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St. Charles Essential Info

Overview

St. Charles, Missouri is located just outside of St. Louis on the bank of the Missouri River. It was Missouri's first state capital and was one of the first stops by Lewis and Clark on their journey to explore the Louisiana Territory. Its historic Main Street has largely been restored to it's 1812 era and is lined with shops selling artwork, handicrafts, home decorations, and antiques. There is also a multitude of restaurants.

Description is available from Wikitravel under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 license. A list of contributors is available at the original article.

Basics

Best Time To Go

Mar-Oct

Current Time

Current Weather

64 °F

Cloudy

Fun Facts

  1. St. Charles was designated as temporary capital of the state in 1821 and remained the seat of government until 1826 when Jefferson City became the permanent capital city.
  2. St. Charles was founded in about 1769 as Les Petites Côtes, or "The Little Hills" in French, by Louis Blanchette, a French-Canadian fur trader.
  3. The first church, built in 1791, was Catholic and dedicated to the Spanish saint San Carlos Borromeo. The town became known as San Carlos del Misuri: "St. Charles of the Missouri".
  4. The "Christmas Traditions Festival", one of the nation's largest Christmas festivals, takes place on the streets of St. Charles annually.
  5. Jean Baptiste Point du Sable, founder of Chicago, moved to St. Charles, Missouri, where he died in 1818.

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