Father Pitt

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  • Urban Archaeology: The Hotel Henry

    Fragment of a plate from the Hotel Henry

    One never knows what may turn up at an old homesite. The Seldom Seen Greenway on the border of Beechview and Mount Washington is forest now, with Saw Mill Run gushing merrily through it. But Seldom Seen was a little village of its own once, and the old homesites are full of broken plates and bottles and other items of intense archaeological interest. Here is a plate from the Hotel Henry, once a grand hotel on Fifth Avenue, but torn down in the 1950s to make way for a modernist skyscraper. Was it bought or stolen from the hotel? We’ll never know.

    The Historic Pittsburgh site has a good picture of the Hotel Henry as it appeared in about 1900.

    Do you need a copy of the hotel’s logo in scalable form? Probably not, but old Pa Pitt has reconstructed it for you anyway:

    April 6, 2021
  • Reflections in the Seldom Seen Arch

    Hypnotic patterns of sunlight reflected from the pool in Saw Mill Run on the bricks of the Seldom Seen Arch. Go to the Wikimedia Commons hosting page to see the video in glorious HD-ish.

    April 6, 2021
  • Saw Mill Run, the Movie

    Another video of Saw Mill Run in action. You can go to the hosting page on Wikimedia Commons for the HD version.

    April 3, 2021
  • Daffodils in the Snow: The Movie Version

    If you were waiting for the movie, here it is. You can go to the Wikimedia Commons hosting page for the HD version.

    April 2, 2021
  • Carnegie International Medal of Honor

    The first Carnegie International was held in 1896, and it immediately became one of the most important exhibitions of modern art in the world. Andrew Carnegie believed in encouraging artists by collecting the old masters of tomorrow, and many priceless works have been acquired for the Carnegie’s collection from International exhibitions.

    This Medal of Honor was designed for the Carnegie by Tiffany & Co. It was reproduced in the catalogue of the 1899 International, which is a beautiful publication from the golden age of American printing.

    March 30, 2021
  • Saw Mill Run After Spring Rains

    March 30, 2021
  • Keystone Athletic Club

    Keystone Athletic Club, Pittsburgh (now Lawrence Hall, Point Park University)

    One of Benno Janssen’s many contributions to the architecture of downtown and Oakland, this is now Lawrence Hall of Point Park University, so that two Pittsburgh universities actually have signature Gothic skyscrapers.

    March 28, 2021
  • Frank & Seder

    Kaufmann’s was the Big Store, but Frank & Seder, facing Kaufmann’s across a whole block of Smithfield Street, was hardly small. The building is now under restoration.

    The restoration has peeled away later accretions, and we can see the shadows of an old sign at the corner of Forbes Avenue.

    Two layers of ghost signs still memorialize the old department store to pedestrians on Fifth Avenue.

    Compare the photograph to this illustration of the store in 1927.

    March 28, 2021
  • Daffodil Time

    March 23, 2021
  • Crocus Time

    March 21, 2021
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