Historic Stable Tour in Tower Grove Park

Tower Grove Park is hosting its Historic Stable Tour on Saturday, October 17, from 10 AM to 12 PM. It's a free tour of the park's historic stables, and it runs in 25-minute increments throughout the morning, so you can pick a slot that fits your schedule. The tour does two things at once: you'll get a look at the stables themselves and a bit of the park's history, and you'll get to meet the horses that live there—Moonshine the Clydesdale and the new pony, Ricochet.

To understand why the stables are there, it helps to know where the park came from. Tower Grove Park is 289 acres, and it started as part of Henry Shaw's huge prairie estate, which also included what we now know as the Missouri Botanical Garden. In 1868, Shaw gave the land to the people of St. Louis with one condition: it had to always remain a park. He modeled it after the pleasure parks he'd seen in Europe, and that influence still shows. The grounds are filled with early 20th-century pavilions, a playground, a children's wading pool, picnic sites, and athletic fields, along with horseshoe pits and tennis courts. It's a place that hosts festivals and events all year long, and the stables are one of its older, quieter corners.

This isn't a one-off, either. The stable tour runs on the third Saturday of each month from April through October, so if you can't make this one, there's usually another chance coming up. The tour is free, but capacity is limited and registration is required, so you'll want to sign up ahead of time rather than just showing up. The stables are at 4256 Magnolia Ave in St. Louis, and the tour runs from 10 AM to 12 PM on Saturday, October 17.