Welcome to Living St.

Louis.

I'm Brooke Butler, and this week we're in the Linnenan House, one of the oldest and most storied places at the Missouri Botanical Gardens.

Now, I realize this time of year isn't the most associated with visiting the gardens, but this Victorian-era conservatory was built specifically to house citrus and other non-hardy plants from the cold, so it felt like a fitting place to introduce today's stories.

This week on Living St.

Louis, stories of migration, resiliency, and legacy.

Winter sets the stage as bald eagles return to the Mississippi River near Alton.

This area in Illinois and Missouri, we have a bigger concentration of the American bald eagle than any other state in the continental United States during the winter.

The small red hearts around Webster Groves tell a bigger story of care and community.

Of course when I see them, it's creating awareness for this congenital heart defect community.

On Cherokee Street, a family bakery looks towards what's next, and we revisit the life and legacy of Annie Malone.

It's all next on Living St.

Louis.

♪♪ While the Linnenan House was built to protect what can't survive the cold, winter presents opportunities for nature to thrive elsewhere.

Just upriver, bald eagles gather near Alton, turning the Mississippi into a seasonal wildlife destination.

Just 30 years ago, seeing a bald eagle in the wild would have been a rare occurrence.

But now, if you go to places like Alton or Grafton, Illinois during the winter, you're almost guaranteed to spot one.

- The bald eagle is exclusive to North America.

It lives no place else in the world except for North America.

This area in Illinois and Missouri, we have a bigger concentration of the American bald eagle than any other state in the continental United States during the winter.

- Rod Jackson is a tour guide for Alton Eagle Watching Tours.

- I grew up on a farm not too far from the river, and they were pretty rare, pretty scarce, you know, when I was young.

- From the 1940s to '60s, a pesticide known as DDT led bald eagles to become a critically endangered species.

The chemical weakened their egg shells, which lessened the survival rates of their embryos.

But in 1972, the use of DDT was banned and the bald eagle population began to grow again, with the help of some other conservation efforts.

In 2007, they were taken off the endangered species list, and according to the U.S.

Department of the Interior, the bald eagle population quadrupled from 2009 to 2020.

So the bald eagles normally live around the Great Lakes and even Ontario.

And in the fall when they realize that the Great Lakes and the rivers up north will be freezing, they cannot feed over open water.

So they come this far south because between the Winfield Lock and Dam and the Alton Lock and Dam, there's open water and they can still feed during the course of the winter.

So basically they're here from Thanksgiving to about Valentine's Day.

A large number of bald eagles in the area during the winter causes an increase in tourism to southwest Illinois.

On January 3rd, Alton hosted the Eagle Ice Festival, celebrating the return of the majestic birds.

Okay, we are on the Great River Road.

It's a national scenic byway.

At the driver's side, you'll see the Mississippi River.

That same day, Rod Jackson and his team held the first Alton Eagle Watching Tour of the year.

Attendees were taken on a shuttle to visit some of Alton's bald eagle hot spots, including the Audubon Center at Riverlands and the Mel Price Locks and Dam.

We could see as many as 12 in one place, maybe two in another place.

It was a sunny day in January in the low 40s.

It was great weather for January, but not necessarily the most ideal for eagle watching.

I guarantee you if it's a sunny, warm day in the wintertime, they're not going to be out and about.

They love the blizzard-like conditions.

If you've seen the documentaries on Alaska on PBS, then you know, you've seen the eagle fighting against the wind, but that's what they like.

We did end up seeing about three bald eagles and two large eagles' nests.

The birds were often tough to get on camera because of how far away they were, though.

Binoculars are a great way to enhance your eagle-watching experience.

Jackson says it's important to be quiet and respectful when watching the birds.

But you just have to be careful.

I think the one mistake that people make is when they see one, they want to pull over on the Great River Road.

You know, people are going 60, 65, 70, and someone sees an eagle and they stop or pull over too quickly, which can be dangerous.

But they get out of their cars, and that scares the eagle away.

And that's what we don't want.

So they're actually better off if they stay in their cars and, you know, quietly put down the window and take a photo or video.

All right, we have our first bird spot right there in the middle of the river.

If you're really lucky, you might even hear the eagles call.

And yes, that's what they actually sound like.

Most movie sound effects use a red-tailed hawk's scream for bald eagles.

Jackson says it's great to see people coming to the area to admire these iconic birds.

As I said, they were endangered at one time.

There were very few bald eagles.

That is our national symbol for American freedom.

So it's important that we preserve that and preserve them.

And I think the more people are educated and the more they learn about them, the more they respect them, because there's a whole lot to know about American bald eagle.

- The Linnenan House is the oldest greenhouse continuously operated west of the Mississippi and reminds us how much the right environment matters to thrive.

That same sentiment is at the heart of our next story.

♪♪ When you drive down the streets of Webster Groves, you probably notice this, rows of trees prominently featuring a decorative heart.

And if you're like me, you wonder why.

Of course, when I see them, it's creating awareness for this congenital heart defect community.

It's creating awareness for Mighty Oaks Heart Foundation.

Welcoming a new child into the world is hectic in itself, but nearly 40,000 infants in the U.S.

each year are born with congenital heart disease, creating a myriad of other stressful decisions for families, like the Ortels and Webster Groves experienced.

But despite their challenges, they've made it their mission to spread hope among the chaos for other families.

Mighty Oaks Heart Foundation is a non-profit.

We're headquartered here in St.

Louis, but we help families who have children with congenital heart defects really all over the U.S.

So often parents have to decide, "Am I going to stay here at the bedside with my kid while they're in critical condition, or do I have to go back to work?"

The way the foundation helps is by paying some of the major financial burdens that come with caring for a sick child.

We'll go in and pay people's mortgages, their rent, utility bills, car payments, insurance, travel expenses.

We really dig in to find out what each individual family needs to thrive.

And that's what we focus on.

We pay those bills so that parents can make the decision.

I'm going to stay here with my kid.

I'm going to advocate for them.

I'm going to shower them with love, give them every reason to fight and get out of this hospital and go on with their lives.

Of course, Becky knows the ins and outs of what these families are facing from personal experience.

Tell us about Oaks.

Yeah.

Oh, there we go, Mighty Oaks.

Oaks was born in 2011.

He was our second child, first son, and the big thing about Oaks in our family was he introduced us to congenital heart defects and this whole world of kids who are born sick.

(laughing) Are you gonna giggle?

Oaks was ultimately diagnosed with pulmonary vein stenosis, a rare condition with blockages in blood vessels that bring blood from the lungs back to the heart.

He underwent several surgeries and eventually received a lung transplant.

I'm the mighty Oaksy!

(laughing) And while the furthest thing from a parent's mind when told their child needs life-saving surgery is the cost, the financial strain is a huge source of stress.

The Ortels were fortunate enough to have great insurance, but their friends and family decided to have a fundraiser anyway and raise nearly $100,000.

And I'm thinking, "I have all this money and we don't need it."

I was really letting my gut and heart lead me to run to the ATM in the basement of Children's, withdraw $100, wrap it up in a little piece of paper, give it to a nurse and say, "Take this to the mom down the hall.

She needs it more than I do."

Really quickly, that emergency fund that was raised for us, we set up, we met with an attorney friend, we set up a 501(c)(3), we started going through the legal process to establish a non-profit.

So Oaks is in the hospital and we are setting up this non-profit.

It was the right thing to do.

In hindsight, I can't believe we had the bandwidth to really get organized, but we did.

And he got a lung transplant.

And truly, in hindsight, that bought us about nine months.

You know, nine months that we treasured.

When I talk about Oaks, I think of our foundation.

I think about his diagnosis, but you know as a mom, he was feisty.

He was so strong.

He was a big flirt.

As a baby, it's hard to see personalities sometimes.

And when your kid is sick and they're sedated or in their medically induced coma, it's hard to identify.

But he made us laugh.

He made his nurses smile.

I mean, he got to know his older sister, who was two when he was born, and talk about light up.

I mean, he just adored her.

And they had, and I think still have, a really special bond.

In February of that year, Becky needed a creative outlet, so she decided to make a heart out of spare lumber as a Valentine's to Oaks.

She placed it on her porch, and it caught the attention of the whole neighborhood.

That was the original heart, and then when Oaks passed away a couple months later, those neighbors, they tied red ribbons on all the trees and telephone poles going from our house to our church.

No one needed to say anything.

I just, I felt the support.

I felt so much love.

It meant so much that Oaks was honored and remembered.

And I told one of my neighbors, I said, I'm going to be so sad when those ribbons fade and come down.

And she said, "We need to make a bunch of your red hearts."

The red hearts are not only a fitting tribute to Oaks and the many others like him, they are one of the sources of fundraising for the organization.

The Ortels would gather friends and families to make dozens of hearts for the public to purchase, and soon other groups started offering their services.

One of those sources are the students in the shop class at Webster Groves High School.

- So the Heart Project is something that we have had a couple of different woodshop teachers working on for around 10 years or so.

This is something that actually works very well for both parties.

If these kids develop a skill and they can use it to help other people as they go forward through life, then we win.

And that's what we want.

We wanna develop citizens that are going to support others in our society and our community.

They're gonna take care of one another.

They're gonna be good neighbors and good parents.

That's what we want.

Does it give a little bit more meaning in the work?

Yeah, it's really cool to see that.

Around Webster, I see 'em all over the place.

I actually have one at my house.

I like that it has some imperfections.

It's not a perfect heart.

That's on purpose?

Yeah, we don't sand them to be completely smooth or perfect, because it just doesn't work like that.

Just like a human heart, right?

Yeah.

I think for different people, the hearts mean something different.

And it could have a real personal meaning to one person and represent maybe a parent who has passed away for someone or a milestone in their family's life.

But it's been a really special project that has been with us from the beginning.

I mean, the hearts are going strong and it's amazing.

Our next story takes us down to Cherokee Street, where humans of St.

Louis got to go inside El Chico Bakery and meet siblings Ana and Oscar Rivera, who inherited not just a business, but a family legacy.

The sacrifices, I think the sacrifices of owning any small business, but the sacrifices that we make, missing out on birthdays, missing out on family time.

I told my parents and I told my family, I was like, for my wedding, I was like, we have to close for like a week.

I was like, I cannot, we have to just be completely shut down for a week, which we did and it was so nice.

But I think a lot of us, our motivation to keep going is because I don't want my, honestly if we closed the bakery, my mom would be so upset and she would just be kind of heartbroken.

So that's a big motivation why I continue to do this is because I don't want to let them down.

I don't want them to be completely just heartbroken.

My mom, I talk to, I guess I'm a mom, she's still more like a mom.

I talk to her more about my problems and stuff like that.

Even where in the back working, it's still more like a mom for her.

Honestly, they'll say, my brother and sister say that they're at the bottom of the pool, but honestly, I'm not at the bottom because nobody listens to me.

I'm Ana Rivera-Gonzalez.

We are in South St.

Louis on Cherokee Street at my parents' bakery of 26 years.

Mexican bakery, I should say.

Yeah, my parents started this.

My dad started it 26 years ago.

We would go up to Chicago quite often to go and get breads and meats and tortillas and pan dulce and all kinds of things from Chicago and bring it back.

We had a big freezer and we would stock it up.

My dad used to work at a bakery in Mexico and somehow without finishing grade school decided to open up a bakery.

(speaking in foreign language) - I don't even know what word to describe it.

It's fun, I guess that's the first thing that comes to mind.

Fun and empanada making is something that we can do while we're sleeping, something that we get into arguments about.

So the folding has to be a little tighter.

And then when my mom makes the fold in the empanadas, like the braid, she has a little more extra dough at the top, which I don't like, and it's hard to, like, "I'll do that!"

Like, tell her not to do them because she's helping.

Oscar says I have two crooked fingers because my empanadas come out, like, once shorter than the other side.

So, yeah, he's always like, "I'll do them.

These are mine.

I'll do them."

But, yeah, empanadas are fun, interesting.

They can get heated.

I know probably 65% of the things that we do here I know how to make.

But a baker, I just, I don't know.

I'm just a person that works at a bakery, but not a baker though.

At the farmers market, I love farmers markets because I get to talk to all the customers and stuff and just to interact with all the other vendors and market staff.

Wake up like around 5.30 and get ready to go and then be at the market by 6.30.

Then we set up from 6.30 to 7.30, start setting up, getting everything looking nice and pretty.

Market starts at 8.00.

By 12.00, 12 o'clock, I'm mostly done.

And then if I have time, I'll put everything away in my van and then go socialize with the other vendors.

I remember that there were little kids, maybe elementary school, and then they keep going, and then I might not see them for a little bit.

I'll see their parents and then their kids will come up and they start going on to college.

I'm like, "Oh my God, I can't believe it's this guy right here."

They've grown up.

Or they'll tell me, "I used to come here with my grandparents," and stuff like that.

It doesn't feel like it, but just looking at other people, I'm like, "Yeah, it's been a long time."

Juan, my dad said he wanted to open a bakery.

What did you think?

Nothing.

I wanted to open a tortilleria, but he said, "No, I know how to make bread.

I worked."

I said, "Okay, do it."

But I didn't think I'd come to work.

-And you're here now.

-And me.

[ Laughs ] Because I knew something.

-Would you change still?

-No, not anymore.

No.

I wouldn't change.

I'd say, "Oh, good thing they put bakery."

-My dad's name is Bernabe Rivera.

Everybody calls him Chico.

I don't know where that comes from because I think a lot of Hispanics are smaller, like shorter.

Even my mom would call him Chico, Chico.

And so it's nice because it's like El Chico Bakery, the small bakery, which we are.

And then my dad, El Chico, Chico.

Back more than 26 years, my dad lived on Cherokee Street for a while, and Cherokee Street was a big area to come.

They had Woolworths, and then they had like, you would come down, there was like a bus or a trolley, and everybody would do their shopping on Cherokee Street.

And this was, I mean, we've been open for 26, I wanna say like 40 years ago, but maybe he saw like how it was a long, long time ago and how it could be again.

His English was broken, he didn't finish grade school.

We grew up, I'm like, we didn't grow up with money.

One of the most important things though that we had that my dad, like one of the values is like we always had each other.

We always have each other.

We always have love.

My mom has a saying though, "Preguntando se llega a Roma" which is what I live by.

By asking you'll find a way to Rome.

So I'm sure it was a lot of asking.

I'm sure it was definitely a lot of friends and family helping.

We also I think he had a lot of just tenacity.

Tenacity in that man, in my parents.

Gosh.

I think every year when we renew a lot of the permits and a lot of like the insurance it's like I always try to tell them like hey everything's up for renewal what are we doing and you know I I would want to be done with it and I'm always trying to maybe like hey maybe we shouldn't do it but we try not to complain because my mom doesn't complain but you know we do complain to each other about how our backs hurt and our feet hurt and how we're just absolutely so tired physically so yeah the reality is we're getting older too.

I don't know it's I'd love to see it until I couldn't go anymore but it's kind of hard just by one with one person I definitely need to have my sister and brother along with me.

I think a lot of us our motivation to keep going is because I don't want my mom, honestly if we closed the bakery my mom would be so upset and she would just be kind of heartbroken.

So that's a big motivation why I continue to do this is because I don't want to let them down.

I don't want them to be completely just heartbroken.

It's a win-win from now on.

We've been in business 26 years now.

I've always told all my customers, if we make it past 25, it's a win-win.

After that, heads high, no problem.

If we have to close the doors, it's not because something's going wrong or there's no business.

That's not it.

If we close the shop, it's because we're done.

We're pretty much done.

And we just try something new.

But yeah, if I could do this and there's nothing, I mean, you could do pretty much anything.

Yeah.

♪♪ - I'm Veronica Mohesky, and I'm here with Jody Sowell, president of the Missouri Historical Society.

And today we're talking about a St.

Louisan who started a beauty empire.

That's right.

You know, St.

Louis could introduce itself.

It might say, "I am the place where one of the country's first black female millionaires made her riches."

That's the story of Annie Malone.

Annie Malone develops a hair care product that doesn't have some of the same harsh chemicals for African-American women's hair that most products of the day had.

And from there, she built a beauty empire.

At one time, she has hired 75,000 people around the globe to sell and make her products.

She opened Poro College in 1918 in the Ville neighborhood to train people to sell and make those products.

And she's also one of the country's biggest philanthropists of her time.

And what's Annie Malone's legacy in St.

Louis?

Yeah, you know, Annie Malone started Orphan's Home that is now named in her honor.

And you might still go to the Annie Malone parade, but really, I think it's her legacy as an inspiration for entrepreneurs today.

Here's a woman who faced all sorts of discrimination, but built a business that many of us would be envious of today.

Absolutely.

What an incredible story.

Thank you, Jody.

Sure.

♪♪ - And that's Living St.

Louis.

The Linnenan House isn't the only cool thing to see at the Botanical Gardens this time of year.

The Orchid Show is happening now through March 1st.

What's your favorite thing to do this time of year around St.

Louis?

Let us know at ninepbs.org/lsl.

I'm Brooke Butler.

Thanks for joining us.

♪♪ Living St.

Louis is funded in part by the Betsy and Thomas Patterson Foundation and the members of Nine PBS.

♪♪