Tag: North Avenue

  • Third Ward School, Dutchtown

    Third Ward Public School

    Designed by Frederick Sauer, this school was called the Latimer School after Allegheny was conquered by Pittsburgh. It was built in 1898.

    Date stone with date 1898

    In the 1980s it was converted to apartments under the name “The School House.” As far as old Pa Pitt knows, this was the first major conversion of a disused school to apartments in the city, and it showed that the idea was viable.

    Entrance

    The school was converted to apartments in the age of Postmodernism, and the designer of this canopy cleverly made it a kind of abstracted projection of the original entrance. Father Pitt caught the fabric part of the canopy on a bad hair day.

    Romanesque capital
    Latimer School
    North Avenue side of the school
    Nikon COOLPIX P100.

    The North Avenue side.

    Map.


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  • Battle of the Dutchtown Lutherans

    Deutsche Evangelische Lutherische Matthaeus Kirche

    On the corner of North Avenue and Middle Street stands this small but imposing German Lutheran church, built in 1877. Father Pitt is fairly sure the Lutherans have gone, though the church site (last updated in 2010) is still on line. The Urban Impact ministry remains.

    Front of the church
    Date stone: Die Deutsche Evang. Lutherische Matthaeus Kirche Gebaut A. D. 1877

    “St. Matthew’s German Evangelical Lutheran Church, built 1877.”

    Entrance

    Connoisseurs of such things will note that this is a church with the sanctuary upstairs.

    Tower

    The hefty tower was added in a burst of prosperity about 25 years after the church was built.

    From the east
    St. Matthew’s German Evangelical Lutheran Church

    Meanwhile, just across narrow Middle Street was a different kind of Lutheran church. And although old Pa Pitt gave this article a humorous headline, he is fairly sure there was no battle. Pittsburgh learned the virtue of tolerance: those other Lutherans across the street may be completely wrong about everything that is most important in life, but they’re our neighbors, and we wave to them when we see them on the street.

    St. Mark’s Lutheran Church

    St. Mark’s was built in 1892. After its Lutheran congregation left, it was a Church of God in Christ until a few years ago. It has recently been expensively refurbished and painted black (it used to be painted brick red). Old Pa Pitt has not heard who was responsible for the refurbishing, but all the stained glass was removed, which is often the sign of a Pentecostal congregation moving in.

    St. Mark’s

    Except for the loss of the glass, the church is in very good shape externally, and it is a fine example of Pittsburgh Rundbogenstil—the round-arched German style that mixes classical and Romanesque elements.

    St. Mark’s
    Nikon COOLPIX P100; Canon PowerShot SX150 IS.

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  • Russell H. Boggs House and Trinity Lutheran Church, Mexican War Streets

    Russell H. Boggs house

    Designed by Longfellow, Alden & Harlow very early in their practice, this house was built in 1888. For a long time it served as the parsonage for Trinity Lutheran Church next door, which created the odd spectacle of a church whose parsonage was taller and grander than the sanctuary.

    Trinity Lutheran Church

    If you look for downspouts on this house, you won’t find them. Oral tradition says that Mr. Boggs, one of the founders of the Boggs & Buhl department store, hated gutters; at any rate, his architects devised a system of internal drainage that, when it works, carries runoff through channels in the walls. When it doesn’t work, the grand staircase is a waterfall on a rainy day. When the church sold the house, the buyers had to spend a million dollars refurbishing it, and making the drainage system work again was where a lot of the money went. The house is now a boutique hotel under the name Boggs Mansion.

    Front of the house
    Russell H. Boggs house
    Kodak EasyShare Z981; Sony Alpha 3000.

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  • Allegheny YMCA, Mexican War Streets

    YMCA in lights

    A North Side landmark for just about a century now, the Allegheny YMCA on North Avenue was designed by R. Maurice Trimble and built in 1926. It did not hide its light under a bushel: the letters YMCA are picked out in light bulbs at the top of the North Avenue façade.

    Allegheny YMCA
    Allegheny YMCA
    Allegheny YMCA
    Allegheny YMCA entrance
    Entrance decorations
    Window
    Kodak EasyShare Z981; Sony Alpha 3000.

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  • Emich Apartments, Mexican War Streets

    Emich Apartments

    A grand apartment house that would have been grander before it lost its cornice in front. Another “Emich Apartments,” taller and grander, stood where Allegheny General Hospital is today; both were named for developer W. A. Emich. This one was built on the site of the old Second Ward School in the city of Allegheny.

    Front of the building
    Entrance
    Ionic capital
    Kodak EasyShare Z981; Sony Alpha 3000.

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  • A Walk on North Avenue in Manchester

    1337 and 1339 West North Avenue

    A few weeks ago old Pa Pitt took a wintry walk on North Avenue (which used to be Fayette Street back when it did not run all the way through to North Avenue on the rest of the North Side). He took piles of pictures, and although he published four articles so far from that walk (one, two, three, four), there’s still quite a collection backed up waiting to be published. Thus this very long article, which is a smorgasbord of Victorian domestic architecture with a few other eras thrown in. Above, a pair of Italianate houses. They both preserve the tall windows typical of the high Italianate style; the one on the right still has (or has restored) its two-over-two panes.

    1334
    Many more pictures…
  • Stony Romanesque in the Mexican War Streets

    208 West North Avenue

    This stone-fronted Romanesque house on North Avenue is decorated with intricate carvings, and Father Pitt would guess that they were probably by Achille Giammartini, who was responsible for most of the best Romanesque decoration in Pittsburgh, and who also decorated the Masonic Hall just up the street.

    Romanesque capital
    Romanesque capital
    Romanesque capital
    Carved ornament and volute
    Kodak EasyShare Z981.

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  • More Houses on North Avenue in the Mexican War Streets

    North Avenue at Palo Alto Street

    A couple of blocks of North Avenue, where we can see some fine Italianate houses of the Civil War era, interspersed with some towering Queen Anne mansions. We start at the corner of Palo Alto Street, where a Queen Anne house makes the most of a tiny lot by going up to a fourth floor.

    400 West North Avenue
    404 and 402

    These two houses share splendid porches, probably added later, since the porches match even though the houses do not. The owners of the houses have coordinated their efforts, so that the porches match.

    410–406

    Three more modest houses, though their full third floors give them a generous allotment of bedrooms.

    418 and 412

    A pair of houses that were both the peak of elegance in different eras. The Italianate one on the right goes for a simpler dignity; the Queen Anne on the left pulls out all the stops to make the most picturesque composition possible. Note the relative heights, by the way: high ceilings were a feature of the Italianate style in better houses, so that the house at left adds one more floor in exactly the same vertical height.

    Seventeen years ago, Father Pitt published a picture of the front door of the house on the right. The picture was taken on 120 film with a folding Agfa Isolette.

    412
    418
    502 and 500

    Two simple and attractive Italianate houses, one of which has grown a partial fourth floor.

    508 and 506

    Here is an interesting document of how the neighborhood has changed. The house at left was originally an Italianate residence; the corner store may have been original or may have been added later. The projecting commercial building next to it, which probably dates from about 1920, was added when the house was taken over by the United States Casket Company, later the Melia Casket Company, which still inhabited the building until about twelve years ago. Both buildings have had a thorough renovation since the casket-makers moved out.

    508
    516–512
    512 and 514

    Two different interpretations of Italianate, one of which has sprouted an inartistic dormer to give it a fourth floor.

    514 and 512
    516

    Finally, a center-hall house in a kind of late Greek Revival style; it occupies a double lot.

    516
    Sony Alpha 3000; Kodak EasyShare Z981.

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  • Masonic Hall, North Side

    Masonic Hall

    Bartberger & East were the architects of this Masonic Hall, which sat derelict and in danger of demolition for many years. (The Bartberger of the partnership was Charles M. Barberger, the younger of the two Charles Bartbergers.)1 Now it is beautifully restored as a center of literary culture, which teaches us not to lose hope.

    Inscription: “Masonic Hall”

    The building was put up in 1893, as you can tell by reading the super-secret Masonic code in terra cotta on the front: “A. L. 5893.” “A. L.” stands for anno lucis, “in the year of light,” a Masonic dating system that takes the creation of the world as its starting point. At the risk of suffering the fate of William Morgan, old Pa Pitt will reveal the secret calculation that converts A. L. dates to our Gregorian calendar: subtract 4000.

    A. L.
    58
    93
    Reddour Street entrance

    Like most lodge buildings of the time, this one had the main assembly hall upstairs, leaving rentable storefronts on the ground floor. The side entrance on Reddour Street, which led up to the main hall, is festooned with carvings by Achille Giammartini.

    Stonecarving by Achille Giammartini
    Perspective view
    Front of the hall
    Kodak EasyShare Z981; Kodak EasyShare Z1285; Sony Alpha 3000; FujiFilm FinePix HS10.

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  • Malta Temple, North Side

    Malta Temple

    Built in 1927, this was a lodge for the Knights of Malta, one of those Masonic orders that old Pa Pitt has never sorted out. Most North Siders remember it as the Salvation Army building. It narrowly escaped demolition in 2008, and now it is in good shape again and ready for its next life.

    Entrance
    Perspective view
    Kodak EasyShare Z1285; Fujifilm FinePix HS10.

    Addendum: The architects were Beltz & Klicker, as we learn from their own drawing of the building as it was published in the Press on September 11, 1927.

    “Knights of Malta bldg., now being erected at North ave. West, and Reddour st., Northside, one block west of Federal st., as it will appear when completed. The building and site will represent an expenditure of about $140,000. It is being erected by the four North Side Malta commanderies, numbering 1,200 members, who hope to have the new building ready for dedication about Christmas. The building committee consists of Arthur Stambaugh, Louis Falck, Albert Gawinske, and M. Landsdale. Beltz & Klicker were the architects.”


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