Father Pitt

Tag: Filling Stations

  • Old Filling Station in Larimer

    Filling station
    Sony Alpha 3000.

    There was a time when even the humble gas station was expected to make an attempt at being an ornament to its neighborhood, and the little buildings were designed by real architects. This little service station right at the end of the Larimer Avenue bridge probably dates from the 1920s, and it has had very few alterations. On the one hand, it makes no attempt to disguise what it is; on the other hand, the polygonal office and shop in front creates an impression of welcoming domesticity that makes the business seem like a friendly neighbor.

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  • Old Filling Station on West Liberty Avenue

    Old filling station

    Pittsburgh invented the drive-up filling station for automobiles, and every once in a while we run across a relic of that first generation of gas stations. This one in the West Liberty Avenue automotive district is not a filling station anymore, but it is still attached to a garage. It appears on a 1925 Sanborn Fire Insurance map as “Fill’g sta.,” but we cannot be sure of the date, because those Sanborn maps were kept up to date for years by carefully pasting newly printed jigsaw pieces over the map, as we can see in this image:

    Old filling station

    Capital Avenue, which is still Belgian block, rises steeply behind the little building, so that the rear of the building is mostly under ground.

    Old filling station