Missouri Preservation announced its 2019 Places in Peril list at an “Unhappy Hour” event Sept. 13 at HyVee Arena in Kansas City.The list includes the former Emmaus Homes property in Marthasville.Missouri Preservation also has a “Watched Properties” list for places that have garnered attention, but are still not out of the woods. That list includes Vitt’s Mill in Union and Starke-Meinershagen-Boeke Rural Historic District in Marthasville.Places in Peril is an annual list of endangered historic places in the state of Missouri. These places are nominated by concerned individuals and decided upon by a committee of preservation advocates.The Unhappy Hour event, held at the former Kemper Arena, served as the official announcement of the list, but also a networking event in which participants can help brainstorm for the future of these endangered places.Each listed Place in Peril has an associated action item, a realistic task that attendees can accomplish that will help save these historic places.Emmaus HomesThe Emmaus Home complex in Marthasville began as a seminary for the German Evangelical Church in Missouri. It later served as home for handicapped and developmentally disabled residents.A campus of five buildings was completed here by 1859. Four of these remain in various states of repair, those being the Farm House, Bake Oven, Friedensbote (Messenger of Peace) Publishing House and the Dormitory.The College Building itself was lost to a fire in 1930. The seminary was in operation at this site until 1883, when it moved to St. Louis and eventually became Eden Seminary.In 1893, the campus in Marthasville became known as the Emmaus Asylum for Epileptics and Feeble Minded. The campus grew to a total of eight substantial buildings including a chapel, by 1928.In more recent years the religious denomination became the United Church of Christ and the two campuses the church body owned became known simply as the Emmaus Homes.Missouri Preservation said this is an important historic site, having been constructed by some of the tens of thousands of Germans who emigrated here beginning in the 1830s. In the area the first Evangelical church West of the Mississippi was constructed, and this marked the beginning of the Synod of the west, known as Der Deutsche Evangelisch Kirchenverein des Westens.The buildings in the complex are unique in that they are of sturdy limestone construction in varying German styles by German immigrants. They are representative of the tenacity of some of Missouri’s earliest Germans, and are unique in that most are original with very few modifications over the years.Through the years the approach toward caring for the handicapped and developmentally disabled also has changed, and care for the residents at Emmaus has shifted from large institutional settings to smaller group homes. Emmaus has listed the campus for sale and it is hoped that listing on the Places in Peril will bring it to the attention of a preservation-minded developer.

Photo courtesy of www.emmaushomes.org.