| Notes |
Died:
- Elmer Chester Denham was born on 13 Mar 1921 in the home of his parents, Chester Denham and Viola Rockers. His parents lived in this house at 3745 Pennsylvania Ave., St. Louis, Missouri until 1978. It was Elmer's only childhood home.
Elmer was the second of three children in the family. His older sister, Dorothy, was born in 1919 and his younger sister, Ruth, was born in 1923.
Across the street was Froebel Elementary School which Elmer attended through his 8th grade graduation in 1935. But it was a difficult economic time, The Great Depression. Elmer started high school but dropped out at age 15 to go to work. During his lifetime, Elmer only had a 9th-grade education.
His first job was at White Photography. As a teenager, Elmer learned the fundamentals of photography at this small family-owned business. He learned to take good pictures with a camera. But he also learned how to develop negative film and make prints and enlargements. Elmer was always grateful to Mr. White for giving him the opportunity to learn the business. Many years later, Elmer expressed his gratitude. In 1964, he drove from St. Louis to Mineral Point, Wisconsin to visit an old friend ? his first employer.
In 1980, Elmer wrote the following in a letter: "My father and my relationship was something which proved to be unattainable in his lifetime. I was never the son he wanted and he was never the father I wanted. ..." Like many men in the first half of the 20th century, Chester Denham wanted his teenage son to follow in his footsteps. Chester worked in a machine shop ? successfully ? as a tool and die maker. Chester wanted his teenage son to work in a machine shop, too. But Elmer preferred working in photography and as a film developer.
In 1937, Elmer's grandmother, Emma Rockers, died suddenly. She fell down the stairs from the 2nd floor to the 1st floor at 3745 Pennsylvania Ave. and died in the hospital four days later. Emma Rockers was the adoptive mother of Viola Denham (Elmer's mother). The adoption happened on 16 Apr 1909 when Viola was 9-years old. Viola married 17-year old Chester Denham on 13 Feb 1919 at Alton, Illinois. After the wedding, Chester moved into Emma's house. At the time of the accident, Emma lived in the house at 3745 Pennsylvania with Chester, Viola, and their 3 children.
Elmer met Florence Kountzman in 1938, just slightly after he met Constance Blank and her mother, Mabel Blank (nee Kountzman). Mabel was the older sister of Florence. Constance Blank was single, lived with her parents at 8527 Minnesota Ave., and operated the Constance Blank School of Dancing. Elmer went to the dance studio for lessons.
During his entire lifetime, Elmer enjoyed music. And he also enjoyed dancing. After an extended period, 3 years or longer, Mabel Blank began telling both Constance and Florence that one of them should marry Elmer. However, on 7 Dec 1941, the Japanese launched a surprise attack on the U.S. Naval Base at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. Suddenly, our country was at war and the lives of many young people were changed. Elmer and Florence decided to get married. Elmer was baptized on 8 Feb 1942 at St. Mark Catholic Church and married Florence Kountzman on 14 Feb 1942 at St. Columbkille Catholic Church, 8202 Michigan Ave., St. Louis, Missouri. Constance Blank was maid of honor at the wedding. Elmer was only 20-years old, so his mother, Viola Denham, gave parental consent to obtain a marriage license.
In later years, Elmer admitted that he married Florence to stay out of the military. On 15 Feb 1942, the day after the wedding, Elmer registered for the World War II draft at St. Louis, Missouri. World War II lasted a long time, almost 4 years. Eventually, military service was required for most American men born in 1921. Elmer enlisted in the U.S. Navy on 15 Sep 1943 at St. Louis, Missouri.
Shortly after entering the Navy, Elmer contracted rheumatic fever and became a patient in the U. S. Naval Hospital at Farragut, Idaho, from October 1943 to April 1944. Florence joined him upon his transfer to the Naval Base in Long Beach, California, and eventually to Pensacola, Florida, where they lived in a trailer or furnished room. Elmer was honorably discharged on 31 Jan 1946 at Bainbridge, Maryland, with the rank of Seaman First Class.
During World War II, St. Columbkille Catholic Church published a newsletter titled "The Kolum Killer." Posted on this memorial is a copy of the June 1945 edition which includes "That Elmer Denham S 1/c writes from Pensacola, Florida where he is studying photography that said studies keep him busy 16 hours a day."
After the death of her father, Clement McCoy Kountzman, Florence inherited the house at 8521 Minnesota Ave. which Clement had built in 1901 and where Florence was born in 1910. After his discharge from the Navy, Elmer and Florence moved into the house at 8521 Minnesota Ave. Elmer & Florence contributed to the baby boomer generation, the demographically large generation born between the end of World War II and the mid-1960s. They had 3 sons born within three years. Mike was born on Thanksgiving Day 1946 and Tom was born on Thanksgiving Day 1949. And, in the middle, was Don, born on Elmer's birthday, 13 Mar 1948.
In 1949, Elmer and Florence purchased a rooming house at 1618 S. Compton Ave., St. Louis, Missouri. During this time period, rooming houses were often the least expensive housing for low income tenants who shared bath and kitchen facilities. The new landlords of the 3-story brick building with 8 bedrooms, 4 kitchens, and 3 bathrooms rented furnished apartments on a weekly basis to single adults and small families. The house on Compton Avenue was only the first of many for both Elmer and Florence. After their divorce in 1952, Florence became the owner of 1618 S. Compton where she continued to rent rooms until her death in 1967. After the divorce, each of them purchased many other rental properties as individuals.
After Tom was born on 24 Nov 1949, Florence was diagnosed with a virus infection in her spine and returned to the hospital where she remained until April. Over Christmas 1949, it was questionable that she would live until 1950. But she eventually recovered. This was a very difficult time for the family. Elmer found himself with a wife in the hospital and 3 small children. Elmer's sister, Ruth, kept Tom (the baby) the whole time, but Elmer needed to find babysitters for Don. Elmer wrote in a letter, "I had hospitalization on her which paid a total of $700.00. Her bills were over $100.00 a week and had to be paid weekly. At that time I was working as a substitute clerk at the Post Office, and was lucky that I could work an unlimited amount of hours which was usually a maximum of 12 hours a day, 7 days a week. The job paid $1.29 an hour. I was losing ground every week, and had no idea how long her stay would be, and had planned how I would liquidate everything we had if necessary."
Elmer, Florence, Mike, Don, and Tom are all listed in the 1950 Census as living at 1618 S. Compton. This sheet of the census was enumerated on 21 Apr 1950. The occupation for Elmer is "Postal clerk." In column 19, the heading is "How many hours did he work last week?" The answer for Elmer is "54."
Elmer and Florence were divorced on 14 Nov 1952 at the Circuit Court for the City of St. Louis, Missouri. After the divorce, Elmer remained single for the next eight years. Elmer moved frequently during this time period and continued moving frequently for the rest of his life. The second rooming house Elmer purchased in the 1950s, located at 2820 Henrietta Street, St. Louis, Missouri, became his home twice, living first on the 3rd floor and then on the 2nd floor.
During the mid-1950s, Elmer served as Cubmaster of Cub Scout Pack 215. Mike and Don were old enough to be Cub Scouts. Elmer was in charge of monthly pack meetings in the auditorium of Carondelet School which both boys attended at 8221 Minnesota Ave.
During the 1950s, Elmer had a part-time job at Casa Loma Ballroom, 3354 Iowa Ave. at Cherokee Street. Casa Loma started in 1927 and became a landmark of entertainment in St. Louis, providing a wide range of popular music and dancing. Posted on this memorial is a copy of an article that was published in the 27 Sep 1981 edition of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch under the headline, "Swinging Soiree at Casa-Loma Ballroom." For Elmer, this may have been the perfect part-time job. Elmer enjoyed music and dancing and he also enjoyed having a good time with people.
During the early 1950s, Elmer went to work at Recordak Corp., 3303 Washington Blvd., St. Louis, Missouri. In 1928, Recordak a subsidiary of Eastman Kodak Company, introduced the first microfilm system ? designed to simplify handling of bank records. Microfilming involved photographing documents at a greatly reduced size for archiving purposes. By 1931, Recordak had automated the process, moving film in synchronization with documents fed over a revolving drum. This allowed documents of any length to be filmed. In following decades of advancing technology, microfilm became commonplace in many document-intense areas like insurance firms, libraries, government agencies, and the transportation industry.
In 1956, Elmer Denham and Virgil Siegrist became business partners. The name of the company was Cine-Graphic Film Lab, Inc. But everyone simply called the business "the lab." They rented approximately 2,000 square feet on the lower level of a building at 1720 Olive Street in downtown St. Louis for operation of their 16 mm black & white film processing lab.
Posted on the memorial for Virgil Siegrist is a newspaper article that was published in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch on December 28, 1973. It includes the following: "Siegrist has been in motion pictures and related hobbies, including sound recordings, for 25 years. He started out processing newsreel film for television in the early days in his basement workshop. 'The late Earle Del Porte, television engineer for KSD-TV, saw some film of an important news event that I had processed for Eddie Goldberger. He was impressed with the quality of the processing, but they couldn't use the film because neither Eddie nor I belonged to the union,' said Siegrist. He explained that Del Porte came out to see his equipment because he had spent two days processing films of Vice President Barkley when he married Jane Hadley in St. Louis. 'He was instrumental in getting me into the union and I then did all the processing for KSD-TV. Earle had a lot to do with the original processor. ... it was his design and it was foolproof,' he said. He soon outgrew his basement processing and opened a plant downtown and took a partner. He continued with the business for almost 10 years. 'We did mainly news, football and sports, but doing lab work now for TV wouldn't be so good because they all do their own processing. But in those early days, it was a rat race. If there was a fire late at night, that film had to be processed immediately,' he said. He said that during slack periods they worked for racetracks around the country. 'We didn't take the pictures, we just operated the processing plants for the judges. I think most of the tracks have gone to video tape now. In those days, the pay was good, but you had to work out of town, and that's for people who like to live out of a suitcase, not me,' he said. He finally disposed of the lab interest to his partner. In addition to his recordings, Siegrist has built a color processing machine that he has consigned to a man in Colorado Springs."
During the late 1950s, Elmer was usually the business partner traveling out of town to work at racetracks, including Churchill Downs in Louisville, Kentucky; Keeneland in Lexington, Kentucky; River Downs in Cincinnati, Ohio; and Oaklawn Park in Hot Springs, Arkansas. Elmer often made new friends when he worked at the racetracks. In Louisville, Elmer met Edward Mazzoni, an amateur motion picture enthusiast and co-owner of his family's Oyster House restaurant. In Hot Springs, Elmer met Eardie Graham. In the 1960s, Eardie came to St. Louis to work for Elmer at the lab during the busy season.
Elmer enjoyed traveling and took his sons on vacations during the late 1950s and early 1960s, most of them by car. However, the first one in 1956 was a trip to Southern California in a Greyhound bus. In the summer of 1957, they went to California again, this time by car with stops along the way for sightseeing. In 1958, they went to Florida. In December 1959 they went to New York City and stayed memorably on Times Square where they joined the crowd on New Year's Eve. In the summer of 1960, they left St. Louis in a car, drove 1,000 miles North to Winnipeg, Manitoba, in Canada, boarded a Canadian National Railway train in Winnipeg, and traveled by train another 1,000 miles north to Churchill, Manitoba, on Hudson's Bay. During summer vacations in 1961 and 1962, Elmer camped with the boys at Lake Ouachita State Park in Arkansas. Elmer's friend, Eardie Graham, was instrumental in arranging the Arkansas trips. Eardie owned a motorboat and lived nearby (Hot Springs). The boys learned to water ski at Lake Ouachita.
In 1960, the business partnership between Virgil Siegrist and Elmer Denham reached a crisis. Virgil wanted to build a color processing machine but the location at 1720 Olive wasn't big enough. Renting a new location and expansion into color created a financial crisis. They resolved it with Elmer buying Virgil's interest in the lab and delaying expansion into color. So, Elmer Denham became the sole proprietor of Cine-Graphic Film Lab Inc., which remained a black & white lab at 1720 Olive, for the next few years.
On 8 Dec 1960, Elmer married Virginia Lee Williams at Las Vegas, Nevada. It was Virginia's second marriage, too. She grew up in Mountain View, Howell County, Missouri. A few weeks after she married Sherley Younger, she contracted polio during an epidemic that swept across central Missouri in 1949. Virginia was confined to a wheelchair the rest of her life. During the early 1960's, Elmer and Virginia lived at 3715 Marine Ave. in South St. Louis, the Plaza Square Apartments in downtown St. Louis, and a new house in Crestwood, a suburb in St. Louis County. Elmer and Virginia had two children ? a daughter, Kathy (1962), and a son, Charles (1968).
Elmer showed his love of music and dancing during the early 1960s with season tickets to The Muny, outdoor amphitheater with 11,000 seats in Forest Park, which still presents evening performances from mid-June to mid-August. Elmer and other members of the Denham family have enjoyed its wonderful musicals.
Often after a divorce, an ex-husband and an ex-wife don't get along well due to bitterness and resentment. However, Elmer and Florence had a congenial relationship after their divorce. There was an attitude of forgiveness concerning previous shortcomings and faults. Actually, Florence was a friend of both Elmer and Virginia. For example, Elmer sold the rooming house at 2820 Henrietta to Florence in the early 1960s and Florence rented it out for the rest of her life. Also, if Elmer and Virginia needed a babysitter for their daughter Kathy, it was often Florence who took care of her.
During the late 1950s and early 1960s, television was an emerging technology. After purchasing black-and-white TVs in the 1950s, consumers could buy color TVs in the early 1960s. During this time period, motion pictures were also an emerging technology. Gradually, the quality of color film improved. In 1960, Virgil Siegrist and Elmer Denham found out that they were premature. They couldn't afford to expand their business to include color processing. The quality of color motion picture film also needed to improve.
After Virgil left the business, Elmer continued to operate the black-and-white processing business. And it started to grow. The lab was unique. No other companies processed black & white motion picture film in the St. Louis market. A single TV station quickly grew to three. KSD-TV (Channel 5) was an NBC-affiliated station, KMOX-TV (Channel 4) was a CBS affiliate, and KTVI-TV (Channel 2) was an ABC affiliate. They all wanted film processed for the 6 p.m. and 10 p.m. news on weekdays. News programs on the weekends made it necessary to keep the lab open seven days a week plus weekday evenings.
During autumn, processing of motion picture films for football was in high demand. More than 30 high schools in the St. Louis area took movies of their games and needed the lab to process the film ASAP afterwards. Illinois high schools usually played on Friday nights. Often these coaches personally delivered their film to the lab on Saturday morning. Coaches at high school games in Missouri, usually played Saturday afternoons, wanted their film processed on Saturday evenings. The University of Missouri usually had games on Saturday afternoon, and someone drove two hours from Columbia, Missouri to the lab so that their film could be processed that same night. But the premier football customer was a professional football franchise, the Cardinals. Film from the Cardinals' NFL games, usually on Sunday afternoon, needed to be processed on Sunday evening.
In the early 1960s, Elmer's two oldest sons, Mike and Don, just in their early teens, were old enough to learn the family business in the lab. They learned how to go into a darkroom alone to remove exposed film from a spool by re-winding film onto a magazine for the processing machine. They learned how to run the processing machine and fix breaks. Whenever there was a tear in the film and the film broke, it was necessary to re-thread the processing machine. Mike and Don also learned how to mix chemicals and replace the developer on the machines.
In 1963, Mike's help was needed at the lab. Mike left high school and went to work full-time at the lab. Don continued in high school but went to the lab after school several evenings a week. The evening shift was a one-person crew. Don was expected to process all news film by himself. On football Saturdays, Don worked the day shift as a two-person crew with Eardie Graham. They worked from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Elmer and Mike came in at 6 p.m. and stayed until all processing was finished.
On 12 Jul 1966, the Major League Baseball All-Star Game was held in St. Louis. A new baseball stadium in downtown St. Louis helped attract national attention. TV networks brought out-of-town film crews to cover the big game. However, the lab was still unique ? the only firm in town processing motion picture film. Elmer did his best to support network crews by providing work space and whatever else they needed. It turned out that baseball was not the top story that day. It was the heat. The temperature at game time was a blistering 105 degrees and spectators were passing out in the stands. The quote of the day was from Casey Stengal. When asked, "What do you think about the new stadium?" he replied, "It sure seems to hold the heat real good." Still, the lab provided quality workmanship during the All-Star Game and all film was processed in a timely manner.
The 1966 All-Star Game was probably the catalyst that brought change to the lab. It brought national exposure. TV networks were in a competitive environment. They weren't satisfied with the status quo. Elmer had delayed expansion into color processing as long as possible. It would be expensive and he wanted to avoid another financial crisis. However, the time had come. Additional floor space was needed, so the lab moved to a new location at 17th & Chestnut in downtown St. Louis. A brand-new color processing machine was ordered.
Elmer was right. Expansion into color created another financial crisis for the lab. Before the new color processing machine was up and running, the lab ran out of money. However, Elmer put his "Plan B" into action. Elmer's salary was the first to be cut from the lab's expenses. Elmer, Virginia, and Kathy headed to Chicago in 1966. Elmer was able to get work at two horse racetracks in the Chicago Area ? Sportsman's Park and Arlington Park. Elmer put his 18-year-old son Mike in charge of the lab in St. Louis.
The change from black-and-white to color news film in St. Louis took place during late summer 1966. Mike and Don both worked fulltime for the lab that summer. Don attended junior college during the school year. They worked together to get the new color machine running. Initially, TV stations brought in a few rolls of color film to test. But there was no feedback from TV stations. In the meantime, Mike and Don tried to fix bugs with the machine and the color process. The conversion to color literally happened overnight. Late one afternoon, all three TV stations said they would use 100% color film the very next day. But the machine posed a major problem. Its chemicals were corroding a stainless steel drain trough. Mike and Don quickly decided to repair the machine. They worked all night and had the color machine ready the next morning. From that point on, all work for the TV stations was in color. From a quality control perspective, the conversion to color was a success. But from a financial perspective, the lab was in a deep hole.
Autumn 1966 was stressful. Elmer still worked at the racetrack in Chicago. Mike, Don, and Tom lived with their mother, Florence, at 8521 Minnesota. Processing for the TV stations was in color and processing for football customers was in black-and-white. Mike worked seven days a week but the lab didn't have enough money to pay him, so Mike was paid 50% of his salary. Florence did the lab's bookkeeping for free, without pay. Don attended college full-time and worked about 25 hours per week, stretching to a 16-hour shift from 8 a.m. to midnight every football Saturday.
On 10 Jan 1967, an unexpected event "tore the family apart." Florence Denham died suddenly. Elmer had recently returned from Chicago. Everyone in the family was shocked. Mike was 19-years old, trying to deal with job-related stress, then his mother's death added to the burden. Mike eventually said, "I quit," and found employment elsewhere. Don planned to finish his college education at the University of Missouri at Rolla in autumn and continued working part-time for the lab until June 1967. Shortly after that, Elmer sold the lab and went back to Chicago.
Elmer continued to work at Sportsman's Park and Arlington Park in the Chicago area until his retirement in 1978. During the 1970s, Elmer, Virginia, Kathy, and Charles lived at Cicero in Cook County, Illinois.
In April 1979, Elmer and his family moved to Florida. They purchased a house at 5611 Northeast 22nd Ave. in Ocala. However, shortly after moving to Florida, Elmer had a stroke. He was a patient in the VA Medical Center in Gainesville, Florida for 59 days from 13 June 1979 to 10 Aug 1979. The stroke left Elmer partially paralyzed and he was confined to a wheelchair for the rest of his life. The Veterans Administration certified that Elmer was 100% disabled. Elmer became a life member of the Disabled American Veterans (No. 398027) through the Ocala, Florida Chapter.
Elmer and Virginia were divorced on 14 Sep 1982 at Marion County, Florida.
After the divorce, Elmer returned to St. Louis. During most of the next seven years, Elmer bounced back and forth between VA hospitals and nursing homes. When a transfer to a nursing home was needed, the Veterans Administration would work out logistics with a VA-approved nursing home and provide financial assistance to pay the cost. Elmer was a patient at two VA hospitals ? the VA Medical Center at Jefferson Barracks and John Cochran VA Medical Center. He also lived at St. Sophia Geriatric Center in Florissant, Clayton House Healthcare in Manchester, Clayton-on-the-Green Nursing Center in Ballwin, and Medicalodge of Halls Ferry in North St. Louis County. In addition to heart problems, Elmer suffered from diabetes for the last 25 years of his life, the quality of his live deteriorating as the diabetes advanced.
Elmer Denham died on 27 Oct 1989 at John Cochran VA Medical Center, 915 N. Grand Blvd., St. Louis, Missouri. A Funeral Mass was celebrated on 31 Oct 1989 at St. Gerard Majella Catholic Church, Kirkwood, Missouri. Interment was in Jefferson Barracks National Cemetery.
Submitted by Don Denham
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Listed in the 1930 Census for St. Louis, Missouri (ED 450, Page 7B, Line 54).
Listed in the 1940 Census for St. Louis, Missouri (ED 96-259, Page 1B, Line 80).
Baptized on 8 Feb 1942 at St. Mark Catholic Church, St. Louis, Missouri.
First married to Florence Kountzman on 14 Feb 1942 at St. Columbkille Catholic Church, St. Louis, Missouri.
Listed in the 1950 Census for St. Louis, Missouri (ED 96-1097, Sheet 12, Line 14).
Second married to Virginia Lee Williams on 8 Dec 1960 at Las Vegas, Clark County, Nevada.
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1921 - 1989 (68 years)
