Brick peddlers trolled the city at night, razing abandoned buildings themselves. They pounded down walls with sledgehammers. They fastened chains between their

Brick peddlers trolled the city at night, razing abandoned buildings themselves. They pounded down walls with sledgehammers. They fastened chains between their truck bumpers and wrecking bars wedged into windows and hit the gas, yanking down bricks. A few people died when walls collapsed on them, but that didn't deter the steady flow of peddlers, who hauled their loot to used-brick companies, stacked them in the companies' yards, and sold them for five times what they made at demolition sites. This is still a big problem in St. Louis. Brick rustlers often remove just the weakest wall, resulting in "dollhouses" like this one: * https://instagram.com/p/0f9Ax2hAbj/ https://instagram.com/p/0f9Ax2hAbj/ Of course, they sometimes get the whole structure. Sites like this one aren't uncommon: * https://instagram.com/p/tvZAKFBASH/ https://instagram.com/p/tvZAKFBASH/