Father Pitt

Category: Churches

  • Gospel Hall, Bloomfield

    Gospel Hall, front elevation

    W. Ward Williams was the architect of this little church facing Friendship Park, built in about 1915.1 It has been painted for its new life as a day-care center in bright patterns that both contrast with and emphasize its Rundbogenstil features.

    These pictures were taken in July of 2025, but somehow old Pa Pitt forgot about them until now.

    Gospel Hall
    Gospel Hall
    Olympus E-20N.
    1. Source: The Construction Record, September 19, 1914. “Architect W . Ward Williams, Magee building, has revised, plans for a one-story brick and concrete church, to be built on 4923 Friendship avenue, for the Gospel Hall Congregation.” Additions and alterations by the same architect, 1927. Source: The Charette, September, 1927: “343. Architect: W. Ward Williams, 309-4th Avenue, Pittsburgh, Pa. Title: Gospel Hall, Friendship Avenue, E. E., Pittsburgh, Pa. Alterations and additions. Ordinary construction. Two stories, new heating plant. Job closes August 16. Plumbing, heating and wiring reserved. List of Bidders: Walker & Curley, H. S. Moorhead & Company; A. J. Gloekler; Pittsburgh Engineering & Construction Corp.; and J. Kindler.” ↩︎
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  • Second Presbyterian Church, Braddock

    Second Presbyterian Church

    Built in 1896, this eclectic pile seems not to be in use right now, but it is not in terribly bad shape. It was built as the Second Presbyterian Church of Braddock, but later took the name Calvary Presbyterian. Old Pa Pitt spent some time trying to figure out who designed the building, but none of the newspaper articles he found mentioned an architect.

    Left entrance

    These stubby entrance towers, with their double eyebrowed round windows, trigger a disturbing pareidolia in Father Pitt’s brain.

    Right entrance
    Fan window

    On the other hand, the whole building was worth putting up just to display this fan window.

    Calvary Presbyterian
    Calvary Presbyterian

    The church is separated by less than a yard from its neighbor, the historically Black New Hope Baptist Church. It illustrates an interesting fact of social history: the separation of Black and White residents into different neighborhoods was largely a development of the second half of the twentieth century, and it was largely a conscious decision of the powers that were. In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, our urban neighborhoods were the proverbial melting pots of all nations and races.

    Second Presbyterian and Good Hope Baptist
    Second Presbyterian Church
    Canon PowerShot SX20 IS.
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  • St. Joseph’s Church, Manchester

    You are ordered to demolish, says the sticker
    Main entrance

    This building has been slowly crumbling for many years now, and it has finally reached a stage where reasonable people agree nothing can be done to save it. According to neighborhood gossip, it was estimated that five million dollars would be needed just to stabilize the structure, and no one has five million to spend on a big church in Manchester.

    St. Joseph’s Church
    Rowhouses on Liverpool Street

    It is part of the curious paradox of Manchester that this church stands on Liverpool Street right next to perhaps the finest and best-restored block of Victorian rowhouses in Pittsburgh. “A building like this anchors the community,” one neighbor told old Pa Pitt—“even in this condition.”

    Hole in the roof

    St. Joseph’s was built in 1897 for a German parish. The architect, as we might guess from the picturesque style and the buff brick, was Frederick Sauer.1

    Cornerstone with date 1897 partly scraped off
    Front elevation

    When the parish closed, the building was sold to a nondenominational congregation, but the same neighborhood gossip tells us that the congregation struggled even to pay utility bills. After it folded, the building stood vacant, and suffered the usual piecemeal destruction of a large vacant building.

    Main entrance

    A few days ago, Father Pitt passed by on Liverpool Street and saw the big red sticker on the door. It was pouring down rain at the time, but he went back the next morning to document the church before it disappears, which is why we have more than fifty pictures to show you.

    Many more pictures…

  • Swissvale Baptist Church

    Swissvale Baptist Church sign with church in background

    This historically Black congregation has been in Swissvale just about since there was a Swissvale. According to our correspondent “Calvin,” this building was originally the First Presbyterian Church of Swissvale. When that church built its new stone church in 1909, this building was sold and moved. (Moving buildings was surprisingly common, and there were firms that specialized in nothing else.)

    Front elevation of Swissvale Baptist Church
    Entrance
    Swissvale Baptist Church
    Swissvale Baptist Church
    Sony Alpha 3000 with 7Artisans f/1.4 35mm lens; Canon PowerShot SX20 IS.
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  • A. M. E. Brown Chapel, North Side

    A. M. E. Brown Chapel

    This historically Black congregation has met in this building for more than 120 years. Some of the stained glass is being restored, so old Pa Pitt will have to return for more pictures when the work is done. The architect was Frederick Sauer,1 who specified his favorite buff Kittanning brick for the job. These streets in the central part of the North Side are tiny, and Sauer’s challenge was to cram as much church as he could into a minuscule lot. He employed the usual Pittsburgh expedient of putting the sanctuary upstairs, with Sunday-school rooms and offices on the ground floor. It seems, by the way, that old Pa Pitt succeeded in finding the architect where other local historians failed (or didn’t try), but the citation is no surprise. This buff Kittanning brick was almost Sauer’s signature, and the building looks like what would happen if you squished St. Mary of the Mount into an impossibly tiny lot.

    Cornerstone with date 1903
    Front elevation
    Tower
    A. M. E. Brown Chapel
    Fujifilm FinePix HS20EXR.
    1. “Notes for the Afro-American,” Pittsburg Press, June 22, 1902, p. 7. “The plans and specifications of the new Brown chapel, Allegheny, are about completed, and in a few days Architect F. C. Sauer will advertise for bids and material.” ↩︎
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  • St. Gregory Russian Orthodox Church, Homestead

    St. Gregory Russian Orthodox Church

    We are not sure who designed this church, and perhaps a parishioner can enlighten us. Our problem is too many architects: James D. Van Trump attributed it to R. N. Verbrowski, but in the Charette for December, 1949, we read: “ ‘You never know what the Russians are doing,’ is Thomas Pringle’s report on his St. Gregory Russian Orthodox Greek Catholic Church for Homestead. Of brick with stone trim and one-story, the church will include a chapel, will cost approximately $75,000 and, with the help of God in donations, may be undertaken next Spring.” The mystery would evaporate if we assumed that the design was Verbrowski’s, and Pringle was the local architect of record responsible for supervising the building. At any rate, whoever was responsible for the design went deep into Russian tradition to pick out the elements, but arranged them in a very modern fashion.

    Cornerstone with date 1950

    The cornerstone preserves the memory of a traumatic event in Homestead’s history: perhaps as traumatic as the 1892 labor war that temporarily turned Homestead into an independent republic, and even as traumatic as the closing of the mills in the 1980s. In 1941, with the Second World War raging in Europe and the American government wisely preparing for the possibility of being sucked into the conflict, the Homestead mill was enormously expanded. Blocks and blocks of densely inhabited streets were bulldozed; splendid churches were razed; ethnic communities were scattered. Everything between Sixth Avenue and the river was just gone. Most of the churches rebuilt somewhere in upper Homestead; but several of them, like this one, could not build until after the war was over and the surviving male halves of their congregations returned.

    Tower
    Onion dome
    Dome and side of the church
    Entrance

  • St. Matthew’s Episcopal Church (1913), Homestead

    St. Matthew’s Episcopal Church

    Homestead’s own Adam G. Wickerham, whose office was a short stroll down the street, designed this distinctive Gothic church, the foundation of which was laid in 1913.1 It replaced the earlier St. Matthew’s, which had been built only fourteen years before and still stands a few strides away. In the picture above, we can see another Wickerham building across the street: the old Rodef Shalom synagogue, now a nondenominational church.

    St. Matthew’s Episcopal Church
    St. Matthew’s Episcopal Church
    St. Matthew’s Episcopal Church
    A later wing

    Old Pa Pitt does not know the history of this later wing.

    St. Matthew’s Episcopal Church
    Canon PowerShot SX20 IS; Fujifilm FinePix HS20EXR.
    1. The Construction Record, August 23, 1913: “Homestead, Pa.—Foundations are in for a $35,000 stone church to be constructed on McClure avenue and Tenth street for St. Mathew’s P. E. Congrega[tion] from plans drawn by Architect Adam Wickerham, McClure avenue.” ↩︎
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  • St. Matthew’s Episcopal Church (1899), Homestead

    Old St. Matthew’s Episcopal Church

    Charles J. Rieger was the architect of this little church with a big tower, which was built in 1899.1 (This is one of the earliest Rieger projects we have found; he had many years of productive work ahead of him.) The congregation must have grown rapidly, because only fourteen years later it moved a block up the street to a larger church. This building was sold to a Hungarian congregation; at some point it ceased to be a church and had a garage door cut into it.

    Cornerstone with Maltese cross and date of 1899
    Canon PowerShot SX20 IS.
    1. Philadelphia Real Estate Record & Builders’ Guide, March 29, 1899, p. 201: “At Homestead, Allegheny county, the vestry of St. Matthews’ Episcopal Church, at a meeting held a few days since, instructed the architect to have all plans and specifications ready by April 4th. Rev. W. J. White Frederick Howden and George Hatcher, committee, Architect Chas. Rieger, Renshaw Building, Pittsburg, Pa., is the architect, and will receive the bids.” ↩︎
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  • St. Nicholas Carpatho-Rusyn Orthodox Church, Homestead

    Domes of St. Nicholas

    It is traditional to paint onion domes blue like the heavens, or to gild them if the congregation is feeling rich. But Homestead was known for one thing, so these domes are glimmering Homestead stainless steel.

    St. Nicholas Orthodox Church

    This church was designed by Button & McLean, who also designed yesterday’s Homestead Senior High School. The Button of the pair was Lamont Button, whom we have met as a designer of high-class houses for the upper middle classes. Ground was broken in 1936, but the church got stuck at the basement level. It remained stuck until 1949, when the job was finally finished.1

    St. Nicholas Orthodox Church
    St. Nicholas Orthodox Church
    Front of the church
    Entrance
    Medallion
    Medallion
    Medallion
    Cornerstone
    Domes
    Canon PowerShot SX20 IS.
    1. “Who, What, Why, When and Where in Today’s Church Work,” Charette, December, 1949, p. 17. See also the Wikipedia article on St. Nicholas Carpatho-Rusyn Church. ↩︎
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  • SS. Peter and Paul Greek Catholic Church, Braddock

    SS. Peter and Paul Church

    This grand Byzantine church, built in 1923, is set on a steep slope on an implausibly tiny street. Its congregation is still going: for cultural and administrative reasons, Eastern churches tend to continue long after their Western neighbors have thrown in the towel. The church itself was modeled after the Cathedral of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross in Uzhhorod, Ukraine, which also served as the model for St. John the Baptist in Munhall; but the architect of this one, W. Ward Williams,1 took his model more literally than Titus de Bobula did. Curiously enough the church in Ukraine has the same kind of slope to deal with, as we see in this picture by Raimond Spekking:

    Cathedral of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross, by Raimond Spekking
    © Raimond Spekking / CC BY-SA 4.0 (via Wikimedia Commons)
    Cornerstone with dates of 1896 and 1923
    Pediment

    The pediment is strictly classical, Doric rather than the Corinthian of its model, with the inscription “Russian Greek Catholic Church of SS. Peter and Paul.”

    Tower
    SS. Peter and Paul Church
    1. Source: Proposals, Pittsburg Press, May 26, 1922, p. 38. “Proposals are invited from building contractors for the erection of a fireproof church building to be erected for SS. Peter and Paul Greek Catholic church. George st., Braddock, Pa. Bids are to be made on forms as furnished by the Architect, W. Ward Williams…” In the original version of the article, we did not know the architect, but a lucky item buried in a correspondence from David Schwing sent us on a long chase, and we finally cornered Mr. Williams. ↩︎