The property that has been home to the House Springs Lions Club for almost 70 years is up for sale.
The 2.65-acre property, at 6482 Hwy. MM, includes a building with 4,200 square feet on the first floor and a partially finished basement. It also includes a 70-by-22-foot pavilion and a paved parking lot with room for 60 vehicles, said listing agent Peggy Stewart with Realty Executives of St. Louis.
The property, which is listed for $493,000, went up for sale two weeks ago.
“We’ve had some good interest in it,” Stewart said June 26.
Lions Club vice president Kim Fanter said the cost to maintain the building has become too high for the club because rentals have decreased. In addition, like many other civic organizations, the Lions Club has seen its membership dwindle.
The number of members now stands at 41. In its heyday, the club had more than 150 members, Fanter said.
“(The selling of the building) has been coming for a long time. COVID-19 just sealed it for us,” she said.
The House Springs Lions, however, will go on even after the hall is sold, Fanter said.
“We will meet in a restaurant or in the community room at the library,” she said. “We will continue to serve our community because that is what we do; we serve. My concern is what are we going to do with the big events that we hold?”
Each year for the last 25 years, the Lions have donated the use of the hall for the Northwest Jefferson County’s Chamber of Commerce Toy Drive, where thousands of donated toys are stacked across the stage and onto the floor of the hall. About 100 people attend the event, donating at least one toy to cover admittance. At the end of the gathering, which includes food and entertainment, firefighters from the Cedar Hill and High Ridge Fire Protection Districts take the toys to be distributed to local children in need.
The annual House Springs Lions Christmas Parade, an event that can draw a couple of thousand people each year, ends at the hall, where many people get together for hot chocolate, cookies and visits with Santa.
In addition, the club holds an annual car show, the Ride for Kids’ Sight, and mouse races at the hall, all fundraisers for the community, Fanter said.
When the club is not having a special event, the building is rented out for weddings, anniversary parties, and other celebrations and parties. Those rentals fund the hall and help maintain it. Since the COVID-19 pandemic started, renting out the hall has not been easy, so it has been difficult to make ends meet, Fanter said.
“We had cancellations, and we gave the money back because that’s community,” she said. “We continue to take rentals and we still have some on the books.”
The history
The building the Lions Club uses for its hall was completed in 1927 and previously housed a couple of other civic organizations.
House Springs resident Albert Weber owned the property and offered to donate it for the Catholic church, St. Philomena, that was to be built in House Springs. The church, however, chose another property Weber donated, and that’s where Our Lady Queen of Peace’s Cemetery is now located.
Since the church didn’t want the property where the Lions hall now stands, it was later donated to a group that built the hall for the community to use, said Steve Nahlik of Fenton.
“It was called the House Springs Community Center, and all my relatives, the Nahliks and the Webers, worked on it,” he said. “My dad (Vick Nahlik) dug out the basement with a horse and a scoop.”
Later, the American Legion bought the property and named it the Stacy-Weber Post after two local men who died in World War II, Nahlik said.
When the House Springs Lions Club was chartered in 1951 with 27 members, the club rented it from the American Legion. The post, however, was decommissioned in the early 1970s, and the Lions Club purchased it, Nahlik said.
“Over the years (the hall) was the site of 35 homecoming picnics (put on by the Lions),” he said. “That ended in the 1980s.”
In the Lions Club’s early days, like most fraternal groups at the time, the membership was reserved for men. The Lions had an auxiliary for women called the Lionesses. Eventually the Lions Club was opened to women and the auxiliary was disbanded, Nahlik said.
Through the years, the House Springs Lions Club members held fishing derbies, health fairs, haunted houses and barbecues. They participated in Operation Clean Stream and helped with the construction of the Northwest High School football field. In fact, the school district’s lion mascot is a tribute to the club, members said.
As with all Lions Clubs, the House Springs club’s main focus is on helping people who have vision problems. Over the years, the club has covered the cost for people to get eye examinations, eyeglasses, eye surgeries and leader dogs.
The club also has donated to food pantries and other charitable causes, members said.
Former president Al Blumenberg of Cedar Hill said he joined the Lion’s Club in 1983 after a neighbor challenged him to.
“For me, at first, it was social. It was a night out from the family, but after I found out what the Lions (Club) was about, I started to become more involved,” he said. “At first we wrote a lot of checks to organizations – the Red Cross, the Student Council, the Lion’s Foundation – and that was easy and nice, but when you get your hands into what the Lions do, well there were so many avenues and we filled so many needs over the years.”
Blumenberg said the Lions Club members want to help and have fun.
“It’s a caring organization. We work hard and play hard,” he said.
Despite the building’s sale, the club is open to new members, Blumenberg said.
“We are always looking for volunteers,” he said.