Father Pitt

Why should the beautiful die?

Homewood Presbyterian Church (Bethesda Presbyterian Church), Homewood

Homewood Presbyterian Church (Bethesda Presbyterian Church)

Thomas Hannah designed this unusual church, which was built in about 1917.1 We find many churches in Pittsburgh where the sanctuary is upstairs, with Sunday-school rooms and social halls on the ground floor; this appears to be one of the very few where there are rooms above the sanctuary. It is still Presbyterian, but in 1961 came into the hands of the Bethesda United Presbyterian congregation.

Bethesda United Presbyterian Church plaque
Homewood Presbyterian Church (Bethesda Presbyterian Church)
Homewood Presbyterian Church (Bethesda Presbyterian Church)
Entrance, Homewood Presbyterian Church (Bethesda Presbyterian Church)
Tympanum
Entrance to the Homewood Presbyterian Church (Bethesda Presbyterian Church)
Tower
Tower
Ornamental frieze
Windows and brickwork

When you look at this church, it looks back.

Eyeball window
  1. Gazette Times, July 30, 1916: “Bids have been received and are now under consideration…for a church for the Homewood Presbyterian congregation at Bennett street and Zenith way, Thomas Hannah, architect…” ↩︎

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One response to “Homewood Presbyterian Church (Bethesda Presbyterian Church), Homewood”

  1. von Hindenburg

    This looks like an administrative building in a far-flung corner of the Byzantine empire. Somewhere along the Sea of Azov, this structure was built to combine all of the colony’s administrative functions into one compact, but imposing structure. Surely, somewhere deep inside, a Prothonotary lurks.

    The former St. Michael’s (now Zion Apostolic Assembly) in Pitcairn is another example of a sanctuary on the first floor with rooms above.

    It’s something that I really need to confirm sometime, but I assume that a lot of our less-inspired churches in the eastern suburbs are examples of the final wave of Catholic church plantings in this area where the school building/social hall was constructed first and used as the church, but the funds to build the intended separate sanctuary never materialized before attendance began to taper.

    Reply

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