Charles Bickel designed the May Building, and—as he often did—he made liberal use of terra cotta in the ornaments.
More pictures of the May Building.
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May Building
Nikon COOLPIX P100.
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Federal Building
Fujifilm FinePix HS10. Altenhof & Bown, a Pittsburgh firm that also designed the State Office Building, were the architects of what is now officially called the William S. Moorhead Federal Building. It’s a good example of mid-century modern architecture—distinctive in its vertical-blind curtain of aluminum panels, yet somehow easy to ignore.
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Plaza Theatre, Bloomfield
The Plaza lingered on to the end of the twentieth century as a movie house, but it finally went the way of most neighborhood cinemas. Fortunately the beautiful and distinctive façade has been preserved.
The green-tiled roof is the first thing you notice. The little round-topped dormers give the building the look of a European palace.
Terra-cotta suppliers got rich on movie houses like this one.
The marquee has been kept, which is lucky, because it was an important part of the look of the building.
Kodak EasyShare Z981.
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B. F. Jones Building
Built in 1881, this is the only remaining downtown work of Joseph Stillburg—as far as old Pa Pitt knows, but he still hopes for surprises. Stillburg was a very big deal in Pittsburgh in the nineteenth century and into the early twentieth, but most of his buildings have disappeared. They were prominent buildings in their time—the Pittsburgh Exposition buildings, for example, and the Bissell Block—but they were replaced by other even grander projects as the land they were built on became even more valuable (or, in the case of the Exposition buildings, they were taken down for Point Park).
This building is a symphonic fugue of perfectly balanced themes and rhythms woven into a composition that must have been strikingly modern in 1881. It has been restored and renovated with good taste, and it is ready for another century and a half of use.
Fujifilm FinePix HS10.
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Spring Comes to Liberty Center
Flowering trees at Liberty Center, and views of other landmarks through the flowers.
Penn Station.
Looking up Grant Street.
The federal courthouse.
Fujifilm FinePix HS10. Looking down Liberty Avenue.
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Hoffstot Building
Canon PowerShot SX150 IS. Originally a building with five floors, built in 1886; a sixth floor was added in 1892 with considerable skill. We have more pictures of the building from two years ago; the picture above is a composite of six different photographs, so it is very big if you enlarge it.
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Dimling’s Ghost Sign on Exchange Way
Old Pa Pitt recommends wandering in back alleys as a hobby. You never know what you might find, from antique sculpture to ghost signs. Dimling’s hasn’t had a candy shop here for more than fifty years, but this sign still sits on the back of the building the shop once occupied, facing Exchange Way at the intersection with Tito Way.
When it was prospering, Dimling’s Liberty Avenue shop occupied two buildings and covered them with tiles that made the entire Liberty Avenue façade a giant billboard. The picture above is a detail of a much larger photograph taken by the Pittsburgh City Photographer in 1965: it may still be encumbered by copyright (although probably not, unless the copyright was renewed), but if the city of Pittsburgh wants a fee for using it Father Pitt can probably afford a quarter or so.
By the 1970s, the buildings were still a billboard for Dimling’s, but a photo from 1973 shows that the tenants were Arthur Treacher’s, an adult theater, and a massage parlor.
The wheel of history kept turning, however, and the restoration of Liberty Avenue brought these buildings back to respectable use. Peeling away the tiles revealed the old Victorian fronts, which have been lovingly restored and now make up part of the extraordinary Victorian streetscape of Liberty Avenue in the Cultural District.
Nikon COOLPIX P100.
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Why We Have Pennsylvania Broad Gauge
Pennsylvania streetcars do not run on standard-gauge track. This is not just a local quirk: it was a law of the Commonwealth. Streetcar companies must not lay standard-gauge track. Why did we have such a law? Well…
From Pittsburgh Illustrated, 1889. This is Liberty Avenue in 1889, where a railroad ran down the middle to serve the wholesalers. Now imagine one backroom deal with the streetcar company, one little switch, a few extra feet of track, and suddenly the Pennsylvania Railroad has access to every major street in the city.
But that can’t happen, because the streetcar tracks are a different gauge.
That is why, to this day, streetcars in Pittsburgh and Philadelphia use Pennsylvania Broad Gauge or Pennsylvania Trolley Gauge, 5 feet 2½ inches, instead of the standard American rail gauge of 4 feet 8½ inches. (Actually, Philadelphia is off by a quarter-inch at 5 feet 2¼ inches.) Most other American transit systems use standard gauge, although New Orleans streetcars use Pennsylvania Broad Gauge, too.
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Liberty Avenue in Bloomfield
Carson Street on the South Side is reputed to be one of the best-preserved Victorian streetscapes in America. Liberty Avenue in Bloomfield may not come quite up to that standard, but it is probably second in Pittsburgh. The commercial district was built up in the 1880s and 1890s. Like Carson Street, it preserves many Victorian commercial buildings, along with a peppering of later styles. These pictures are all of the northeast side, because the sun was behind the southwest side.
A good example of the most basic form of Pittsburgh Rundbogenstil, the German hybrid of classical and Romanesque architecture that old Pa Pitt mentions every chance he gets because he likes to say “Rundbogenstil.” In the 1800s, before it became the most Italian of our Italian neighborhoods, Bloomfield was mostly German.
A Second Empire building from the 1880s.
This building dates from the 1890s. It probably had a date and inscription in that crest at the top of the façade, but later owners obliterated the evidence.
We saw this 1924 building before at dusk; here it is in bright sunlight. The bright light gives us a chance to appreciate the decorative details with a long lens.
Kodak EasyShare Z981.
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Bloomfield Trust Company
This fine new building opened in 1926, and the bank got to enjoy it for five years before it was liquidated in the dark days of the Depression. After that, it sat vacant for a while. Just after Prohibition ended, the Liquor Control Board picked it for a liquor store, but bids for the conversion came in too high, and the board went looking for another location. Later, at some point, it became a bank again. Now the bank has moved out, and it’s ready for its next life.
As you can see from the picture above, the streets do not intersect at a right angle at this corner, so the building is a trapezoid. The upper floors were built as apartments to gain some extra income to pay for the building.
Kodak EasyShare Z981.
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