The rich soil and abundant food sources of the American Bottom made the Valmeyer area ripe for development, allowing Native Americans to harvest crops, fish and wildlife from the floodplain while gathering nuts and berries from the neighboring bluffs. River traffic brought activity as people traveled to and from local river landings, and when the St. Louis Iron Mountain and Southern Railway came through the area in the late 1800's, much settlement and economic activity moved further inland. Before Valmeyer was formally founded, the railroad had already built one track through the area and later added a second. In the early settlement period, the east side of town was called Rock City because of the rocky river bluff, while the west side was called Frogtown because it was swampy and was also called Moredock because of the nearby lake. Moredock Lake, named after Indian fighter John Casper Moredock, was a large meander scar of the Mississippi River that later became a favorite fishing and vacation spot for St. Louis residents. Early immigrants included the Meyer family of Swiss origin, and in April, 1857, Fridolin Meyer and his wife Mary purchased the ground that eventually became Valmeyer. The railroad brought more people and created demand for hotels, restaurants and general stores. By 1909, development and population growth led members of the Meyer family to file a plat for incorporation of a new community to be called Meyer City, but after discussions with the U.S. Postal Service because of confusion with Miller City, the village was renamed Valmeyer, a shortened version of Valley of the Meyers. The area long faced flooding from the Mississippi River; during the Flood of 1844, floodwater was so deep that steamboats could travel from the Missouri bluff to the Illinois bluff, and in later years farmers built small levees with primitive equipment to protect their property. A series of floods in 1943, 1964 and 1947 caused widespread damage and destruction, after which the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers constructed a protective levee system along the length of the Mississippi River in Monroe County, completed in 1950, that protected Valmeyer and the American Bottoms of Monroe County in the years that followed. Valmeyer developed businesses serving village residents and the surrounding farm community, and it continued to thrive after World War II as its population increased. In the early 1980's, FEMA enacted floodplain-related building restrictions that halted new home construction. In 1993, high river levels caused by snow melt and heavy late spring and early summer rains led to intense levee patrols and sandbagging, but after a levee west of Columbia was overtopped in early August and the Fountain Creek levee was eventually overtopped, water passed through Valmeyer and filled the entire 60,000 acre Monroe County River Bottom. The damage led residents to re-establish the village on top of the bluff to the east, with work beginning in 1994 and the first residents moving into new homes in 1995 and 1996.