The history behind Pittsburgh’s landmarks and buildings, from famous homes and jails to bridges, churches and the skyline.
The Liberty Tunnel was built between 1919 and 1922 and opened to traffic on January 30, 1924, before its ventilation was ready. Here is the timeline, the 1924 scare, and the city’s other road tunnels.
Gimbels Pittsburgh shut its doors on September 13, 1986. The reasons were a parent company that wanted out, steep losses, a labor fight, and the shift to the suburbs.
Pittsburgh’s favorite meeting spot grew out of a South Side tailor shop. Here is how the Kaufmann’s clock got its corner, and what became of the Big Store behind it.
Before the Civic Arena’s roof opened to the skyline in 1961, about 95 acres of the Lower Hill District were cleared. Here is what stood there, who left, and what the records can and can’t prove.
On the morning of February 11, 2001, thousands of Pittsburgh residents gathered on bridges, riverbanks, and rooftops in the cold to watch a building die. Three Rivers Stadium Pittsburgh had stood at the confluence of the Allegheny and Monongahela rivers for thirty years, and at 8:03 a.m. a series of precisely placed explosive charges brought…
There is a moment, stepping through the front doors of the William Penn Hotel Pittsburgh and into the lobby, when the city outside seems to fall away. The ornate plasterwork overhead, the grand chandeliers throwing warm light across the polished floors, the sense of accumulated occasion that clings to a room where generations of deals…
On a clear evening, if you stand at the base of the Duquesne Incline on West Carson Street and watch one of its vintage wooden cars creak slowly up the face of Mount Washington, it is easy to forget that you are looking at a piece of living Pittsburgh inclines history. The car climbs at…
Sometime around 1782 — possibly earlier — a trader named Daniel Elliott built a sandstone tavern along the road connecting Washington and Pittsburgh, and travelers heading into the frontier started stopping there for a drink, a meal, and a place to sleep. That building is still standing. It sits at 434 Greentree Road, two stories…
Around 1792, when Pittsburgh was barely a city and the surrounding region was still very much a frontier, the Woods family built a stone house overlooking the Monongahela River in what is now Hazelwood. That house is still standing. It is a two-and-a-half-story vernacular rubblestone house with hand-hewn beams, wide-plank floors, and fireplaces at each…
The Real Blue Mist Road – A Secluded North Park Byway Blue Mist Road is not a name you’ll find on an official map, but locals in Allegheny County know it well. The road’s real name is Irwin Road, a narrow lane tucked deep into North Park, just north of Pittsburgh. By day, it’s a…