The Arzt House Beginnings
Compton Dry Map 1876
In 1873, Dr. Arzt purchased the land at Lami (aka Ohio Street) and State Street (now 12th Street). He first constructed a small two-story structure on the back end of the property, with his office downstairs and his apartment above it. This structure appears on the Compton-Dry Map published in 1876, showing the lot fronting on State Street as vacant. In 1874, at just 29 years old, Franz personally drew plans for his new home to be built at this address, sketching out details based on his memories of similar architectural structures in Austria. That same year, on July 4, 1874, the Eads Bridge opened to traffic across the Mississippi River.
Construction on the Arzt House at State and Lami was completed in 1876. The French Second Empire design was built with steel frames repurposed from railroad tracks, no doubt influenced by his father’s history of working with steel on the Austrian railroads. All of the walls, both outer and inner, were made of multiple layers of brick. The house remains, almost 150 years later, a strong testament to the workmanship and ingenuity of our ancestors.