The Jefferson National Expansion Memorial was established by executive order in 1935 by President Franklin D. Roosevelt. An architectural competition was held in 1945 to choose the design of the memorial which would celebrate the westward expansion of the United States championed by President Thomas Jefferson. Eero Saarinen’s design for the memorial was selected in 1947. The Jefferson National Expansion Memorial is now better known as Gateway Arch National Park because of Saarinen’s design.

Construction began in February 1963 and the memorial was completed in October 1965.   Gateway Arch opened to the public in June 1967.

Gateway Arch is located at the water front in the city of Saint Louis, Missouri. City visits in an RV can be difficult to plan; however, we were able to find an RV park within a 30 minute walk of the Arch. We just had to stay across the river (The Mississippi) in a different city and state, East St. Louis, Illinois ;).

The RV park was part of a casino complex. This was the first time we have stayed at a casino RV park. It definitely wasn’t an attractive setting, imagine an asphalt parking lot with RV hookups and a few trees. It did however have showers and very nice laundry facilities.

The National Park Service has a trove of information concerning the construction of the Arch. We will just touch on the basics. The Arch is 630 feet wide at the base and 630 feet high. It is constructed of 142 double walled sections in the shape of an equilateral triangle. Each section was fabricated off-site and is composed of an inner skin of carbon steel and the outer surface is polished stainless steel panels. Concrete fills the space between the two skins up to the 300 foot level. A total of 2157 tons of carbon steel and 886 tons of stainless steel were used in its construction.

It is truly amazing that there were no worker fatalities during the construction project, especially considering there were no fall protection requirements at the time. In fact, this project preceded the establishment of OSHA.

The structure has an outer-worldly appearance. Our gaze was constantly drawn to the Arch as we walked across the bridge spanning the Mississippi River and walked around its base. The structure is simply mesmerizing both in scope and design. It hovers over the city like an alien space ship.

There are two trams in the Arch that you can ride to a viewing area at the top. The tram cars seat five and are small. The door opening is only 4 foot 6 inches. Tram tickets can be pre-ordered online or purchased at the Arch.

The National Park Service maintains a museum underneath the Gateway Arch with exhibits on Colonial St. Louis, the Manifest Destiny Period, Westward Expansion and Jefferson’s vision for a transcontinental United States.

We highly recommend that you visit Gateway Arch National Park. Allow at least half a day to tour the museum and take a ride to the top of the Arch. If you find yourself hungry, we recommend having lunch or dinner at Sugarfire BBQ, which is within walking distance.

We are currently in Idaho and heading to a campground in the Great Salt Lake. Hard to believe we started traveling west a month ago and still have eight weeks of travel ahead. Thanks for staying in touch. If you register at our homepage you will get an email each time we add a new post.