This impressive portal, wide enough to drive a large delivery wagon through, leads to the central courtyard.
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Fifth Avenue Portal, Allegheny County Courthouse
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South Avenue Methodist Episcopal Church, Wilkinsburg
Wilkinsburg’s own Milligan & Miller designed this rambling Gothic church, which is still in use by its original congregation, now South Avenue United Methodist. “One of the most important additions to the structural beauty of the place,” said a 1907 Pittsburg Press feature on Wilkinsburg,1 “will be the new South Avenue Methodist Episcopal Church, which is to replace the old burned down last February. It is to cost $125,000 and will be one of the finest church buildings in the community. The construction is under the charge of Architects Milligan & Miller, who designed the plans.”
Impressive stone lanterns flank the front steps.
Olympus E-20N; Nikon COOLPIX P100. An arcaded porch after the manner of a medieval cloister runs along the side.
- “Old Town of Aspect All Modern,” Press, July 14, 1907. ↩︎
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Apartments in the Watkins Development, Squirrel Hill
This quiet enclave of small apartment buildings is part of the same “city set on a hill” development as the Morrowfield, and the buildings were probably also designed by J. E. Dwyer. They’re fairly ordinary Pittsburgh buildings of the early 1920s, Mission style with a bit of Romanesque thrown in. They look their best in black and white.
Fujifilm FinePix HS10; Samsung Digimax V4.
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Entrance to the Jones & Laughlin Headquarters Building
Samsung Digimax V4. MacClure & Spahr designed the headquarters for Jones & Laughlin, which is now the John P. Robin Civic Building. The entrance is lavishly decorated. The angle below shows off two of the most impressive lanterns in the city.
Fujifilm FinePix HS10. More pictures of the Jones & Laughlin Headquarters Building: front of the building, from the southeast, and the construction of the second stage of the building.
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Fifth Avenue from Grant Street
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Liberty Bridge
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Entrance to One Mellon Center (BNY Mellon Center)
In theory there is no reason to take digital pictures in black and white, since they can always be desaturated later. In practice, knowing that the picture will never have any colors in it makes one think more in terms of lines and shadows. Here are two pictures taken with a camera from the Neolithic era of digital cameras, which Father Pitt keeps set to black-and-white mode.
Samsung Digimax V4.
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Grant Street Entrance to the Union Trust Building
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EQT Plaza
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St. Nicholas Byzantine Catholic Church, McKeesport
A modernist church built in 1964 in traditional basilica form. The architect was J. Kenneth Myers. The church is dedicated to St. Nicholas of Myra, famous for giving gifts to poor children (thus inspiring our legend of Santa Claus) and for smacking Arius across the face at the Council of Nicaea. He was versatile.
Jolly old St. Nick slapping Arius. Ecumenical councils were a lot more fun in the old days. 
It is a curious fact of our religious life that, even in the most depressed areas, the Eastern Catholic and Orthodox congregations often flourish, while the Western churches languish and evaporate one by one. This church is in a part of downtown McKeesport that can seem nearly abandoned—but not if you visit on a Sunday, when parishioners flock to St. Nicholas and the Russian Orthodox church just down the street.
The skeleton outline of an onion dome instantly conveys that this is an Eastern church.
Sony Alpha 3000; Fujifilm FinePix HS10.
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