The Wilkinsburg borough building, which also houses the library, was designed by Theodore Eichholz in 1938, at the height of the mania for Colonial American architecture spurred by the restoration of Williamsburg. It opened on the first day of 1940.1 In these past two years it has been getting some restoration, including replacement of those tall columns, which are made of wood. The old ones had rotted; these new ones, carefully duplicating the originals, are supposedly treated to prevent rot—although if you only have to replace your wooden columns once every eighty-five years, you’re not doing too badly.
When the thriving borough of Wilkinsburg needed a magnificent new high school to accommodate its mushrooming population, the borough government decided to get the best building possible by inviting an all-star cast of architects to a competition. From the Pittsburg Press, July 8, 1908, p. 17:
Plans for a high school building to cost over $200,000 will be received by the school board of Wilkinsburg. The architects in the competition are Thomas H. Scott, M. G. Wilkins Company, DeBobula & Hazeltine, Milligan & Miller, S. E. Schrieber and E. J. Carlise. M. F. Henning is chairman of the building committee. The competing architects will be given about a month to submit plans.
The winner was Thomas H. Scott, whose name was among the few correctly spelled in the article. He beat some big names, including Wilkinsburg’s own Milligan & Miller, E. J. Carlisle (who already had many schools to his credit), the W. G. Wilkins Company (specialists in large industrial buildings and warehouses, including the one that is now the Andy Warhol Museum), the wildly eccentric and self-aggrandizing genius Titus de Bobula (with an otherwise unknown partner), and probably Frederick Scheibler, if we are correct in guessing that “F. G. Scheibler” was misheard over the telephone as “S. E. Schrieber.” Scott, of course, was a big name himself, and the borough could have had no reason to regret its choice.
The school, which is an interconnected complex of buildings that also included the junior high school, is no longer in use as a school: Wilkinsburg students go to Westinghouse in Pittsburgh from the seventh grade on. But the building is well maintained.
Wilkinsburg’s own Milligan & Miller designed this rambling Gothic church, which is still in use by its original congregation, now South Avenue United Methodist. “One of the most important additions to the structural beauty of the place,” said a 1907 Pittsburg Press feature on Wilkinsburg,1 “will be the new South Avenue Methodist Episcopal Church, which is to replace the old burned down last February. It is to cost $125,000 and will be one of the finest church buildings in the community. The construction is under the charge of Architects Milligan & Miller, who designed the plans.”
The Beezer Brothers designed Wilkinsburg’s miniature skyscraper for real-estate developer and brewer Leopold Vilsack. It was built in 1902.1 It had been announced as the Vilsack Building; Vilsack named it the Carl Building (after his son) while it was still under construction; later it was called the Shields Building. It holds a curious place in the history of public housing: it was converted to apartments for senior citizens in 1975 as the first Section 8 housing project.
The Beezers’ rendering of the proposed building appeared in the Gazette for April 12, 1902:
You may notice, if you count carefully, that the building lost a floor between initial design and construction.
We transcribe the caption under the drawing:
Wilkinsburg is soon to have a sky-scraper—somewhat of an infant in its class, perhaps, but ’way above any of its neighbors, and abundant evidence of the hustle and pride that characterize the residents of Pittsburgh’s most attractive suburb. The Vilsack office building, for such will be the title of the new structure, will be a thoroughly high-class building, its owner, Leopold Vilsack, having spared no pains or cost in the plans to make it equal in convenience to any of the more pretentious structures downtown. The site for the building is at the southeast corner of Wood and Ross streets, on a lot 33×122 feet, which Mr. Vilsack purchased a few months ago through his agent, James B. Lawler, for $18,000. The building was designed by Beezer Bros. It will be seven stories high and absolutely fireproof in its construction. Architecturally the building will be an exceptionally handsome structure. The first two stories facing in Wood and Ross streets will be built of Indiana limestone and the upper stories of gray pressed brick and terra cotta. Two high-speed elevators will carry the tenants and the building will have a duplicate boiler system to furnish it with power, heat and light. The first floor will be used for storerooms. On the upper floors are about 90 offices, all finished in hard wood and provided with marble floors and wainscoting. A large barber shop and a photograph studio will be among the features. Water will be supplied from an artesian well. The building is to be erected under the immediate direction of Beezer Bros. and will cost at least $150,000. The house on the lot, now occupied by Dr. A. B. Smith, the former owner, will be moved about 150 yards up Ross street on to another lot of Mr. Vilsack’s. Work on the new building will begin May 1 and it is expected it will be finished by January 1.
It is interesting to note that, if you visit the building today, you will once again find “a large barber shop” among the features.
Built in 1916, the Wilkinsburg Masonic Temple was designed by Alden & Harlow. Mr. Alden had already been dead for eight years, but his famous name was kept at the head of the firm; Howard K. Jones, whose name was not added to the firm (as “Alden, Harlow & Jones”) until 1927, was doing much of the design work by 1916, and may have had a large hand in this building.
It’s a curious structure, two-thirds basement. Often lodge halls were put on upper floors to provide rentable storefronts on the ground floor that would pay for the building, but that is obviously not the case here. Perhaps the reason may be sought in pure symbolism. Whatever goes on in this building (which the uninitiated are not permitted to know) is so lofty that even the members must ascend through two and a half levels of basement before they can reach the main event.
A full-page photograph in the Architectural Record from 1925 shows us that the front of the building has not changed in any noticeable way, except for the new doors and windows:
Unlike some other landmark buildings in Wilkinsburg, this one has been preserved by new occupants, the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community Mosque, who clearly love the building and keep it in sparkling condition. Even the inscription and the cartouche have been attractively covered, not obliterated, by the Muslim community.
This fine corner-tower church, whose cornerstone was laid in 1911, was designed by O. M. Topp and Charles M. Hutchison.1 The plan was probably made in 1906, when a small chapel was put up with the intention of building the larger church when there was enough money. This is one of the very rare cases, incidentally, where the Pittsburgh History and Landmarks Foundation is wrong. The PHLF plaque has the church designed by F. Hoffman & Co.; but F. Hoffman & Co., was a Wilkinsburg contractor (probably the one that got the contract for the building), not an architectural firm.
The congregation is gone, but some attempt is being made to restore the building as a Center for Civic Arts. Old Pa Pitt wishes the Center good fortune, because this fine building deserves to have a future, and Wilkinsburg deserves art. As we can see from this old postcard from the Presbyterian Historical Society collection, the building has hardly been altered at all:
The congregation prospered, and in 1928 a large educational wing was built—now abandoned and in bad shape. The architect was Lawrence Wolfe, with O. M. Topp—by then one of the grand old men of Pittsburgh architecture—listed as “associate architect.”2
One of the most imposing-looking banks in the whole Pittsburgh area, this expensive—we had almost said egregiously expensive—Doric pile seems not to be occupied at the moment, but it is in beautiful shape externally. It was still in use as a bank until about six years ago, so it is fully accessible and waiting for the next tenant who needs a building that will knock people’s socks off.
J. H. Giesey was the architect of this rich-looking palace for a utility company.1 It was built in 1916, and it has been restored very neatly, although if old Pa Pitt applied his highest standards to the restoration, he would have to admit to not liking either the filled-in windows or the new front door very much.
Source: American Contractor, October 16, 1915, p. 58. “Office Bldg.: 2 sty. & bas. 50×100. $20M. Wilkinsburg, Pa. Archt. J. H. Giesey, Mellon Bank bldg., Pittsburgh. Owner Penn Water Co., Oliver bldg., Wilkinsburg. Bids in; will soon let contr. Brk.” ↩︎
This flamboyantly eclectic building caught old Pa Pitt’s eye as he walked down Wood Street in Wilkinsburg. He knows nothing else about it, other than that he hopes current and future owners realize that they have a remarkable building in an unusually good state of preservation.
Designed by Walter H. Cookson, this station—one of the grandest of our suburban stations—was built in 1916. The last train left in 1975. After sitting abandoned for decades, the station has finally been restored to very nearly its original appearance.
