History of Pittsburgh in Pictures

Back in December, Beth went to a swim clinic at Carnegie Mellon University. I dropped her off and came back to pick her up. I got there before it finished so I had some time to roam around the building where the pool is.

So, I go up to the second floor and come across this mural that wrapped around all the walls of the second floor rotunda. What I stumbled upon were these paintings that captured what Pittsburgh looked like from about the early 1900's to the 1970's or 1980's. It spans the entire rotunda and you can read more about it here.

I snapped a couple of shots and here were some of my favorites (If you click on the picture, it's a little bit bigger and you can see more detail):

This first one shows downtown WAY back in the day. Lots of steel mills and smoke. Also, that's not PNC Park, it's Exposition Park along the North Side. It's interesting to see the bridges that connected downtown back then.

The next two show the Oakland area with Forbes Field from two different angles. I know where Forbes Field was and the topography around it (close to where my education classes were), but I guess I never realized how steep of a drop off it was set upon along the right field side of the park. You can make out Pitt's Cathedral of Learning (the tallest structure) and the hospital where Beth now works!. Also, CMU was called Carnegie Tech back then.

The last two show more of present Pittsburgh along the Monongahela (above) and the Allegheny (below). In the view with the Mon, you can see 'The Bluff' that Duquesne University sits upon. In the one of the Allegheny, you can see most of the modern downtown buildings and the bridges that I come down along during my daily commute. No PNC Park in the picture, though.

Anyway, thought that was neat and highly recommend it for anyone who's a fan of Pittsburgh, history, and maps. I spent a half hour there and didn't even realize it.