Category: Cemeteries

  • Remembering Those Who Served in the Civil War

    The Civil War monument in Richland Cemetery, Dravosburg. The sculpture bears a maker’s plaque: “Manufactured by the W. H. Mullins Co., Salem, Ohio, U.S.A.”

    Camera: Kodak EasyShare Z1485 IS.
  • Memorial Day

    Flags fly over veterans’ graves in the Homewood Cemetery.

    Camera: Olympus E-20n.
  • Henry Aiken Cross, Homewood Cemetery

  • Penn Avenue Gatehouse, Allegheny Cemetery

    Old Pa Pitt has done his best to make this picture look like an old colored postcard. Henry A. Macomb won a design competition for this gatehouse, whose tower is clearly influenced by the tower of the Allegheny County Courthouse downtown. The entrance buildings were finished in 1889, just after the courthouse opened, and some last-minute changes to the tower were probably intended to make it look more like Richardson’s work on the courthouse.

    Camera: Olympus E-20n.
  • Deer in the Snow, Allegheny Cemetery

  • Sphinx in the Snow

    The Emil Winter mausoleum, a bit of Cecil B. De Mille Egyptian fantasy in the Allegheny Cemetery, was designed by John Russell Pope, architect of the Jefferson Memorial and the National Archives in Washington. It is almost an exact duplicate of the Woolworth mausoleum in Woodlawn, the Bronx, which means that—believe it or not—there are two of these things in the world. The sphinx guardians are probably its most striking feature.

    Camera: Kodak EasyShare Z1485 IS.
  • Shields Chapel and Mausoleum, Edgeworth

    Camera: Kodak EasyShare Z1485 IS.
    Camera: Samsung Digimax V4.

    The Shields Chapel was built in 1868 as a Presbyterian church donated by Eliza Leet Shields, extremely rich person, on the grounds of her estate. After sitting vacant for a long time, it is now occupied by the second congregation of Grace Anglican Church.

    Camera: Samsung Digimax V4.

    Next to the church is what appears to be another church, immemorially ancient; but it is actually the Shields family mausoleum, built in 1893. Apparently no mere cemetery was classy enough for the Shields family. This is an enormous mausoleum, as big as a church, and in fact Grace Anglican’s congregation met in it before the Shields Chapel became available. There is space for thirty-six permanent residents here, of which number eighteen have already moved in.

    Camera: Kodak EasyShare Z1485 IS.
  • A Ginkgo Drops Its Leaves

    A Ginkgo biloba has just dropped its leaves in the Union Dale Cemetery. Ginkgo biloba is an odd tree in almost every respect, and this is one of its odd habits. Most trees lose their leaves over the course of a few days, but a Ginkgo loses them in a surprisingly short time, almost all at once. If there is not much wind, the result is a rich golden carpet with the tree at the center of it.

  • Fall in the Homewood Cemetery

    Schoonmaker monument with autumn leaves, Homewood Cemetery, 02, smaller

    Many more pictures of gorgeous monuments and fall leaves are at Father Pitt’s Pittsburgh Cemeteries site.

  • View from the Union Dale Cemetery

    A view from Division 1 of the Union Dale Cemetery. Of the great cemeteries in the city, only the Union Dale Cemetery is divided into sections by major thoroughfares running through it.