Father Pitt

Tag: Gothic Architecture

  • St. Bernard’s from Mt. Lebanon Cemetery

    A winter view of St. Bernard’s from Mt. Lebanon Cemetery, featuring a fine silhouette of a tree. Below, more church and less tree.

  • Mt. Lebanon United Presbyterian Church

    The west front of this church, with its outsized towers, was inspired by York Minster; it makes the church look a good bit bigger than it actually is. The hilltop location makes it a landmark visible from miles away. The congregation, a descendant of the early-settler congregation that established the St. Clair Cemetery across Scott Road, now belongs to the Evangelical Presbyterian Church, a young denomination founded in 1980.


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    Addendum: According to the September, 1931, issue of the Charette, the magazine of the Pittsburgh Architectural Club, the architects were “O. M. Topp and T. L. Beatty associated.”

  • St. Bernard’s, Mt. Lebanon

    St. Bernard’s Catholic Church, Mt. Lebanon

    Begun in 1942, this church is more elaborate than many cathedrals. The architect, William Perry, grew up in Dormont, and he seems to have realized that this was a chance to leave a magnificent legacy in his own back yard.


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  • Mount Lebanon Cemetery Office

    This fine vernacular-Gothic house serves as the gatehouse and office for the Mount Lebanon Cemetery, which was founded in 1901. It’s charmingly out of place in its neighborhood, which is a later development where most of the houses date from after the First World War.

  • Cathedral of Learning on a Winter Morning

    Morning sun illuminates the Cathedral of Learning.

  • First Baptist Church

    The First Baptist Church in Oakland was designed by Bertram Goodhue, a disciple of Ralph Adams Cram, the greatest figure in American Gothic architecture.

  • First Presbyterian Church

    First Presbyterian was designed by the Philadelphia architect Theophilus P. Chandler, whose name makes him sound like the obstructive villain in a Marx Brothers farce. Above we see it from across Trinity Churchyard, with the last leaves of autumn still clinging to an oak tree in front of Trinity Cathedral. Below, details of the Gothic decoration.

    Not many churches are confident enough of the permanence of their service times to have them literally set in stone.

  • Spire of Trinity Cathedral

    The spire of Trinity Cathedral, with the Oliver Building in the background and the pinnacles of First Presbyterian Church in front and to the right.

  • Deco Gothic in Mount Lebanon

    Though old Pa Pitt has not yet found any documentary evidence, he identifies this building with some confidence as an old neighborhood movie house. The marquee, the Hollywood Gothic fantasy terra-cotta front, and the shape of the building (it is fairly long from front to back) all suggest a movie theater of the silent era.


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  • Dormont United Methodist Church

    The year 2013 was a bad year for older churches in Dormont: three of them—the Presbyterians, the Baptists, and the Methodists—gave up trying to maintain their fine old buildings with diminished congregations. The Presbyterians sold their building to a suburban megachurch; the humbler Methodists sold their building to Buddhists who used it as a temple. But the Buddhists, after having painted the building in this attractive bright yellow and red, have given up as well; and as of October 2019 the building is for sale again.


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