Pittsburgh After the Fire from Boyd’s Hill, by William C. Wall, 1845. In the Carnegie Museum of Art.
“Every year, on the 10th day of April, the fire-bells ring out the number 1-8-4-5, in memory of the baptism of fire that comes, sooner or later, to nearly every city. Like all great disasters of this kind, the origin was trifling. While the loyal but noisy fire-cracker decorates the historical shield of the fire department of Portland, Maine, and the combination of a kicking cow and a coal-oil lamp that of Chicago, the homely but useful wash-boiler stands as a reminder of the greatest disaster that has ever fallen on Pittsburgh. Early in the morning of the 10th of April, I845, an extra hot fire under a wash-boiler, in a poor tenement at the corner of Ferry street and Second street, now second avenue, started a fire which, for lack of water, was soon beyond the control of the fire department. A high wind carried the burning fire-brands over the different portions of the city, and in a few hours one-third of the geographical extent of the city and two-thirds of its value, was only a mass of charred cinders. The estimated loss was from six to eight million dollars, while twelve thousand people, most of whom had been in good circumstances, were rendered homeless. Fortunately but two persons lost their lives, one being Mr. Samuel Kingston, and the other Mrs. Malone. This was a severe blow to the business interests of the city, but with remarkable pluck the work of rebuilding was begun at once. The most liberal settlements were made by those having goods here on commission, generous aid was extended to the sufferers, and the city rallied rapidly from what otherwise would have been its death knell.”
The Hotel Roosevelt, as it appeared in a 1928 advertisement in the National Vaudeville Artists Year Book. The advertisement was designed to appeal to performers on the vaudeville circuit (which was just about to come crashing down and would be nearly extinct in five years), and it was certainly a convenient location, within a block’s walk of at least five theaters. The Roosevelt still stands today, converted to apartments, and it is still surrounded by theaters.
The ad carries the name of L. Fred Klooz, President and Managing Director, and it includes a bit of doggerel so awful that we can only presume it was written by Mr. Klooz himself.
This picture has been manipulated on two planes to match the perspective of the 1889 image below. It is no longer possible to stand in exactly the same place, because other buildings have sprouted in inconvenient places.
W. H. Keech was a dealer in furniture and carpets. In the 1880s he built this towering six-floor commercial palace on Penn Avenue at Garrison Place in the furniture district. The main part of the building has hardly changed since the photograph below was published in Pittsburgh Illustrated in 1889:
Probably in the 1890s, an addition was put on the right-hand side of the building, matching the original as well as possible.
This building is festooned with decorative details in just the right places, including some Romanesque carved stone above the entrance. (Addendum: The architect of the original building and additions, including one to the right later destroyed by fire and another one after that, was James T. Steen, according to a plaque on the Conover Building three doors down, which was originally part of the expanded Keech Block.)
Old Pa Pitt recommends wandering in back alleys as a hobby. You never know what you might find, from antique sculpture to ghost signs. Dimling’s hasn’t had a candy shop here for more than fifty years, but this sign still sits on the back of the building the shop once occupied, facing Exchange Way at the intersection with Tito Way.
When it was prospering, Dimling’s Liberty Avenue shop occupied two buildings and covered them with tiles that made the entire Liberty Avenue façade a giant billboard. The picture above is a detail of a much larger photograph taken by the Pittsburgh City Photographer in 1965: it may still be encumbered by copyright (although probably not, unless the copyright was renewed), but if the city of Pittsburgh wants a fee for using it Father Pitt can probably afford a quarter or so.
By the 1970s, the buildings were still a billboard for Dimling’s, but a photo from 1973 shows that the tenants were Arthur Treacher’s, an adult theater, and a massage parlor.
The wheel of history kept turning, however, and the restoration of Liberty Avenue brought these buildings back to respectable use. Peeling away the tiles revealed the old Victorian fronts, which have been lovingly restored and now make up part of the extraordinary Victorian streetscape of Liberty Avenue in the Cultural District.
Pennsylvania streetcars do not run on standard-gauge track. This is not just a local quirk: it was a law of the Commonwealth. Streetcar companies must not lay standard-gauge track. Why did we have such a law? Well…
This is Liberty Avenue in 1889, where a railroad ran down the middle to serve the wholesalers. Now imagine one backroom deal with the streetcar company, one little switch, a few extra feet of track, and suddenly the Pennsylvania Railroad has access to every major street in the city.
But that can’t happen, because the streetcar tracks are a different gauge.
That is why, to this day, streetcars in Pittsburgh and Philadelphia use Pennsylvania Broad Gauge or Pennsylvania Trolley Gauge, 5 feet 2½ inches, instead of the standard American rail gauge of 4 feet 8½ inches. (Actually, Philadelphia is off by a quarter-inch at 5 feet 2¼ inches.) Most other American transit systems use standard gauge, although New Orleans streetcars use Pennsylvania Broad Gauge, too.
A view across the Bellefield Bridge toward the Carnegie Library in Oakland. The bridge is still there, but you can’t see it. The hollow was filled in with the bridge still in place, and the Mary Schenley Memorial Fountain sits on top of the buried bridge now.
This view shows the library building before the enormous expansion in 1907. The two towers were victims of the expansion—but also perhaps victims of some negative criticism. The building in general—designed by Longfellow, Alden & Harlow—was highly praised, but some critics thought the towers a bit embarrassing. When Alden & Harlow (Longfellow had decided to stay in Boston) designed the new addition, the towers came down.
The busy and chaotic Mon Wharf, where goods were loaded and unloaded and passengers came to board downstream-bound steamboats. This picture was published in 1894, and we can see the dawn of the skyscraper age just beginning to break: the Conestoga Building, finished in 1892, was the first building in Pittsburgh built on a steel frame, and one of the first in the world.
The view is quite different today (or in 2021, when these pictures were taken), though many of the same buildings are there. The Robert Moses plan ringed downtown Pittsburgh with expressways, as Moses had done with Manhattan, cutting off the people from the rivers. It was an understandable adaptation: if there must be expressways, the riverfronts made space for them without knocking down a lot of buildings. But it took us decades to begin to reclaim the shores with a system of parks and bicycle trails.
From The Pittsburgh Bicentennial in 1958, an advertisement for Alcoa aluminum as the new wonder material in construction. All these buildings are still standing, though the Heinz Food Research Center badly needs a rescue.
From Closing Services, First Methodist Protestant Church, Fifth Avenue, Pittsburgh, some engravings of the old downtown church on Fifth Avenue, built in 1832. It was a sad day, of course, when the congregation moved out in 1892, but the consolation was that they were moving into a grand new Romanesque church designed for them by Frederick Osterling (still standing today as the Korean Central Church of Pittsburgh). They were probably also taking a pile of money for their church: the Kaufmann Brothers had leased the land on which the church stood, and soon a huge addition to their department store would rise there.
The First M. P. congregation had succumbed to the forces that were changing Pittsburgh from a dense medium-sized city to an urban colossus. The “Introductory Note” to the commemorative book explains the circumstances very well.
That those who worshipped together in the old church were strongly attached to it was a matter of course, and when at the close of the last service in it, Sabbath evening, May 15, the large congregation slowly retired, many went away with heavy hearts, sorrowing most of all because they should enter their old church home no more. If it is asked why did the church dispose of its home the answer is: The inexorable logic of events so decreed.
When the church was built probably no better location could have been found. It was then almost in the centre of the city and was easily reached from every point in the town. The population was held within a comparatively small territory, but as the city grew the need for business property became more and more urgent, and consequently the people were gradually forced away from their homes in the business sections of the city and scattered into surrounding suburbs. Many of the churches located in what was Pittsburgh sixty years ago have found in these later years their membership steadily and inevitably diminishing in number, and the difficulty in recruiting their ranks has increased with almost every passing year; and the explanation of both facts is the plain one: That the people have moved away and built other churches convenient to their homes.
So the church was abandoned to the inexorable march of commerce—but the land was not. For many years thereafter, Kaufmann’s, the Big Store, stood partly on land that was owned by and paying good money to the First Methodist Protestant Church, now in the tony suburb of Shadyside.
From the Sangamon Valley Collection, published at SangamonLink. These cards were sold in a local restaurant when Schrader set up shop in Springfield, Illinois.
On a blustery day in March of 1897, a bearded man in a robe rolled up on a bicycle and set up shop in the Masonic Hall in Dutchtown. Although no advance publicity had heralded his arrival, he was nevertheless recognized at once, and crowds started to gather around him. This was Schrader, the Divine Healer. And if you ask how he was recognized at once, it probably helped that he wore a bright sash across his chest with the words “DIVINE HEALER SCHRADER” printed in big letters.
Although his arrival was unheralded, the wire services had been playing John the Baptist for him for more than a year. Everywhere he went, Schrader was news. He attracted crowds; and the more news he generated, the larger the crowds; and the larger the crowds, the more news he generated.
And so we will allow the Press reporter to take it from here, and old Pa Pitt will return afterward to wrap up the story.
SCHRADER THE HEALER
BIKED INTO ALLEGHENY TO PRACTICE ON THE PUBLIC.
HIS COSTUME AND LOOKS.
He Gives an Illustration of His Alleged Miraculous Powers—Clergymen Opposed to His Methods and Describe His Subjects as Weak-Minded and Impressible.
Schrader, “the divine healer” from the west, arrived in Allegheny yesterday and this morning opened a mission for the healing of the sick and the lame, in the barroom of Masonic hall on Washington street. His coming was unheralded and the divine healer slipped in from Parkersburg on a bicycle.
The opening of the mission is being met by an avalanche of opposition from the North Side ministers. Schrader has been denounced as a fraud and an imposter by Rev. W. J. Robinson, of the First United Presbyterian church on Union avenue. In addition to the denu[n]ciation Assistant Superintendent Glenn, of the Allegheny police department, has ordered a watch kept on the alleged apostle’s movements, and Detective P. M. McDonough was this morning sent to investigate Schrader and the character of his meetings.
Schrader is a remarkable man. Personally he bears all the earmarks of being a sharp fakir, and is almost repulsive to look upon. His mouth is large and sensual, the forehead blotched and the nose and eye unattractive. These defects in his personal beauty are covered by a beard and long, curling hair, worn after the style of the old-time master’s conception of the Holy One. His clothes are old and worn, but over these he wears a long robe of cheap material and a cheap red sash.
In spite of the inclemency of the weather this morning, there were a number of people present when Schrader arrived at Masonic hall. He did not wait for any preliminaries, but started to work at once in his muddy shoes and bedraggled clothes.
His first subject was J. F. McBride, of 7 Monitor street. McBride is a believer in spiritualism, and for years has been a sufferer from nervous troubles. Schrader laid his hands on his head, and after shaking his brow gently, made the sign of the cross upon his breast. McBride’s handkerchief was then taken and blest, after which the stamp bearing the words “Schrader, the Devine Healer” was put upon it. McBride is an educated man, and thoroughly versed in hypnotism. He claims that there is no hypnotic influence excited by Schrader, but there is an undefinable feeling during the period the hands were left on the head. His nervousness entirely disappeared. Others were not so fortunate and left the room without receiving any relief.
Schrader, who is but 25 years old, said to a Press reporter this morning that he would remain in Allegheny for several weeks. It is his intention to hold meetings dally, but a sufficient number of people were not present to-day. He claims that since he was 13 years of age he has been practicing faith cure. He has been through the entire west, but unlike Balaam, who in Biblical times rode about on an ass, Schrader rides a bicycle. During his visit to Mexico he practiced the deception that he was Christ, and, according to his own story, was besieged by thousands, among whom he performed many cures.
In Allegheny his work will not be confined to his mission in the room, which has been the scene of many disgraceful orgies, but he will visit houses of the sick. His first public appearance was in 1895. From that time he has created a profound sensation in all parts of the west. He finally suddenly disappeared, and when he turned up in Denver he claimed he had fasted for 40 days on the Holy Cross mountain. Last spring Schrader came east and wandered through the south until he reached Galveston, Tex. He also spent considerable time at Chattanooga and Lexington. At the latter place he held services in the united brotherho[o]d church. He is accompanied in his wanderings by one man, who claims to be a believer. Schrader claims to have come to Allegheny at divine dictation.
Rev. W. J. Robinson, when seen by a Press reporter this morning, said: my mind Schrader is a most pronounced fraud. From the accounts the newspapers have published of his wandering, he is undoubtedly a man who has lost all moral sense of right and should be ostracized from a religious community. Every indication points to the fact that the man is a fraud. He claims to be gifted with the spirit of God. This alone should condemn him in the eyes of right thinking people. In addition to the fact his alleged cures are performed upon people who are nervous and physically weak and who are liable to great excitement.”
Rev. Robinson is not alone in his stand against Schrader, but a number of other ministers are indignant that such actions should be tolerated by the police. In defense of the position in which the police department is placed Assistant Superintendent Glenn said that as long as Schrader did not charge for his services or hold disorderly gatherings, he could not interfere. He ordered Schrader watched, however.
And now old Pa Pitt will wrap up with just a few more words. It seems as though Schrader’s visit to Allegheny followed the usual pattern. You may have noticed that a hall was prepared for him—the old German Masonic Hall at the intersection of Washington Street (now Pressley) and Madison Avenue, a location that is now under a pile of expressway spaghetti. Someone had planned the visit in advance. An article at the SangamonLink site describes Schrader’s visit to Springfield, Illinois, in 1896. It includes that card reproduced above. According to that article, Schrader was sponsored by local businessmen and railroads, who found it profitable to exploit the crowds he drew. The article is entertaining reading, so Father Pitt will send you there instead of filling in the details here. Another article at a Pittsfield news site tells us more about Schrader’s background.
Schrader continued in the faith-healing business for some years longer. Did he believe in his own divinity? It’s possible, but people who knew him before he became divine remembered him as a con man. In later years he grew more openly mercenary. He sold those divinely blessed handkerchiefs, the ones stamped with his name that he was already handing out in Allegheny, through the mail—a poor decision, because mail fraud was a federal crime. He was indicted, but died of natural causes while awaiting trial.
