In the 1870s, when they laid Gravois Rock Road through the western part of Jefferson County, the road didn’t run to Oermann, said Della Lang in her book “On the Road to History.”
In those early years, Oermann could only be reached by road from Grubville and Franklin County.
Although you can now get there by road, Oermann remains a little obscure. It is just south of Dittmer and other than a firehouse, farms and a few houses, there isn’t much else.
However, for a good many years, Oermann had a post office. It was established in 1888 and continued operating until 1955.
As was often the case, the town was named after the first postmaster, Charles Oermann, who also owned the general store, Lang wrote.
His parents, Christian Frederick and Mary Oermann, originally from Prussia, arrived in Missouri in 1857. They purchased 80 acres in what became Oermann from the United States government.
Charles Oermann was one of their seven children. After his mother died in 1874, his father remarried a woman named Minnie, and they had five more children.
By 1894, William Kramme, married to an Oermann, took over the postmaster position and the general store.
Other important town members near the turn of the century, according to Lang, were August H. Kramme, store clerk; Frederick Rolf, blacksmith; Dan Homan, harness maker; and John Oermann, undertaker and owner of a farm machinery business.
In the 1907 Jefferson County directory, a full 44 households were receiving their mail at the Oermann General Store.
Then the road finally came to Oermann.
The new Hwy. 30 was built through in the late 1920s and 30s. But it really didn’t make Oermann a boom town, although one man took advantage of the new connection. Hugo Redhage began a delivery service taking merchandise from St. Louis to places along Hwy. 30.
Eventually the post office closed and the general store was turned into a private home, according to Lang.
There is still a sign marking the town’s place along Hwy. 30, but not much else. Of course, Oermann does have its legacy, mostly in Oermanns. There are more than 10 listings for Oermann in the phone book along Hwy. 30 from House Springs to St. Clair.
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