walk around, spend a leisurely day exploring the small businesses in Kimmswick.
Dean Klinkenberg 1:12:39
Thanks for listening. If you enjoyed this episode, subscribe to the series on your favorite podcast app so you don’t miss out on future episodes. I offer the podcast for free but when you support the show with a few bucks through Patreon, you help keep the program going. Just go to patreon.com/DeanKlinkenberg. If you want to know more about the Mississippi River, check out my books. I write the Mississippi Valley Traveler guide books for people who want to get to know the Mississippi better. I also write the Frank Dodge mystery series set in places along the river. Find them wherever books are sold. The Mississippi Valley Traveler podcast is written and produced by me, Dean Klinkenberg. Original Music by Noah Fence. See you next time.
