Family Trips to the Lou

Title

Description

If you'd have told me 20 years ago that I'd be writing a sappy social media post about this hotel on a Thursday morning , I'd have said you were crazy. If you had this on your 2025 bingo card, go ahead and put a chip down, because that is what's happening.

The Millinium Hotel in St. Louis will be or already has finished being demolished this week.. which was not totally unexpected as it has been abandoned for some time. It once stood as a great titan over the city, bustling with activity and business. No longer..

At one point though, a little boy bounced up and down these halls with overwhelming intrigue and excitement . If you happened to have a room here back in the early 2000s, there was a decent chance I was there. Sitting at the bottom of the elevator just waiting on more Cardinals players to come by.. or running down to the card shop to see what I could get for a few dollars to try to get autographed later.

Every year, for a chunk of my childhood, Greg Petty would haul our little group up to the Millinium Hotel in January for the St. Louis Cardinals Winter-Warm Up. I got to meet some of my favorite players there .. like Edgar Renteria and JD Drew. I got to meet Hall of Famers like Tony La Russa and Lou Brock. I got to meet future managers like Mike Matheny and Joe Girardi. As well as many others.

More than anything, I made many happy memories. Core memories .. whether it be after a Cardinals win in May or on a frosty January night, feeling that cold wind blow in every time the automatic door opened for another guest, still waiting for that one last Legend to walk through the door.

In the end, this hotel will go down as legendary in my book. Thank you for housing so many great memories. I hope I was able to breathe a bit of that life back into you, one last time

Date

2002

Contributor

Gunner Petty

Format

Digital Story