Back when tuberculosis was incurable, the best medical wisdom held that plenty of fresh air was essential for tuberculosis patients. Thus this hospital for tuberculosis was given a parklike setting with plenty of pleasant areas for sitting around in the healthful outdoors. Now that it is a retirement home called Milliones Manor, the beautifully landscaped grounds are just as welcome.
The main building was designed by E. P. Mellon, nephew of Andrew Mellon. Other buildings—Father Pitt has not sorted out which is which—were designed by other local stars, including Benno Janssen and Ingham, Boyd & Pratt.
The late Franklin Toker believed that these houses were probably designed by Frederick Scheibler. He was following the original scholars of Frederick Scheibler, Shear and Schmertz, who brought poor old Scheibler out of obscurity in his old age in time to see himself hailed as a prophet of modern architecture.
Father Pitt hates to contradict Dr. Toker, whose encyclopedic knowledge of Pittsburgh architecture was probably unmatched; but Toker has been wrong before. Martin Aurand, whose biography of Scheibler will probably remain the definitive one for generations to come, lists these houses under the “misattributions.”
Old Pa Pitt himself is of the Aurand opinion, and in fact Father Pitt has probable grounds for attributing these houses—without, however, claiming complete certainty—to Benno Janssen. His reason is that there is a very similar terrace in Oakland (368–376 McKee Place) that is almost certainly by Janssen & Abbott. Father Pitt hopes to have pictures of those houses soon; meanwhile, you can take his word for it—or look them up on Google Street View—that it would be odd if one of these terraces were by Janssen & Abbott and the other by Scheibler.
These houses are yet another clever answer to the question of how to design a terrace of relatively inexpensive houses so that they are architecturally attractive and distinctive—so that, in other words, they make potential tenants think they’re getting something special. Compare them, for example, to the row just next door to the left, which was built on a lower budget to a much more ordinary design.
Benno Janssen and Edward J. Hergenroeder were the architects of this school, which seems to show the economy of line old Pa Pitt associates with Janssen. Hergenroeder would go on to design many Catholic schools, as well as the convent around the corner from this one (which we’ll be seeing soon).
The parish school closed years ago, but the building has found another use, so it is occupied and well maintained.
Among the decorations are several inscriptions, most of them not from Catholic sources.
“Knowledge is that which, next to virtue, truly and essentially raises one man above another.” —Addison.
The side entrance on Arvada Way.
“The purest treasure mortal times afford is spotless reputation.” —Shakespeare.
Terra-cotta figures of children enjoying their childhood decorate the side walls of the school.
The Negley was probably built in about 1909; the architects were the firm of Janssen & Abbott. Some of the original details have vanished over the years, but Benno Janssen’s spare version of Georgian style still leaves an impression of dignity and elegance.
An unusual choice: the doorway frames are cast iron.
The Buhl Building, an early work of Benno Janssen, bathed in reflected light. Perhaps the image would be more poetic without the construction zone at the end of Fifth Avenue, but old Pa Pitt can only do so much about construction zones.
The Keystone Athletic Club was designed by Benno Janssen, Pittsburgh’s favorite architect for high-class clubs of all sorts. Most of them were classical in style, but for this skyscraper clubhouse Janssen chose a simple and streamlined Gothic style instead. It is now Lawrence Hall, the main building of Point Park University, so that two universities in Pittsburgh have trademark Gothic skyscrapers.
Early in his career, Benno Janssen was a fiend for terra cotta; he was much more restrained later on, but he usually included some characteristically appropriate terra-cotta ornaments.
An elegant Tudor or Jacobean mansion designed by MacClure & Spahr and built in 1903, as the dormer tells us. This Post-Gazette story (reprinted in a Greenville, North Carolina, paper that does not keep it behind a paywall) tells us that a 1925 addition was designed by Benno Janssen, who had worked in the MacClure & Spahr office and may have had some responsibility for the original design. The article also tells us how vandals masquerading as interior designers rampaged through the house and painted all the interior woodwork white or pale grey to “banish dark wood,” but at least the exterior is in good shape.
Most of the houses in Schenley Farms were built singly: usually the property owner chose an architect, though the land company built a few houses to sell on spec. But on Schenley Farms Terrace, Janssen & Abbott were hired to design a row of seventeen houses all at once. The result is one of those rare tract-house developments where the houses are little masterpieces that combine to make a beautiful and well-thought-out streetscape.
(The house at extreme left with the colonnaded balcony is not part of the Janssen & Abbott row.)
Similar developments stick to one style, but on Schenley Farms Terrace you come across a Colonial Revival house, and then a crisply modern cottage, and then a Pittsburgh Foursquare, and then a French farmhouse. Somehow they all look comfortable together.
Again, similar developments stick to one scale, but Janssen uses differences in height to make a streetscape that feels as though it just grew there.
We have quite a large number of pictures here, so we put them behind a “more” link to avoid weighing down the front page.
The architect Benno Janssen, one of the titans of Pittsburgh architecture, was very fond of terra cotta, as he showed early in his career in the exuberant Wedgwood patterns of the Buhl Building. The William Penn is more restrained, but it is still a feast for lovers of ornament.
The head of William Penn in ceremonial Quaker headdress.
