J. H. Giesy was the architect of this little utility-company palace, built in 1916.1
The relief in the shield is so shallow that it has eroded to near invisibility. It looks to old Pa Pitt like an allegorical figure pouring out water, but he is happy to be corrected by someone with a better eye or more accurate information.
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.” ↩︎
Later known as the Mulberry Presbyterian Church. O. M. Topp and Charles W. Hutchison, “țhe well-known Pittsburg architect,” were the architects of this church, built in 1911.1
In spite of his self-declared notability, Charles W. Hutchison has not left much of a visible architectural legacy: after some searching, old Pa Pitt found only two projects definitely attributable to him, of which this is one. It was probably his own church: he lived in Wilkinsburg. His moment of greatest fame came the year after this church was built, when his honeymoon trip was interrupted by the wreck of the Titanic: he and his bride were passengers on the Carpathia, the ship that picked up Titanic survivors. He sold his story, with a well-made diagram of the scene of the rescue, to the Press, which put him on the front page as “the well-known Pittsburg architect.”
Olaf M. Topp, on the other hand, was a very successful architect with a long career ahead of him and much experience behind him. Half the prewar Lutheran churches in the Pittsburgh area were designed by Topp, in addition to a few for other denominations; and in secular buildings his greatest work was the still-lamented Jenkins Arcade.
A while ago this church was taken over by an organization with ambitious plans to turn it into a Center for Civic Arts. The plans seem to have run hard up against economic reality, however, and when old Pa Pitt visited recently the building was up for sale again.
“Old Town of Aspect All Modern,” Pittsburg Press, July 14, 1907. “One of the most important additions to the structural beauty of the place 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.” ↩︎
A modernistic apartment building in a good state of preservation. Father Pitt sees nothing Yorkish or royal about it in particular; the same building could have been called the Monte Carlo or the Emperor Montezuma or the Thomas Jefferson with just as much stylistic appropriateness. But the name is important in selling the idea of the building to tenants: you will be able to say, “I live at the Royal York,” and that sounds much more impressive than “815 North Avenue.”
Old Pa Pitt takes it as one of his missions to record things that may vanish soon, so that posterity will have some visual memory of them. This apartment building is abandoned, and it had been given some unsympathetic remodelings before it was entirely given up on. Nevertheless, it was an attractive if ordinary building, and it could be made attractive again if Wilkinsburg became a trendy neighborhood. Right now it survives because no one has the money and the will to tear it down.
Addendum: Thanks to our correspondent David Schwing, we can identify the architects as Wilkinsburg’s own A. Dudgeon & Son. The building was called the Eleanor; it was built in 1905.1
Gazette, February 17, 1905, p. 13. “Architects A. Dudgeon & Son have plans nearly completed for an $18,000 flat building for J. M. Lesher in South avenue, Wilkinsburg.” Plat maps show the building, called the Eleanor, owned by J. M. Lesher in 1915. ↩︎
Designed in 1902 by the Beezer Brothers, this was Wilkinsburg’s contribution to the early skyscraper age. It was put up for Leopold Vilsack, a real-estate investor who was also one of the founders of the Iron City brewery. He named it for his son Carl; later it became known as the Shields Building.
When it was announced, the building was to have eight floors. One floor fell away between initial design and construction.
The building is now apartments. The base has been refurbished with a simpler and more abstract design that hardly registers as different from the original until we look at it closely.
The cap is festooned with elaborate Baroque terra-cotta ornaments.
Alden & Harlow were the architects of this classically symmetrical school, which was built in 1926. Alden had died in 1908, and Harlow had only another year to live (he died in 1927); it seems that by this time much of the design work in the firm was done by Howard K. Jones. The school now is kept in good shape as the home of various community services.
The 1920s were in the middle of the golden age of terra-cotta ornament.
The architects had a typically Pittsburghish lot to deal with, so the school has four floors above ground on the Wallace Avenue front and two in the rear on North Avenue.
This is almost unique in Pittsburgh: an apartment building that curves into a crescent shape to follow the curve in the street. It is deliberately given a Georgian look to remind us of the crescents in London. Old Pa Pitt has not been able to determine an architect yet; the complex was built for James A. Wilson in 1903. In 2011 it was restored under the supervision of Landmarks Design Associates.
George Nattress & Sons of Philadelphia were the architects of this church, one of the dwindling number of black stone churches in Pittsburgh. The Nattresses were favorites among Episcopalians. Old Pa Pitt can think of any number of Pittsburgh architects of the era who could have done just as well or better from at least an external point of view, but perhaps the Philadelphians had an innate sense of the rhythm of Episcopalian worship.
Impressive wooden doors form the main entrance.
The inscription “My house shall be called the house of prayer for all people” is from Isaiah 56:7, which was later quoted by Jesus on the one occasion in his earthly career when he got really angry: the Cleansing of the Temple.
The rough-cut black stones of the front arcade. Old Pa Pitt still thinks the sooty blackness adds dignity to many an otherwise prosaic church, and he encourages congregations that still possess black stone churches to keep their historical soot.
The parish house is built of matching stone (or at least the stones matched after a few years of exposure to Pittsburgh’s blackening atmosphere), but the neat frames for the windows and doors give it a more urbane and less rustic appearance.
Father Pitt knows nothing about this building other than what you see here. It is an interesting combination of traditional and modern, with a simple cornice that could easily date from the 1890s, but more modernistic corner windows making bright sunrooms that invite tenants to use them as conservatories. The original windows have been preserved in most of the apartments; a few have been replaced.
The glass and metal awning needs just a little working over to make it a splendid and impressive statement at the entrance again.
