History of Pittsburgh
Encyclopedia
Native Americans in the United States
Native Americans in the United States are the indigenous peoples in North America within the boundaries of the present-day continental United States, parts of Alaska, and the island state of Hawaii. They are composed of numerous, distinct tribes, states, and ethnic groups, many of which survive as...
civilization in the modern Pittsburgh region. Eventually French
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
and British
British Empire
The British Empire comprised the dominions, colonies, protectorates, mandates and other territories ruled or administered by the United Kingdom. It originated with the overseas colonies and trading posts established by England in the late 16th and early 17th centuries. At its height, it was the...
explorers encountered the strategic juncture where the Allegheny
Allegheny River
The Allegheny River is a principal tributary of the Ohio River; it is located in the Eastern United States. The Allegheny River joins with the Monongahela River to form the Ohio River at the "Point" of Point State Park in Downtown Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania...
and Monongahela River
Monongahela River
The Monongahela River is a river on the Allegheny Plateau in north-central West Virginia and southwestern Pennsylvania in the United States...
s meet to form the Ohio
Ohio River
The Ohio River is the largest tributary, by volume, of the Mississippi River. At the confluence, the Ohio is even bigger than the Mississippi and, thus, is hydrologically the main stream of the whole river system, including the Allegheny River further upstream...
. The area became a battleground when France and Britain fought for control in the 1750s
French and Indian War
The French and Indian War is the common American name for the war between Great Britain and France in North America from 1754 to 1763. In 1756, the war erupted into the world-wide conflict known as the Seven Years' War and thus came to be regarded as the North American theater of that war...
.
Following American independence
American Revolution
The American Revolution was the political upheaval during the last half of the 18th century in which thirteen colonies in North America joined together to break free from the British Empire, combining to become the United States of America...
in 1783, the village around Fort Pitt
Fort Pitt (Pennsylvania)
Fort Pitt was a fort built at the location of Pittsburgh, Allegheny County, Pennsylvania.-French and Indian War:The fort was built from 1759 to 1761 during the French and Indian War , next to the site of former Fort Duquesne, at the confluence the Allegheny River and the Monongahela River...
continued to grow. The region saw the short-lived Whiskey Rebellion
Whiskey Rebellion
The Whiskey Rebellion, or Whiskey Insurrection, was a tax protest in the United States in the 1790s, during the presidency of George Washington. Farmers who sold their corn in the form of whiskey had to pay a new tax which they strongly resented...
, when farmers rebelled against federal taxes on whiskey. The War of 1812
War of 1812
The War of 1812 was a military conflict fought between the forces of the United States of America and those of the British Empire. The Americans declared war in 1812 for several reasons, including trade restrictions because of Britain's ongoing war with France, impressment of American merchant...
cut off the supply of British goods, stimulating American manufacture. By 1815, Pittsburgh was producing large quantities of iron, brass, tin, and glass products. By the 1840s, Pittsburgh had grown to one of the largest cities west of the Allegheny Mountains
Allegheny Mountains
The Allegheny Mountain Range , also spelled Alleghany, Allegany and, informally, the Alleghenies, is part of the vast Appalachian Mountain Range of the eastern United States and Canada...
. Production of steel
Steel
Steel is an alloy that consists mostly of iron and has a carbon content between 0.2% and 2.1% by weight, depending on the grade. Carbon is the most common alloying material for iron, but various other alloying elements are used, such as manganese, chromium, vanadium, and tungsten...
began in 1875. By 1911, Pittsburgh was producing half the nation's steel. Pittsburgh was a Republican party stronghold until 1932. The soaring uneployment of the Great Depression
Great Depression in the United States
The Great Depression began with the Wall Street Crash of October, 1929 and rapidly spread worldwide. The market crash marked the beginning of a decade of high unemployment, poverty, low profits, deflation, plunging farm incomes, and lost opportunities for economic growth and personal advancement...
, the New Deal relief programs and the rise of powerful labor unions in the 1930s turned the city into a liberal stronghold of the New Deal Coalition
New Deal coalition
The New Deal Coalition was the alignment of interest groups and voting blocs that supported the New Deal and voted for Democratic presidential candidates from 1932 until the late 1960s. It made the Democratic Party the majority party during that period, losing only to Dwight D. Eisenhower in 1952...
under powerful Democratic mayors. In World War II, it was the center of the "Arsenal of Democracy
Arsenal of Democracy
"The Arsenal of Democracy" was a propaganda slogan coined by U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt, in a radio broadcast delivered on December 29, 1940. Roosevelt promised to help the United Kingdom fight Nazi Germany by giving them military supplies while the United States stayed out of the actual...
", producing munitions for the Allied war effort as prosperity returned.
Following World War II, Pittsburgh launched a clean air and civic revitalization project known as the "Renaissance." The industrial base continued to expand through the 1960s, but after 1970 foreign competition led to the collapse of the steel industry, with massive layoffs and mill closures. Top corporate headquarters moved out in the 1980s and in 2007 the city lost its status as a major transportation hub. The population of the Pittsburgh metropolitan area is holding steady at 2.4 million, and is 65% white. Despite the flourishing service, education, medicine, arts and high tech sectors, Pittsburgh still faces many problems, including poverty, crime and pollution.
Native American era
Hunter-gatherer
A hunter-gatherer or forage society is one in which most or all food is obtained from wild plants and animals, in contrast to agricultural societies which rely mainly on domesticated species. Hunting and gathering was the ancestral subsistence mode of Homo, and all modern humans were...
lifestyle in the region perhaps as early as 19,000 years ago. Meadowcroft Rockshelter, an archaeological site
Archaeological site
An archaeological site is a place in which evidence of past activity is preserved , and which has been, or may be, investigated using the discipline of archaeology and represents a part of the archaeological record.Beyond this, the definition and geographical extent of a 'site' can vary widely,...
west of Pittsburgh, provides evidence that these first Americans lived in the region from that date. During the Adena culture
Adena culture
The Adena culture was a Pre-Columbian Native American culture that existed from 1000 to 200 BC, in a time known as the early Woodland Period. The Adena culture refers to what were probably a number of related Native American societies sharing a burial complex and ceremonial system...
that followed, Mound Builders erected a large Indian Mound at the future site of McKees Rocks
McKees Rocks, Pennsylvania
McKees Rocks, also known as "The Rocks", is a borough in Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, along the south bank of the Ohio River. The borough population was 6,104 at the 2010 census.In the past, it was known for its extensive iron and steel interests...
, about three miles (5 km) from the head of the Ohio. The Indian Mound, a burial site, was augmented in later years by members of the Hopewell culture
Hopewell culture
The Hopewell tradition is the term used to describe common aspects of the Native American culture that flourished along rivers in the northeastern and midwestern United States from 200 BCE to 500 CE. The Hopewell tradition was not a single culture or society, but a widely dispersed set of related...
.
By 1700 the Iroquois
Iroquois
The Iroquois , also known as the Haudenosaunee or the "People of the Longhouse", are an association of several tribes of indigenous people of North America...
held dominion over the upper Ohio valley; other tribes included the Lenape
Lenape
The Lenape are an Algonquian group of Native Americans of the Northeastern Woodlands. They are also called Delaware Indians. As a result of the American Revolutionary War and later Indian removals from the eastern United States, today the main groups live in Canada, where they are enrolled in the...
, or Delawares, who had been displaced from eastern Pennsylvania by European settlement, and the Shawnees, who had migrated up from the south. With the arrival of European explorers, these tribes and others had been devastated by European diseases, such as smallpox
Smallpox
Smallpox was an infectious disease unique to humans, caused by either of two virus variants, Variola major and Variola minor. The disease is also known by the Latin names Variola or Variola vera, which is a derivative of the Latin varius, meaning "spotted", or varus, meaning "pimple"...
, measles
Measles
Measles, also known as rubeola or morbilli, is an infection of the respiratory system caused by a virus, specifically a paramyxovirus of the genus Morbillivirus. Morbilliviruses, like other paramyxoviruses, are enveloped, single-stranded, negative-sense RNA viruses...
, influenza
Influenza
Influenza, commonly referred to as the flu, is an infectious disease caused by RNA viruses of the family Orthomyxoviridae , that affects birds and mammals...
, and malaria
Malaria
Malaria is a mosquito-borne infectious disease of humans and other animals caused by eukaryotic protists of the genus Plasmodium. The disease results from the multiplication of Plasmodium parasites within red blood cells, causing symptoms that typically include fever and headache, in severe cases...
.
In 1748, when Conrad Weiser
Conrad Weiser
Weiser's colonial service began in 1731. The Iroquois sent Shikellamy, an Oneida chief, as an emissary to other tribes and the British. Shikellamy lived on the Susquehanna River at Shamokin village, near present-day Sunbury, Pennsylvania. An oral tradition holds that Weiser met Shikellamy while...
visited Logstown
Logstown
The riverside village of Logstown was a significant Native American settlement in Western Pennsylvania and the site of the 1752 signing of the treaty of friendship between the Ohio Company and the Amerindians occupying the region in the years leading up to the...
, 18 miles (29 km) downriver from Pittsburgh, he counted 789 warriors gathered: 165 Lenape
Lenape
The Lenape are an Algonquian group of Native Americans of the Northeastern Woodlands. They are also called Delaware Indians. As a result of the American Revolutionary War and later Indian removals from the eastern United States, today the main groups live in Canada, where they are enrolled in the...
, 163 Seneca
Seneca nation
The Seneca are a group of indigenous people native to North America. They were the nation located farthest to the west within the Six Nations or Iroquois League in New York before the American Revolution. While exact population figures are unknown, approximately 15,000 to 25,000 Seneca live in...
, 162 Shawnee
Shawnee
The Shawnee, Shaawanwaki, Shaawanooki and Shaawanowi lenaweeki, are an Algonquian-speaking people native to North America. Historically they inhabited the areas of Ohio, Virginia, West Virginia, Western Maryland, Kentucky, Indiana, and Pennsylvania...
, 100 Wyandot, 74 Mohawk
Mohawk nation
Mohawk are the most easterly tribe of the Iroquois confederation. They call themselves Kanien'gehaga, people of the place of the flint...
, 40 Tisagechroamis
Mississaugas
The Mississaugas are a subtribe of the Anishinaabe-speaking First Nations people located in southern Ontario, Canada. They are closely related to the Ojibwa...
, 35 Onondaga
Onondaga (tribe)
The Onondaga are one of the original five constituent nations of the Iroquois Confederacy. Their traditional homeland is in and around Onondaga County, New York...
, 20 Cayuga
Cayuga nation
The Cayuga people was one of the five original constituents of the Haudenosaunee , a confederacy of American Indians in New York. The Cayuga homeland lay in the Finger Lakes region along Cayuga Lake, between their league neighbors, the Onondaga to the east and the Seneca to the west...
, 15 Oneida
Oneida tribe
The Oneida are a Native American/First Nations people and are one of the five founding nations of the Iroquois Confederacy in the area of upstate New York...
, and 15 Mohicans
Mahican
The Mahican are an Eastern Algonquian Native American tribe, originally settling in the Hudson River Valley . After 1680, many moved to Stockbridge, Massachusetts. During the early 1820s and 1830s, most of the Mahican descendants migrated westward to northeastern Wisconsin...
.
Shannopin's Town, a Seneca tribe village on the east bank of the Allegheny, was the home village of Queen Aliquippa, but was deserted after 1749. Sawcunk, on the mouth of the Beaver River
Beaver River (Pennsylvania)
The Beaver River is a tributary of the Ohio River in Western Pennsylvania in the United States with a length of approximately 21 mi . It flows through a historically important coal-producing region north of Pittsburgh...
, was a Lenape (Delaware) settlement and the principal residence of Shingas
Shingas
Shingas , was a leader of the Delaware people in the Ohio Country and a noted American Indian warrior on the western frontier during the French and Indian War. Dubbed "Shingas the Terrible" by Anglo-Americans during the war, Shingas led devastating raids against white settlements...
, a chief of the Lenapes. Chartier's Town was a Shawnee
Shawnee
The Shawnee, Shaawanwaki, Shaawanooki and Shaawanowi lenaweeki, are an Algonquian-speaking people native to North America. Historically they inhabited the areas of Ohio, Virginia, West Virginia, Western Maryland, Kentucky, Indiana, and Pennsylvania...
town and Kittanning
Kittanning (village)
Kittanning was an 18th century Native American village in the Ohio Country, located on the Allegheny River at present-day Kittanning, Pennsylvania. The village was at the western terminus of the Kittanning Path, an Indian trail that provided a route across the Alleghenies between the Ohio and...
was a Lenape and Shawnee
Shawnee
The Shawnee, Shaawanwaki, Shaawanooki and Shaawanowi lenaweeki, are an Algonquian-speaking people native to North America. Historically they inhabited the areas of Ohio, Virginia, West Virginia, Western Maryland, Kentucky, Indiana, and Pennsylvania...
village on the Allegheny with an estimated 300–400 residents.
Early colonization (1747–1763)
Europeans first began to settle in the region in 1748, when the first Ohio Company
Ohio Company
The Ohio Company, formally known as the Ohio Company of Virginia, was a land speculation company organized for the settlement by Virginians of the Ohio Country and to trade with the Indians there...
, an English land speculation company, won a grant of 200,000 acres (800 km²) in the upper Ohio Valley. From a post at present-day Cumberland, Maryland
Cumberland, Maryland
Cumberland is a city in the far western, Appalachian portion of Maryland, United States. It is the county seat of Allegany County, and the primary city of the Cumberland, MD-WV Metropolitan Statistical Area. At the 2010 census, the city had a population of 20,859, and the metropolitan area had a...
, the company began to construct an 80 miles (128.7 km) wagon road
Wagon train
A wagon train is a group of wagons traveling together. In the American West, individuals traveling across the plains in covered wagons banded together for mutual assistance, as is reflected in numerous films and television programs about the region, such as Audie Murphy's Tumbleweed and Ward Bond...
to the Monongahela River
Monongahela River
The Monongahela River is a river on the Allegheny Plateau in north-central West Virginia and southwestern Pennsylvania in the United States...
Michael Cresap
Michael Cresap was a frontiersman born in Maryland. He was the son of the pioneer Thomas Cresap. He spent part of his adult years in the Ohio Country as a trader and land developer. He led several raids against Indians whom he believed were hostile to white settlement. Logan of the Mingo Indians...
to begin widening the track into a road following mostly the same route as an ancient Amerindian trail
which is now known as Nemacolin's Trail. The river crossing
Crossing (river)
A river crossing is a means to get from one river bank to the other and may refer to:* A ford * A bridge* A tunnel* Any type of Ferry** A cable ferry** A reaction ferry** A water taxi-See also::Category:Crossings by river...
and flats at Redstone creek
Redstone Creek
Redstone Creek is a historically important widemouthed canoe and river boat-navigable brook-sized tributary stream of the Monongahela River in Fayette County, Pennsylvania. The creek is long, running from headwaters on Chestnut Ridge north through the city of Uniontown and reaching the Monongahela...
, the earliest point
Redstone Old Fort
Redstone Old Fort or Redstone Fort or Fort Burd on The Nemacolin Trail was the name of the French and Indian War era wooden fort built in 1759 by Pennsylvania Militia Colonel James Burd to guard the ancient Indian trail's river ford on a mound overlooking the eastern shore of the Monongahela River...
and shortest distance the choices a wagon road descent could follow (later in the war, fortified as Fort Burd, now Brownsville
Brownsville, Pennsylvania
Brownsville is a borough in Fayette County, Pennsylvania, United States, officially founded in 1785 located 35 miles south of Pittsburgh along the Monongahela River...
) was one of several possible destinations. Another alternative was the divergent route that became Braddock's Road a few years later through present day New Stanton
New Stanton, Pennsylvania
New Stanton is a borough in Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania, United States. The population was 1,906 at the 2000 census. New Stanton is often used as a control city in western parts of Pennsylvania, as I-70 joins the Pennsylvania Turnpike eastbound towards Breezewood, Pennsylvania in New...
. In the event, the Amerindian path was not widened to a wagon road much beyond the Cumberland Narrows
Cumberland Narrows
The Cumberland Narrows is a water gap in western Maryland in the United States, just west of Cumberland, Maryland. Wills Creek cuts through the central ridge of the Wills Mountain Anticline at a low elevation here between Wills Mountain to the north and Haystack Mountain to the south...
pass
Mountain pass
A mountain pass is a route through a mountain range or over a ridge. If following the lowest possible route, a pass is locally the highest point on that route...
before hostilities arose, resulting in a series of expeditions, each of which made improvements to the track.
The French had built nearby Logstown
Logstown
The riverside village of Logstown was a significant Native American settlement in Western Pennsylvania and the site of the 1752 signing of the treaty of friendship between the Ohio Company and the Amerindians occupying the region in the years leading up to the...
for the Native Americans as a trade and council center to increase their influence in the Ohio Valley. Between June 15 and November 10, 1749, an expedition headed by Celeron de Bienville
Celeron de Bienville
Pierre-Joseph Céloron de Blainville was aFrench Canadian Officer of Marine. In 1739-1740 he led a detachment to Louisiana to fight the Chickasaw in the abortive Chickasaw Campaign of 1739...
, a French officer, traveled down the Allegheny and Ohio to bolster the French claim to the region. De Bienville warned away English traders and posted markers claiming the territory.
In 1753, Marquis Duquesne
Marquis Duquesne
Michel-Ange Du Quesne de Menneville, Marquis Du Quesne was a French Governor General of New France. He was born in Toulon....
, the Governor of New France
Governor of New France
The Governor of New France was the viceroy of the King of France in North America. A French noble, he was appointed to govern the colonies of New France, which included Canada, Acadia and Louisiana. The residence of the Governor was at the Château St-Louis in the capital of Quebec City...
, sent another, larger expedition. At present-day Erie, Pennsylvania
Erie, Pennsylvania
Erie is a city located in northwestern Pennsylvania in the United States. Named for the lake and the Native American tribe that resided along its southern shore, Erie is the state's fourth-largest city , with a population of 102,000...
, an advance party built Fort Presque Isle
Fort Presque Isle
Fort Presque Isle was a fort built by French soldiers in 1753 along Presque Isle Bay at present-day Erie, Pennsylvania...
. They also cut a road through the woods and built Fort Le Boeuf
Fort Le Boeuf
Fort Le Boeuf, , was a fort established by the French in 1753 on a fork of French Creek, in present-day Waterford, in northwest Pennsylvania...
on French Creek
French Creek (Allegheny River)
French Creek is a tributary of the Allegheny River in northwestern Pennsylvania and western New York in the United States.- Etymology :...
, from which it was possible at high water to float to the Allegheny. By summer, an expedition of 1,500 French and Native American men descended the Allegheny. Some wintered at the confluence of French Creek and the Allegheny, where, the following year, they built Fort Machault
Fort Machault
Fort Machault was a fort built by the French in 1754 near the confluence of French Creek with the Allegheny River, at present-day Franklin, in northwest Pennsylvania. The fort was part of a line that included Fort Presque Isle, Fort Le Boeuf, and Fort Duquesne.- Description:The fort was built on a...
.
Alarmed at these French incursions in the Ohio Valley, Governor Dinwiddie of Virginia sent Major George Washington
George Washington
George Washington was the dominant military and political leader of the new United States of America from 1775 to 1799. He led the American victory over Great Britain in the American Revolutionary War as commander-in-chief of the Continental Army from 1775 to 1783, and presided over the writing of...
to warn the French to withdraw. Accompanied by Christopher Gist
Christopher Gist
Christopher Gist was an accomplished American explorer, surveyor and frontiersman. He was one of the first white explorers of the Ohio Country . He is credited with providing the first detailed description of the Ohio Country to Great Britain and her colonists...
, Washington arrived at the Forks of the Ohio on November 25, 1753.
Proceeding up the Allegheny, Washington presented Dinwiddie's letter to the French commanders first at Venango, and then Fort Le Boeuf
Fort Le Boeuf
Fort Le Boeuf, , was a fort established by the French in 1753 on a fork of French Creek, in present-day Waterford, in northwest Pennsylvania...
. The French officers received Washington with wine and courtesy, but did not withdraw.
Governor Dinwiddie then sent Captain William Trent to build a fort at the Forks of the Ohio. On February 17, 1754, Trent began construction of the fort, the first European habitation at the site of present-day Pittsburgh
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
Pittsburgh is the second-largest city in the US Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and the county seat of Allegheny County. Regionally, it anchors the largest urban area of Appalachia and the Ohio River Valley, and nationally, it is the 22nd-largest urban area in the United States...
. The fort, named Fort Prince George
Fort Prince George
Fort Prince George was an uncompleted fort on what is now the site of Pittsburgh, at the confluence of the Allegheny and Monongahela Rivers in Allegheny County, Pennsylvania. The site was originally a trading post established by Ohio Company trader William Trent in the 1740s...
, was only half-built by April 1754, when over 500 French forces arrived and ordered the 40-some colonials back to Virginia. The French then tore down the British fortification and built Fort Duquesne
Fort Duquesne
Fort Duquesne was a fort established by the French in 1754, at the junction of the Allegheny and Monongahela rivers in what is now downtown Pittsburgh in the state of Pennsylvania....
.
Governor Dinwiddie then launched another expedition. Colonel Joshua Fry commanded the regiment which his second-in-command, George Washington, leading an advance column. On May 28, 1754, Washington's unit clashed with the French in the Battle of Jumonville Glen
Battle of Jumonville Glen
The Battle of Jumonville Glen, also known as the Jumonville affair, was the opening battle of the French and Indian War fought on May 28, 1754 near what is present-day Uniontown in Fayette County, Pennsylvania...
during which 13 French soldiers were killed and 21 were taken prisoner. After the battle, Washington's ally, Seneca chief Tanaghrisson, unexpectedly executed the French commanding officer, Ensign Joseph Coulon de Jumonville
Joseph Coulon de Jumonville
Joseph Coulon de Villiers, Sieur de Jumonville was a French Canadian military officer. His defeat and killing at the Battle of Jumonville Glen by forces led by George Washington was one of the sparks igniting the Seven Years' War.- Early life :Jumonville was born in the seigneury of Verchères, New...
. The French pursued Washington and on July 3, 1754, George Washington surrendered following the Battle of Fort Necessity. These actions sparked the French and Indian War
French and Indian War
The French and Indian War is the common American name for the war between Great Britain and France in North America from 1754 to 1763. In 1756, the war erupted into the world-wide conflict known as the Seven Years' War and thus came to be regarded as the North American theater of that war...
(1754–1763), or, the Seven Years' War
Seven Years' War
The Seven Years' War was a global military war between 1756 and 1763, involving most of the great powers of the time and affecting Europe, North America, Central America, the West African coast, India, and the Philippines...
, an imperial confrontation between England and France fought in both hemispheres.
Braddock expedition
The Braddock expedition, also called Braddock's campaign or, more commonly, Braddock's Defeat, was a failed British military expedition which attempted to capture the French Fort Duquesne in the summer of 1755 during the French and Indian War. It was defeated at the Battle of the Monongahela on...
. Two regiments marched from Fort Cumberland
Fort Cumberland (Maryland)
thumb|380px|Fort Cumberland, 1755 Fort Cumberland was an 18th century frontier fort at the current site of Cumberland, Maryland, USA...
across the Allegheny Mountains
Allegheny Mountains
The Allegheny Mountain Range , also spelled Alleghany, Allegany and, informally, the Alleghenies, is part of the vast Appalachian Mountain Range of the eastern United States and Canada...
and into western Pennsylvania. Following a path Washington surveyed, over 3,000 men built a wagon road 12 feet (3.7 m) wide, that when complete, was the first road to cross the Appalachian Mountains
Appalachian Mountains
The Appalachian Mountains #Whether the stressed vowel is or ,#Whether the "ch" is pronounced as a fricative or an affricate , and#Whether the final vowel is the monophthong or the diphthong .), often called the Appalachians, are a system of mountains in eastern North America. The Appalachians...
. Braddock's Road, as it was known, blazed the way for the future National Road
National Road
The National Road or Cumberland Road was the first major improved highway in the United States to be built by the federal government. Construction began heading west in 1811 at Cumberland, Maryland, on the Potomac River. It crossed the Allegheny Mountains and southwestern Pennsylvania, reaching...
. The expedition crossed the Monongahela River
Monongahela River
The Monongahela River is a river on the Allegheny Plateau in north-central West Virginia and southwestern Pennsylvania in the United States...
on July 9, 1755. French troops from Fort Duquesne ambushed Braddock's expedition at Braddock's Field
Braddock's Field
Braddock's Field is a historic battlefield on the banks of the Monongahela River, at Braddock, Pennsylvania, near the junction of Turtle Creek , about nine miles southeast of the "Forks of the Ohio" in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania...
, nine miles (14 km) from Fort Duquesne. In the Battle of the Monongahela, the French inflicted heavy losses on the British, and Braddock was mortally wounded. The surviving British and colonial forces retreated. This left the French and their Native American allies with dominion over the upper Ohio valley.
On September 8, 1756, an expedition of 300 militiamen
Kittanning Expedition
The Kittanning Expedition, also known as the Armstrong Expedition or the Battle of Kittanning, was a raid during the French and Indian War that led to the destruction of the American Indian village of Kittanning, which had served as a staging point for attacks by Delaware warriors against...
destroyed the Shawnee and Lenape village of Kittanning
Kittanning (village)
Kittanning was an 18th century Native American village in the Ohio Country, located on the Allegheny River at present-day Kittanning, Pennsylvania. The village was at the western terminus of the Kittanning Path, an Indian trail that provided a route across the Alleghenies between the Ohio and...
, and in the summer of 1758, British General John Forbes
John Forbes (General)
John Forbes was a British general in the French and Indian War. He is best known for leading the Forbes Expedition that captured the French outpost at Fort Duquesne and for naming the city of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania after British Secretary of State William Pitt the Elder.-Early life:Forbes was...
began a campaign to capture Fort Duquesne. At the head of 7,000 regular and colonial troops, Forbes built Fort Ligonier
Fort Ligonier
Fort Ligonier is a British fortification from the French and Indian War located in Ligonier, Pennsylvania, United States. The fort served as a staging area for the Forbes Expedition of 1758. During the eight years of its existence as a garrison, Fort Ligonier was never taken by an enemy...
and Fort Bedford
Fort Bedford
Fort Bedford was a French and Indian War-era British military fortification located at the present site of Bedford, Pennsylvania. The fort was a star-shaped log fortress erected in the summer of 1758.-Background:...
, from where he cut a wagon road over the Allegheny Mountains, later known as Forbes’ Road. On the night of September 13–14, 1758, an advance column under Major James Grant was massacred in the Battle of Fort Duquesne
Battle of Fort Duquesne
The Battle of Fort Duquesne was a British assault on the eponymous French fort that was repulsed with heavy losses on 14 September 1758, during the French and Indian War....
. The battleground, the high hill east of the Point, was named Grant's Hill in the memory of Major Grant. With this defeat, Forbes decided to wait until spring. But when he heard that the French had lost Fort Frontenac
Fort Frontenac
Fort Frontenac was a French trading post and military fort built in 1673 in Kingston, Ontario, Canada. It was positioned at the mouth of the Cataraqui River where the St. Lawrence River leaves Lake Ontario , in a location traditionally known as Cataraqui...
and largely evacuated Fort Duquesne
Fort Duquesne
Fort Duquesne was a fort established by the French in 1754, at the junction of the Allegheny and Monongahela rivers in what is now downtown Pittsburgh in the state of Pennsylvania....
, he planned an immediate attack. Now hopelessly outnumbered, the French abandoned and razed Fort Duquesne. Forbes occupied the burned fort on November 25, 1758 and ordered the construction of Fort Pitt
Fort Pitt (Pennsylvania)
Fort Pitt was a fort built at the location of Pittsburgh, Allegheny County, Pennsylvania.-French and Indian War:The fort was built from 1759 to 1761 during the French and Indian War , next to the site of former Fort Duquesne, at the confluence the Allegheny River and the Monongahela River...
, named after British Secretary of State William Pitt the Elder. He also named the settlement between the rivers, "Pittsborough" (see Etymology of Pittsburgh). The British garrison at Fort Pitt made substantial improvements to its fortification. The French never attacked Fort Pitt and the war soon ended with the Treaty of Paris
Treaty of Paris (1763)
The Treaty of Paris, often called the Peace of Paris, or the Treaty of 1763, was signed on 10 February 1763, by the kingdoms of Great Britain, France and Spain, with Portugal in agreement. It ended the French and Indian War/Seven Years' War...
.
Gateway to the West (1763–1799)
In 1760, the first considerable settlement around Fort Pitt began to grow. Traders and settlers built two groups of houses and cabins, the "lower town," near the fort's ramparts, and the "upper town," along the Monongahela as far as present-day Market Street. In April 1761, a census ordered by Colonel Henry BouquetHenry Bouquet
Henry Bouquet was a prominent British Army officer in the French and Indian War and Pontiac's War. Bouquet is best known for his victory over Native Americans at the Battle of Bushy Run, lifting the siege of Fort Pitt during Pontiac's War.-Early life:Bouquet was born into a moderately wealthy...
counted 332 people and 104 houses.
In a final attempt to drive out the British, Pontiac's Rebellion
Pontiac's Rebellion
Pontiac's War, Pontiac's Conspiracy, or Pontiac's Rebellion was a war that was launched in 1763 by a loose confederation of elements of Native American tribes primarily from the Great Lakes region, the Illinois Country, and Ohio Country who were dissatisfied with British postwar policies in the...
began with an assault on British forts in May 1763. Ohio Valley and Great Lakes tribes overran many forts; one of their most important targets was Fort Pitt. Receiving warning of the coming attack, Captain Simeon Ecuyer, the Swiss officer in command of the garrison, prepared for a siege. He leveled the houses outside the ramparts and ordered all settlers into the fort: 330 men, 104 women, and 196 children sought refuge inside its ramparts. Captain Ecuyer also gathered stores which included hundreds of barrels of pork and beef. Pontiac's forces attacked the fort on June 22, 1763. The siege of Fort Pitt
Siege of Fort Pitt
The Siege of Fort Pitt took place in 1763 in what is now the city of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States. The siege was a part of Pontiac's Rebellion, an effort by American Indians to drive the British out of the Ohio Country and back across the Appalachian Mountains...
lasted for two months. Pontiac's warriors kept up a continuous, though ineffective, fire on it from July 27 through August 1, 1763. Then they drew off to meet the relieving party under Colonel Bouquet, which defeated them in the Battle of Bushy Run
Battle of Bushy Run
The Battle of Bushy Run was fought on August 5-6, 1763, in western Pennsylvania, between a British column under the command of Colonel Henry Bouquet and a combined force of Delaware, Shawnee, Mingo, and Huron warriors. This action occurred during Pontiac's Rebellion...
. This victory sealed British dominion over the forks of the Ohio, if not the entire Ohio valley. In 1764 Colonel Bouquet added a redoubt
Redoubt
A redoubt is a fort or fort system usually consisting of an enclosed defensive emplacement outside a larger fort, usually relying on earthworks, though others are constructed of stone or brick. It is meant to protect soldiers outside the main defensive line and can be a permanent structure or a...
, the Fort Pitt Blockhouse
Fort Pitt Blockhouse
The Fort Pitt Blockhouse is a historic building in Point State Park in the city of Pittsburgh...
, which still stands, the sole remaining structure from Fort Pitt and the oldest authenticated building west of the Allegheny Mountains
Allegheny Mountains
The Allegheny Mountain Range , also spelled Alleghany, Allegany and, informally, the Alleghenies, is part of the vast Appalachian Mountain Range of the eastern United States and Canada...
.
Iroquois
The Iroquois , also known as the Haudenosaunee or the "People of the Longhouse", are an association of several tribes of indigenous people of North America...
signed the Fort Stanwix Treaty of 1768, ceding the lands south of the Ohio to the British. European expansion into the upper Ohio valley increased. An estimated 4,000 to 5,000 families settled in western Pennsylvania between 1768 and 1770. Of these settlers, about a third were English
English people
The English are a nation and ethnic group native to England, who speak English. The English identity is of early mediaeval origin, when they were known in Old English as the Anglecynn. England is now a country of the United Kingdom, and the majority of English people in England are British Citizens...
, a third were Scottish-Irish, and the rest were Welsh
Welsh people
The Welsh people are an ethnic group and nation associated with Wales and the Welsh language.John Davies argues that the origin of the "Welsh nation" can be traced to the late 4th and early 5th centuries, following the Roman departure from Britain, although Brythonic Celtic languages seem to have...
, German and others. These groups tended to settle together in small farming communities, but often their households were not within hailing distance. The life of a settler family was one of relentless hard work: clearing the forest, stumping the fields, building cabins and barns, planting, weeding, and harvesting. In addition, almost everything had to be manufactured by hand, including furniture, tools, candles, buttons, and needles. Settlers had to deal with harsh winters, and with snakes, black bears, mountain lions, and timber wolves. Because of the fear of raids by Native Americans, the settlers often built their cabins near, or even on top of, springs. They also built blockhouses, where neighbors would rally during conflicts.
Increasing violence with especially the Shawnee
Shawnee
The Shawnee, Shaawanwaki, Shaawanooki and Shaawanowi lenaweeki, are an Algonquian-speaking people native to North America. Historically they inhabited the areas of Ohio, Virginia, West Virginia, Western Maryland, Kentucky, Indiana, and Pennsylvania...
, Miami
Miami tribe
The Miami are a Native American nation originally found in what is now Indiana, southwest Michigan, and western Ohio. The Miami Tribe of Oklahoma is the only federally recognized tribe of Miami Indians in the United States...
, and Wyandot tribes lead to Dunmore's War
Dunmore's War
Dunmore's War was a war in 1774 between the Colony of Virginia and the Shawnee and Mingo American Indian nations....
in 1774, and conflict with Native Americans continued throughout the American Revolution
American Revolution
The American Revolution was the political upheaval during the last half of the 18th century in which thirteen colonies in North America joined together to break free from the British Empire, combining to become the United States of America...
. In 1777, Fort Pitt became a United States fort, when Brigadier General Edward Hand
Edward Hand
-Early life and career:Hand was born in Clyduff, King's County, Ireland January 10, 1742, and was baptised in Shinrone. His father was John Hand. Among his immediate neighbours were the Kearney family, ancestors of U.S. President Barack Obamba [1]...
took command. In 1779, Colonel Daniel Brodhead
Daniel Brodhead IV
Daniel Brodhead IV was an American military and political leader during the American Revolutionary War and early days of the United States.-Early life:...
led 600 men from Fort Pitt to destroy Seneca
Seneca nation
The Seneca are a group of indigenous people native to North America. They were the nation located farthest to the west within the Six Nations or Iroquois League in New York before the American Revolution. While exact population figures are unknown, approximately 15,000 to 25,000 Seneca live in...
villages along the upper Allegheny.
With the war still ongoing, in 1780 Virginia and Pennsylvania came to an agreement on their mutual borders, creating the state lines known today and determining finally that the Pittsburgh region was Pennsylvanian. In 1783, the Revolutionary War ended, which also brought at least a temporary cessation of border warfare. In the 1784 Treaty of Fort Stanwix
Treaty of Fort Stanwix
The Treaty of Fort Stanwix was an important treaty between North American Indians and the British Empire. It was signed in 1768 at Fort Stanwix, located in present-day Rome, New York...
, the Iroquois
Iroquois
The Iroquois , also known as the Haudenosaunee or the "People of the Longhouse", are an association of several tribes of indigenous people of North America...
ceded the land north of the Purchase Line
Purchase line
The Purchase Line is the name commonly given to the line dividing Indian from British Colonial lands established in the Treaty of Fort Stanwix of 1768 in western Pennsylvania...
to Pennsylvania.
Boat building
Boat building, one of the oldest branches of engineering, is concerned with constructing the hulls of boats and, for sailboats, the masts, spars and rigging.-Parts:* Bow - the front and generally sharp end of the hull...
. Flatboats could carry large numbers of pioneers and goods downriver, while keelboats were capable of traveling upriver.
The village began to develop vital institutions. Hugh Henry Brackenridge
Hugh Henry Brackenridge
Hugh Henry Brackenridge was an American writer, lawyer, judge, and justice of the Pennsylvania Supreme Court.A frontier citizen in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA, he founded both the Pittsburgh Academy, now the University of Pittsburgh, and the Pittsburgh Gazette, still operating today as the...
, a Pittsburgh resident and state legislator, introduced a bill that resulted in a gift deed of land and a charter for the Pittsburgh Academy on February 28, 1787. The Academy later became the University of Western Pennsylvania (1819) and is today known as the University of Pittsburgh
University of Pittsburgh
The University of Pittsburgh, commonly referred to as Pitt, is a state-related research university located in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States. Founded as Pittsburgh Academy in 1787 on what was then the American frontier, Pitt is one of the oldest continuously chartered institutions of...
(1908).
Many farmers distilled their corn harvest into whiskey, increasing its value while lowering its transportation costs. At that time, whiskey was used as a form of currency on the frontier. When the federal government imposed an excise tax on whiskey, Western Pennsylvania farmers felt victimized, leading to the Whiskey Rebellion
Whiskey Rebellion
The Whiskey Rebellion, or Whiskey Insurrection, was a tax protest in the United States in the 1790s, during the presidency of George Washington. Farmers who sold their corn in the form of whiskey had to pay a new tax which they strongly resented...
in 1794. Farmers from the region rallied at Braddock's Field
Braddock's Field
Braddock's Field is a historic battlefield on the banks of the Monongahela River, at Braddock, Pennsylvania, near the junction of Turtle Creek , about nine miles southeast of the "Forks of the Ohio" in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania...
and marched on Pittsburgh. The short-lived rebellion was put down, however, when President George Washington sent in militias from several states.
The town continued to grow in manufacturing capability. In 1792, the boatyards in Pittsburgh built a sloop, Western Experiment. During the next decades, the yards produced other large boats. By the 19th century, they were building ocean-going vessels that shipped goods as far as Europe. In 1794, the town's first courthouse, a wooden structure on Market Square, was built. In 1797, the manufacture of glass began.
| Year | City Population |
|---|---|
| 1761 | 332 |
| 1796 | 1,395 |
| 1800 | 1,565 |
Iron City (1800–1859)
The 1810s were a critical decade in Pittsburgh's growth. In 1811, the first steamboat was built in Pittsburgh. Increasingly, commerce would also flow upriver. The War of 1812
War of 1812
The War of 1812 was a military conflict fought between the forces of the United States of America and those of the British Empire. The Americans declared war in 1812 for several reasons, including trade restrictions because of Britain's ongoing war with France, impressment of American merchant...
was catalytic in the growth of the Iron City. The war with Britain, the manufacturing center of the world, cut off the supply of British goods, stimulating American manufacture. Also, the British blockade of the American coast increased inland trade, so that goods flowed through Pittsburgh from all four directions. By 1815, Pittsburgh was producing $764K in iron; $249K in brass and tin, and $235K in glass products. When, on March 18, 1816, Pittsburgh
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
Pittsburgh is the second-largest city in the US Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and the county seat of Allegheny County. Regionally, it anchors the largest urban area of Appalachia and the Ohio River Valley, and nationally, it is the 22nd-largest urban area in the United States...
was incorporated as a city, it had already taken on some of its defining characteristics: commerce, manufacture, and a constant cloud of coal dust
Coal dust
Coal dust is a fine powdered form of coal, which is created by the crushing, grinding, or pulverizing of coal. Because of the brittle nature of coal, coal dust can be created during mining, transportation, or by mechanically handling coal.-Explosions:...
.
Other emerging towns challenged Pittsburgh. In 1818, the first segment of the National Road was completed, from Baltimore
Baltimore
Baltimore is the largest independent city in the United States and the largest city and cultural center of the US state of Maryland. The city is located in central Maryland along the tidal portion of the Patapsco River, an arm of the Chesapeake Bay. Baltimore is sometimes referred to as Baltimore...
to Wheeling
Wheeling, West Virginia
Wheeling is a city in Ohio and Marshall counties in the U.S. state of West Virginia; it is the county seat of Ohio County. Wheeling is the principal city of the Wheeling Metropolitan Statistical Area...
, bypassing Pittsburgh. This threatened to render the town less essential in east-west commerce. In the coming decade, however, many improvements were made to the transportation infrastructure. In 1818, the region's first river bridge, the Smithfield Street Bridge, opened, the first step in building the city of bridges. In 1820, the original Pennsylvania Turnpike was completed, connecting Pittsburgh and Philadelphia. In 1834, the Pennsylvania Main Line Canal was completed. Now Pittsburgh was part of a transportation system that included rivers, roads, and canals.
Manufacture continued to grow. In 1835, McClurg, Wade and Co. built the first locomotive
Locomotive
A locomotive is a railway vehicle that provides the motive power for a train. The word originates from the Latin loco – "from a place", ablative of locus, "place" + Medieval Latin motivus, "causing motion", and is a shortened form of the term locomotive engine, first used in the early 19th...
west of the Alleghenies. Already, Pittsburgh was capable of manufacturing the most essential machines of its age. By the 1840s, Pittsburgh was not a town, but one of the largest cities west of the mountains. In 1841, the Second Court House
Allegheny County Courthouse
Allegheny County Courthouse is a government building of Allegheny County located in the county seat, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.- Early structures:...
, on Grant's Hill, was completed. Made from polished gray sandstone, the court house had a rotunda 60 feet (18.3 m) in diameter and 80 feet (24.4 m) high.
Like many burgeoning cities of its day, Pittsburgh's growth outstripped some of its necessary infrastructure, such as a water supply with dependable pressure. Because of this, on April 10, 1845, a great fire
Great Fire of Pittsburgh
The Great Fire of Pittsburgh, which occurred on April 10 1845, destroyed a third of the city with damages estimated in the millions, perhaps tens of millions of dollars...
burned out of control, destroying over a thousand buildings and causing $9M in damages. As the city rebuilt, the age of rails arrived. In 1851, the Ohio and Pennsylvania Railroad began service between Cleveland and Allegheny City
Allegheny, Pennsylvania
Allegheny City was a Pennsylvania municipality located on the north side of the junction of the Allegheny and Ohio rivers, across from downtown Pittsburgh. It was annexed by Pittsburgh in 1907...
(present-day North Side
Northside (Pittsburgh)
North Side refers to the region of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, located to the north of the Allegheny River and the Ohio River...
). In 1854, the Pennsylvania Railroad
Pennsylvania Railroad
The Pennsylvania Railroad was an American Class I railroad, founded in 1846. Commonly referred to as the "Pennsy", the PRR was headquartered in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania....
began service between Pittsburgh and Philadelphia.
Despite many challenges, Pittsburgh had grown into an industrial powerhouse. An 1857 article provided a snapshot of the Iron City:
- 939 factories in Pittsburgh and Allegheny City
- employing more than 10K workers
- producing almost $12M in goods
- using 400 steam engines
- Total coal consumed — 22M bushels
- Total iron consumed — 127K tons
- In steam tonnage, third busiest port in the nation, surpassed only by New York CityNew York CityNew York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
and New Orleans.
| Year | City Population | City Rank |
|---|---|---|
| 1800 | 1,565 | NA |
| 1810 | 4,768 | 31 |
| 1820 | 7,248 | 23 |
| 1830 | 12,568 | 17 |
| 1840 | 21,115 | 17 |
| 1850 | 46,601 | 13 |
| 1860 | 49,221 | 17 |
Steel City (1859–1946)
The iron and steel industry developed rapidly after 1830 and became one of the dominant factors in industrial America by the 1860s.Scotch Irish leadership
Ingham (1978) examined the leadership of the industry in its most important center, Pittsburgh, as well as smaller cities. He concludes that the leadership of the iron and steel industry nationwide was "largely Scotch Irish". Ingham finds that the Scotch Irish held together cohesively throughout the 19th century and "developed their own sense of uniqueness."Indeed new immigrants after 1800 made Pittsburgh a major Scotch Irish stronghold. For example, Thomas Mellon
Thomas Mellon
Thomas Alexander Mellon was a Scotch-Irish American, entrepreneur, lawyer, and judge, best known as the founder of Mellon Bank and patriarch of the Mellon family of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.-Early life:...
(b. Ulster 1813–1908) left Ireland in 1823 and became the founder of the famous Mellon clan, which played a central role in banking and industries such as aluminum and oil. As Barnhisel (2005) finds, industrialists like James H. Laughlin
James H. Laughlin
James H. Laughlin was a pioneer of the iron and steel industry in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. He was born March 1, 1806 near Portaferry in County Down.-Steel industry:He became a junior partner of the iron business of Benjamin Franklin Jones in 1857...
(b. Ulster 1806–1882) of Jones and Laughlin Steel Company
Jones and Laughlin Steel Company
The earliest foundations of Jones and Laughlin Steel Company were the American Iron Company, founded in 1851 by Bernard Lauth, and B. F. Jones founded in 1852a few miles south of Pittsburgh along the Monongahela River. Lauth's interest was bought in 1854 by James H. Laughlin...
comprised the "Scots-Irish Presbyterian ruling stratum of Pittsburgh society."
Technology
In 1859, the Clinton and Soho iron furnaces introduced cokeCoke (fuel)
Coke is the solid carbonaceous material derived from destructive distillation of low-ash, low-sulfur bituminous coal. Cokes from coal are grey, hard, and porous. While coke can be formed naturally, the commonly used form is man-made.- History :...
-fire smelting
Smelting
Smelting is a form of extractive metallurgy; its main use is to produce a metal from its ore. This includes iron extraction from iron ore, and copper extraction and other base metals from their ores...
to the region. The American Civil War
American Civil War
The American Civil War was a civil war fought in the United States of America. In response to the election of Abraham Lincoln as President of the United States, 11 southern slave states declared their secession from the United States and formed the Confederate States of America ; the other 25...
boosted the city's economy with increased production of iron and armaments, especially at the Allegheny Arsenal
Allegheny Arsenal
The Allegheny Arsenal, established in 1814, was an important supply and manufacturing center for the Union Army during the American Civil War, and the site of the single largest civilian disaster during the war....
and the Fort Pitt Foundry
Fort Pitt Foundry
The Fort Pitt Foundry was a nineteenth century iron foundry in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. It was originally established at Fifth Avenue and Smithfield Street in 1804 by Joseph McClurg, grandfather of Joseph W. McClurg. It was later moved to the area of Pittsburgh now known as the Strip District at...
. Arms manufacture included iron-clad warships and the world's first 21" gun. By war's end, over one-half of the steel
Steel
Steel is an alloy that consists mostly of iron and has a carbon content between 0.2% and 2.1% by weight, depending on the grade. Carbon is the most common alloying material for iron, but various other alloying elements are used, such as manganese, chromium, vanadium, and tungsten...
and more than one-third of all U.S. glass was produced in Pittsburgh. A milestone in steel production was achieved in 1875, when the Edgar Thomson Works in Braddock
Braddock, Pennsylvania
Braddock is a borough located in the eastern suburbs of Pittsburgh in Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, 10 miles upstream from the mouth of the Monongahela River. The population was 2,159 at the 2010 census...
began to make steel rail using the new Bessemer process
Bessemer process
The Bessemer process was the first inexpensive industrial process for the mass-production of steel from molten pig iron. The process is named after its inventor, Henry Bessemer, who took out a patent on the process in 1855. The process was independently discovered in 1851 by William Kelly...
.
Industrialists such as Andrew Carnegie
Andrew Carnegie
Andrew Carnegie was a Scottish-American industrialist, businessman, and entrepreneur who led the enormous expansion of the American steel industry in the late 19th century...
, Henry Clay Frick, Andrew W. Mellon
Andrew W. Mellon
Andrew William Mellon was an American banker, industrialist, philanthropist, art collector and Secretary of the Treasury from March 4, 1921 until February 12, 1932.-Early life:...
, and Charles M. Schwab
Charles M. Schwab
Charles Michael Schwab was an American steel magnate. Under his leadership, Bethlehem Steel became the second largest steel maker in the United States, and one of the most important heavy manufacturers in the world....
built their fortunes in Pittsburgh. George Westinghouse
George Westinghouse
George Westinghouse, Jr was an American entrepreneur and engineer who invented the railway air brake and was a pioneer of the electrical industry. Westinghouse was one of Thomas Edison's main rivals in the early implementation of the American electricity system...
, credited with such advancements as the air brake
Air brake (rail)
An air brake is a conveyance braking system actuated by compressed air. Modern trains rely upon a fail-safe air brake system that is based upon a design patented by George Westinghouse on March 5, 1872. The Westinghouse Air Brake Company was subsequently organized to manufacture and sell...
and founder of over 60 companies, including Westinghouse Air and Brake Company (1869), Union Switch & Signal
Union Switch & Signal
Union Switch and Signal was a supplier of railway signaling equipment, systems and services in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. As of January 1, 2009, US&S is known as Ansaldo STS USA.-History:...
(1881), and Westinghouse Electric Company
Westinghouse Electric Company
Westinghouse Electric Company LLC is a nuclear power company, offering a wide range of nuclear products and services to utilities throughout the world, including nuclear fuel, service and maintenance, instrumentation and control and advanced nuclear plant designs...
(1886). Banks played a key role in Pittsburgh's development as these industrialists sought massive loans to upgrade plants, integrate industries and fund technological advances. For example, T. Mellon & Sons Bank, founded in 1869, helped to finance an aluminum reduction company that became Alcoa
Alcoa
Alcoa Inc. is the world's third largest producer of aluminum, behind Rio Tinto Alcan and Rusal. From its operational headquarters in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Alcoa conducts operations in 31 countries...
.
Ingham (1991) shows how small, independent iron and steel manufacturers survived and prospered from the 1870s through the 1950s, despite competition from much larger, standardized production firms. These smaller firms were built on a culture that valued local markets and the beneficial role of business in the local community. Small firms concentrated on specialized products, particularly structural steel, where the economies of scale of larger firms were no advantage. They embraced technological change more cautiously than larger firms. They also had less antagonistic relations with workers and employed a higher percentage of highly skilled workers than their mass-production counterparts.
Geography of industrialization
Beginning in the 1870s, entrepreneurs transformed the economy from small, craft-organized factories located inside the city limits to a large integrated industrial region stretching 50 miles across Allegheny County. The new industrial Pittsburgh was based on integrated mills, mass production, and modern management organization in steel and other industries. Many manufacturers searched for large sites with railroad and river accessibility. They purchased land, designed modern plants, and sometimes built towns for workers. Other firms bought into new communities that began as speculative industrial real estate ventures. Some owners removed their plants from the central city's labor unions to exert greater control over workers. The region's rugged topography and dispersed natural resources of coal and gas accentuated this dispersal. The rapid growth of steel, glass, railroad equipment, and coke industries resulted in both large mass-production plants and numerous smaller firms. As capital deepened and interdependence grew, participants multiplied, economies accrued, the division of labor increased, and localized production systems formed around these industries. Transportation, capital, labor markets, and the division of labor in production bound the scattered industrial plants and communities into a sprawling metropolitan district. By 1910 the Pittsburgh district was a complex urban landscape with a dominant central city, surrounded by proximate residential communities, mill towns, satellite cities, and hundreds of mining towns.Representative of the new industrial suburbs was the model town of Vandergrift, according to Mosher (1995). Caught up in a dramatic round of industrial restructuring and labor tension, Pittsburgh steelmaker George McMurtry hired Frederick Law Olmsted
Frederick Law Olmsted
Frederick Law Olmsted was an American journalist, social critic, public administrator, and landscape designer. He is popularly considered to be the father of American landscape architecture, although many scholars have bestowed that title upon Andrew Jackson Downing...
's landscape architectural firm in 1895 to design Vandergrift as a model town. McMurtry believed in what was later known as welfare capitalism
Welfare capitalism
Welfare capitalism refers either to the combination of a capitalist economic system with a welfare state or, in the American context, to the practice of businesses providing welfare-like services to employees...
, with the company going beyond paychecks to provide for the social needs of the workers; he believed that a benign physical environment made for happier and more productive workers. A strike and lockout at McMurtry's steelworks in Apollo, Pennsylvania, prompted him to build the new town. Wanting a loyal workforce, he developed a town agenda that drew upon environmentalism as well as popular attitudes toward capital's treatment of labor. The Olmsted firm translated this agenda into an urban design that included a unique combination of social reform, comprehensive infrastructure planning, and private homeownership principles. The rates of homeownership and cordial relationships between the steel company and Vandergrift residents fostered loyalty among McMurtry's skilled workers and led to McMurtry's greatest success. In 1901 he used Vandergrift's worker-residents to break the first major strike against the United States Steel Corporation.
Germans
During the mid-19th century, Pittsburgh witnessed a dramatic influx of German immigrants, including a brick mason whose son, Henry J. HeinzHenry J. Heinz
Henry John Heinz was an American businessman who founded the H. J. Heinz Company.-Early life:Heinz was one of eight children born to John Henry Heinz and Anna Margaretha Heinz...
, founded the H.J. Heinz Company in 1872. Heinz was at the forefront of reform efforts to improve food purity, working conditions, hours, and wages, but the company bitterly opposed the formation of an independent labor union.
Labor unions
As a manufacturing center, Pittsburgh also became an arena for intense labor strife. During the great railroad strike of 1877Great railroad strike of 1877
The Great Railroad Strike of 1877 began on July 14 in Martinsburg, West Virginia, United States and ended some 45 days later after it was put down by local and state militias, and federal troops.-Economic conditions in the 1870s:...
, Pittsburgh erupted into widespread rioting. Dozens died and over 40 buildings were burned down, including the Union Depot of the Pennsylvania Railroad
Pennsylvania Railroad
The Pennsylvania Railroad was an American Class I railroad, founded in 1846. Commonly referred to as the "Pennsy", the PRR was headquartered in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania....
.
Carnegie Steel Company
Carnegie Steel Company was a steel producing company created by Andrew Carnegie to manage business at his steel mills in the Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania area in the late 19th century.-Creation:...
's manager Henry Clay Frick
Henry Clay Frick
Henry Clay Frick was an American industrialist, financier, and art patron. He founded the H. C. Frick & Company coke manufacturing company, was chairman of the Carnegie Steel Company, and played a major role in the formation of the giant U.S. Steel steel manufacturing concern...
sent in Pinkertons to break the Homestead Strike
Homestead Strike
The Homestead Strike was an industrial lockout and strike which began on June 30, 1892, culminating in a battle between strikers and private security agents on July 6, 1892. It was one of the most serious disputes in U.S. labor history...
. Labor strife continued into the years of the Great Depression
Great Depression
The Great Depression was a severe worldwide economic depression in the decade preceding World War II. The timing of the Great Depression varied across nations, but in most countries it started in about 1929 and lasted until the late 1930s or early 1940s...
, with further organization of H.J. Heinz workers, with the assistance of the Catholic Radical Alliance
Catholic Radical Alliance
The Catholic Radical Alliance was founded in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania in 1937 by Roman Catholic priests Charles Owen Rice, Carl Hensler, and George Barry O'Toole. , with the approval of their bishop, Hugh C. Boyle. It supported the unionization of workers in the H.J. Heinz Company and the Loose...
.
Carnegie
Andrew CarnegieAndrew Carnegie
Andrew Carnegie was a Scottish-American industrialist, businessman, and entrepreneur who led the enormous expansion of the American steel industry in the late 19th century...
, an immigrant from Scotland, a former Pennsylvania Railroad
Pennsylvania Railroad
The Pennsylvania Railroad was an American Class I railroad, founded in 1846. Commonly referred to as the "Pennsy", the PRR was headquartered in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania....
executive turned steel magnate, founded the Carnegie Steel Company
Carnegie Steel Company
Carnegie Steel Company was a steel producing company created by Andrew Carnegie to manage business at his steel mills in the Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania area in the late 19th century.-Creation:...
. He proceeded to play a key role in the development of the U.S. steel industry. In 1890, he established the first Carnegie Library
Carnegie Library
Carnegie Library, Carnegie Public Library, Carnegie Free Library, Carnegie Free Public Library, Andrew Carnegie Library, Andrew Carnegie Free Library or Carnegie Library Building may refer to any of the following Carnegie libraries:- California :*Carnegie Library , listed on the National Register...
, and in 1895, the Carnegie Institute
Carnegie Museums of Pittsburgh
Carnegie Museums of Pittsburgh are four museums that are operated by the Carnegie Institute headquartered in the Oakland neighborhood of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania...
. In 1901, as the U.S. Steel
U.S. Steel
The United States Steel Corporation , more commonly known as U.S. Steel, is an integrated steel producer with major production operations in the United States, Canada, and Central Europe. The company is the world's tenth largest steel producer ranked by sales...
Corporation formed, he sold his mills to J.P. Morgan for $250 million, making him one of the world's richest men. Carnegie once wrote that a man who dies rich, dies disgraced. He devoted the rest of his life to public service, establishing libraries, trusts, and foundations. In Pittsburgh, he founded the Carnegie Institute of Technology
Carnegie Institute of Technology
The Carnegie Institute of Technology , is the name for Carnegie Mellon University’s College of Engineering. It was first called the Carnegie Technical Schools, or Carnegie Tech, when it was founded in 1900 by Andrew Carnegie who intended to build a “first class technical school” in Pittsburgh,...
(now Carnegie Mellon University
Carnegie Mellon University
Carnegie Mellon University is a private research university in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States....
) and the Carnegie Museums of Pittsburgh
Carnegie Museums of Pittsburgh
Carnegie Museums of Pittsburgh are four museums that are operated by the Carnegie Institute headquartered in the Oakland neighborhood of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania...
.
The third (and present) Allegheny County Courthouse
Allegheny County Courthouse
Allegheny County Courthouse is a government building of Allegheny County located in the county seat, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.- Early structures:...
and Jail was completed in 1886. In 1890, trolleys began operations. In 1907, Pittsburgh
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
Pittsburgh is the second-largest city in the US Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and the county seat of Allegheny County. Regionally, it anchors the largest urban area of Appalachia and the Ohio River Valley, and nationally, it is the 22nd-largest urban area in the United States...
annexed Allegheny City
Allegheny, Pennsylvania
Allegheny City was a Pennsylvania municipality located on the north side of the junction of the Allegheny and Ohio rivers, across from downtown Pittsburgh. It was annexed by Pittsburgh in 1907...
, which is now known as the North Shore
North Shore (Pittsburgh)
The North Shore is a neighborhood in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania's North Side. It has a zip code of 15212, and has representation on Pittsburgh City Council by both the council members for District 1 and 6...
.
Early 20th century
By 1911, Pittsburgh had grown into an industrial and commercial powerhouse:- Nexus of a vast railway system, with freight yards capable of handling 60K cars of harbor
- Yearly river traffic in excess of 9M tons
- Value of factory products more than $211M (with Allegheny City)
- Allegheny county produced, as percentage of national output, about:
- 24% of the pig ironPig ironPig iron is the intermediate product of smelting iron ore with a high-carbon fuel such as coke, usually with limestone as a flux. Charcoal and anthracite have also been used as fuel...
- 34% of the Bessemer steel
- 44% of the open hearthOpen hearth furnaceOpen hearth furnaces are one of a number of kinds of furnace where excess carbon and other impurities are burnt out of the pig iron to produce steel. Since steel is difficult to manufacture due to its high melting point, normal fuels and furnaces were insufficient and the open hearth furnace was...
steel - 53% of the crucibleCrucibleA crucible is a container used for metal, glass, and pigment production as well as a number of modern laboratory processes, which can withstand temperatures high enough to melt or otherwise alter its contents...
steel - 24% of the steel railsRail tracksThe track on a railway or railroad, also known as the permanent way, is the structure consisting of the rails, fasteners, sleepers and ballast , plus the underlying subgrade...
- 59% of the structural shapes
- 24% of the pig iron
Environment
During the late 19th century, city leaders debated the responsibility and expense of creating a waterworks system and disposal of sewage. Downstream users complained about Pittsburgh's dumping of sewage into the Ohio River. Allegheny County cities did not stop discharging raw sewage into rivers until 1939. Pittsburgh's smoke pollution, seen in the 1890s as a sign of prosperity, was recognized as a problem in the Progressive EraProgressive Era
The Progressive Era in the United States was a period of social activism and political reform that flourished from the 1890s to the 1920s. One main goal of the Progressive movement was purification of government, as Progressives tried to eliminate corruption by exposing and undercutting political...
and was cleared up in the 1930s-1940s. With little regard for beauty, steel plants deposited mountains of slag until 1972, especially in Nine Mile Run Valley.
In November 1927, 28 people were killed and hundreds were wounded in an explosion of a gas tank.
To escape the soot of the city, many of the wealthy lived in the Shadyside and East End neighborhoods, a few miles east of downtown. Fifth Avenue was dubbed "Millionaire's Row" because of the many mansions lining the street.
On March 17 and 18, 1936, Pittsburgh witnessed the worst flood in its history, with flood levels peaking at 46 feet. This catastrophe killed 69 victims, destroyed thousands of buildings, caused $3B (2006 dollars) in damages, and put over 60,000 steelworkers out of work.
High culture
OaklandOakland (Pittsburgh)
Oakland is the academic, cultural, and healthcare center of Pittsburgh and is Pennsylvania's third largest "Downtown". Only Center City Philadelphia and Downtown Pittsburgh can claim more economic and social activity than Oakland...
became the city's predominant cultural and educational center, including three universities, multiple museums, a library, a music hall, and a botanical conservatory. Oakland's University of Pittsburgh
University of Pittsburgh
The University of Pittsburgh, commonly referred to as Pitt, is a state-related research university located in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States. Founded as Pittsburgh Academy in 1787 on what was then the American frontier, Pitt is one of the oldest continuously chartered institutions of...
erected what today is still the world's second-tallest educational building, the 42-story Cathedral of Learning
Cathedral of Learning
The Cathedral of Learning, a Pittsburgh landmark listed in the National Register of Historic Places, is the centerpiece of the University of Pittsburgh's main campus in the Oakland neighborhood of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States...
. It towered over Forbes Field
Forbes Field
Forbes Field was a baseball park in the Oakland neighborhood of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, from 1909 to 1971. It was the third home of the Pittsburgh Pirates Major League Baseball team, and the first home of the Pittsburgh Steelers, the city's National Football League franchise...
, where the Pittsburgh Pirates
Pittsburgh Pirates
The Pittsburgh Pirates are a Major League Baseball club based in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. They play in the Central Division of the National League, and are five-time World Series Champions...
played from 1909–1970.
New immigrants
Between 1870 and 1920, the population of Pittsburgh grew almost sevenfold. Many of the new residents were immigrants who sought employment in the factories and mills and introduced new traditions, languages, and cultures to the city. Ethnic neighborhoods emerged on densely populated hillsides and valleys, such as South SideSouth Side (Pittsburgh)
South Side is an area in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA, located along the Monongahela River across from Downtown Pittsburgh. The South Side is officially divided into two neighborhoods, South Side Flats and South Side Slopes. Both the Flats and the Slopes are represented on Pittsburgh City...
, Polish Hill
Polish Hill
Polish Hill is a neighborhood in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Primarily a residential area, it is home to one of Pittsburgh's oldest and largest churches, the Immaculate Heart of Mary....
, Bloomfield
Bloomfield (Pittsburgh)
Bloomfield is a neighborhood in Pittsburgh; it is located three miles from the Golden Triangle, which is the city's center, and is represented on Pittsburgh City Council by Patrick Dowd and Bill Peduto. Bloomfield is referred to as Pittsburgh's Little Italy...
, and Squirrel Hill
Squirrel Hill
Squirrel Hill is a residential neighborhood in the east end of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States. The city officially divides it into two neighborhoods, Squirrel Hill North and Squirrel Hill South, but it is almost universally treated as a single neighborhood...
, home to 28% of the city's almost 21,000 Jewish households. The Strip District
Strip District (Pittsburgh)
The Strip District is a neighborhood in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania in the United States. It is a one-half square mile area of land northeast of the central business district bordered to the north by the Allegheny River and to the south by portions of the Hill District...
, the city's produce distribution center, still boasts many restaurants and clubs that showcase these multicultural traditions of Pittsburghers.
Duke Ellington
Edward Kennedy "Duke" Ellington was an American composer, pianist, and big band leader. Ellington wrote over 1,000 compositions...
and Pittsburgh natives Billy Strayhorn
Billy Strayhorn
William Thomas "Billy" Strayhorn was an American composer, pianist and arranger, best known for his successful collaboration with bandleader and composer Duke Ellington lasting nearly three decades. His compositions include "Chelsea Bridge", "Take the "A" Train" and "Lush Life".-Early...
and Earl Hines
Earl Hines
Earl Kenneth Hines, universally known as Earl "Fatha" Hines, was an American jazz pianist. Hines was one of the most influential figures in the development of modern jazz piano and, according to one source, is "one of a small number of pianists whose playing shaped the history of jazz".-Early...
played there. Two of the Negro League's greatest rivals, the Pittsburgh Crawfords
Pittsburgh Crawfords
The Pittsburgh Crawfords, popularly known as the Craws, were a professional Negro league baseball team based in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Named after the Crawford Grill, a club in the Hill District of Pittsburgh owned by Gus Greenlee, the Crawfords were originally a youth semipro team sponsored by...
and the Homestead Grays
Homestead Grays
The Homestead Grays were a professional baseball team that played in the Negro leagues in the United States. The team was formed in 1912 by Cumberland Posey, and would remain in continuous operation for 38 seasons. The team was based in Homestead, Pennsylvania, adjacent to Pittsburgh.-Franchise...
, often competed in the Hill District. The teams dominated the Negro National League in the 1930s and 1940s.
1930s
Pittsburgh was a Republican stronghold starting in the 1880s, and the Republican governments provided jobs and assistance for the new immigrants in return for their votes. But the Great Depression starting in 1929 ruined the GOP in the city. The Democratic victory of 1932 meant an end to Republican patronage jobs and assistance. As the Depression worsened, Pittsburgh ethnics voted heavily for the Democrats, especially in 1934, making the city a stronghold of the New Deal CoalitionNew Deal coalition
The New Deal Coalition was the alignment of interest groups and voting blocs that supported the New Deal and voted for Democratic presidential candidates from 1932 until the late 1960s. It made the Democratic Party the majority party during that period, losing only to Dwight D. Eisenhower in 1952...
. By 1936, Democratic programs for relief and jobs, especially the WPA
Works Progress Administration
The Works Progress Administration was the largest and most ambitious New Deal agency, employing millions of unskilled workers to carry out public works projects, including the construction of public buildings and roads, and operated large arts, drama, media, and literacy projects...
, were so popular with the ethnics that a large majority voted for the Democrats.
Joseph Guffey, statewide leader of the Democrats, and his local lieutenant David Lawrence
David Lawrence
David Lawrence may refer to:*David Lawrence, pseudonym of English poet & TV scriptwriter David Harsent *David Lawrence , Canadian actor *David Lawrence , English cricketer...
gained control of all federal patronage in Pittsburgh after Roosevelt's landslide in 1932 and the election of a Democratic mayor in 1933. Guffey and Lawrence used the New Deal
New Deal
The New Deal was a series of economic programs implemented in the United States between 1933 and 1936. They were passed by the U.S. Congress during the first term of President Franklin D. Roosevelt. The programs were Roosevelt's responses to the Great Depression, and focused on what historians call...
programs to increase their political power and build up a Democratic machine that superseded the decaying Republican machine. Guffey himself acknowledged that a high rate of people on relief was not only "a challenge" but also "an opportunity." He regarded each relief job as Democratic patronage.
1940s
Pittsburgh was at the center of the "Arsenal of DemocracyArsenal of Democracy
"The Arsenal of Democracy" was a propaganda slogan coined by U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt, in a radio broadcast delivered on December 29, 1940. Roosevelt promised to help the United Kingdom fight Nazi Germany by giving them military supplies while the United States stayed out of the actual...
" that provided steel, aluminum, munitions and machinery for the U.S. and the Allies during World War II. Pittsburgh's mills contributed 95 million tons of steel to the war effort.>
Postwar
David LawrenceDavid Lawrence
David Lawrence may refer to:*David Lawrence, pseudonym of English poet & TV scriptwriter David Harsent *David Lawrence , Canadian actor *David Lawrence , English cricketer...
, a Democrat, served as mayor of Pittsburgh from 1946 to 1959 and as Pennsylvania's governor from 1959 to 1963. Lawrence used his political power to transform Pittsburgh's political machine into a modern governmental unit that could run the city well and honestly. In 1946 Lawrence decided to enforce the Smoke Control Ordinance of 1941 because he believed smoke abatement was crucial for the city's future economic development. However, enforcement placed a substantial burden on the city's working-class because smoky bituminous coal was much less expensive than smokeless fuels. One round of protests came from Italian-American organizations, which called for delay in enforcing it. Enforcement raised their cost of living and threatened the jobs of their relatives in nearby bituminous coal mines. Despite dislike of the smoke abatement program, Italian Americans strongly supported the reelection of Lawrence in 1949, in part because many of them were on the city payroll.
| Year | City Population | City Rank |
|---|---|---|
| 1860 | 49,221 | 17 |
| 1870 | 86,076 | 16 |
| 1880 | 156,389 | 12 |
| 1890 | 238,617 | 13 |
| 1900 | 321,616 | 11 |
| 1910 | 533,905 | 8 |
| 1920 | 588,343 | 9 |
| 1930 | 669,817 | 10 |
| 1940 | 671,659 | 10 |
| 1950 | 676,806 | 12 |
Renaissance I (1946–1973)
David L. Lawrence
David Leo Lawrence was an American politician who served as the 37th Governor of Pennsylvania from 1959 to 1963. He is to date the only mayor of Pittsburgh to be elected Governor of Pennsylvania. Previously, he had been the mayor of Pittsburgh from 1946 through 1959...
, elected in 1945, and Richard K. Mellon, chairman of Mellon Bank, began smoke control and urban revitalization, also known as Urban Renewal
Urban renewal
Urban renewal is a program of land redevelopment in areas of moderate to high density urban land use. Renewal has had both successes and failures. Its modern incarnation began in the late 19th century in developed nations and experienced an intense phase in the late 1940s – under the rubric of...
projects that transformed the city in unforeseen ways.
"Renaissance I" began in 1946. Title One of the Housing Act of 1949
Housing Act of 1949
The American Housing Act of 1949 was a landmark, sweeping expansion of the federal role in mortgage insurance and issuance and the construction of public housing...
provided the means in which to begin. By 1950, vast swaths of buildings and land near the Point were demolished for Gateway Center
Gateway Center (Pittsburgh)
The Gateway Center in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania is a high-rise building complex with of office space in four buildings. Gateway Center was purchased in 2004 by Hertz Investment Group, a Los Angeles, California based real estate investment company, for US$55 million...
. 1953 saw the opening of the (since demolished) Greater Pittsburgh Municipal Airport.
In the late 1950s and early 1960s, the lower Hill District, an area inhabited predominantly by people of African descent, was completely destroyed. Ninety-five acres of the lower Hill District were cleared using eminent domain
Eminent domain
Eminent domain , compulsory purchase , resumption/compulsory acquisition , or expropriation is an action of the state to seize a citizen's private property, expropriate property, or seize a citizen's rights in property with due monetary compensation, but without the owner's consent...
, forcibly displacing hundreds of small businesses and over 1,200 residents, to make room for a cultural center that included the Civic Arena
Mellon Arena
Civic Arena is an indoor arena in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania that is currently undergoing demolition. It was the first retractable roof major sports venue in the world, covering 170,000 sq. feet and constructed with just shy of 3,000 tons of Pittsburgh steel...
, which opened in 1961. Other than one apartment building, none of the other buildings planned for the cultural center were ever built.
In the early 1960s, the neighborhood of East Liberty
East Liberty (Pittsburgh)
East Liberty is a culturally diverse neighborhood in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania's East End. It is bordered by Highland Park, Morningside, Stanton Heights, Garfield, Friendship, Shadyside and Larimer, and is represented on by Patrick Dowd...
was also included in Renaissance I Urban Renewal plans, with over 125 acre (0.5058575 km²) of the neighborhood being demolished and replaced with garden apartments, three 20-story public housing apartments, and a convoluted road-way system that circled a pedestrianized shopping district. In the span of just a few years during the mid-1960s, East Liberty became a blighted neighborhood. There were some 575 businesses in East Liberty in 1959, but only 292 in 1970, and just 98 in 1979. The businesses that remained tended not to serve the majority of nearby Pittsburghers, but only the captive audience that remained in what was now an urban ghetto.
Preservation efforts by the Pittsburgh History and Landmarks Foundation
Pittsburgh History and Landmarks Foundation
The Pittsburgh History & Landmarks Foundation is a nonprofit organization founded in 1964 to support the preservation of historic buildings and neighborhoods in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA....
, along with community neighborhood groups, resisted the demolition plans. The neighborhoods containing rich architectural heritage, including the Mexican War Streets
Mexican War Streets
The Mexican War Streets, originally known as "The Buena Vista Tract", is a historic district in the Central Northside neighborhood of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA. The district is densely filled with beautifully restored row houses, community gardens and tree lined streets and alleyways...
, Allegheny West
Allegheny West (Pittsburgh)
Allegheny West is an historic neighborhood in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania's North Side. It has two zip codes of both 15233 and 15212, and has representation on Pittsburgh City Council by the council member for District 6 ....
, and Manchester
Manchester (Pittsburgh)
Manchester is a neighborhood on Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania's North Side. It has a ZIP code of 15233, and has representation on Pittsburgh City Council by the council member for District 6 . The Pittsburgh Bureau of Fire houses 37 Engine and their foam unit in Manchester...
, were spared. The center of Allegheny City with its culturally and socially important buildings were not as lucky. All of the buildings, with the exception of the Old U.S. Post Office, the Carnegie Library, and Buhl Planetarium were destroyed and replaced with the "pedestrianized" Allegheny Center mall and apartments.
Despite this faux pas, the city's industrial base continued to grow. Jones and Laughlin Steel Company
Jones and Laughlin Steel Company
The earliest foundations of Jones and Laughlin Steel Company were the American Iron Company, founded in 1851 by Bernard Lauth, and B. F. Jones founded in 1852a few miles south of Pittsburgh along the Monongahela River. Lauth's interest was bought in 1854 by James H. Laughlin...
expanded its plant on the Southside. H.J. Heinz, Pittsburgh Plate Glass, Alcoa, Westinghouse
Westinghouse Electric (1886)
Westinghouse Electric was an American manufacturing company. It was founded in 1886 as Westinghouse Electric Company and later renamed Westinghouse Electric Corporation by George Westinghouse. The company purchased CBS in 1995 and became CBS Corporation in 1997...
, U.S. Steel
U.S. Steel
The United States Steel Corporation , more commonly known as U.S. Steel, is an integrated steel producer with major production operations in the United States, Canada, and Central Europe. The company is the world's tenth largest steel producer ranked by sales...
and its new division, the Pittsburgh Chemical Company and many other companies also continued robust operations through the 1960s. 1970 marked the completion of the final building projects of Renaissance I: the U.S. Steel Tower
U.S. Steel Tower
U.S. Steel Tower, also known as the Steel Building , is the tallest skyscraper in Pittsburgh, the fourth tallest building in Pennsylvania, and the 37th tallest in the United States. Completed in 1970, the tower has 64 floors to and has of leasable space. Its original name was the U.S. Steel...
and Three Rivers Stadium
Three Rivers Stadium
Three Rivers Stadium was a multi-purpose stadium located in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania from 1970 to 2000. It was home to the Pittsburgh Pirates and the Pittsburgh Steelers, the city's Major League Baseball franchise and National Football League franchise respectively.Built as a replacement to...
. In 1974, with the addition of the fountain at the tip of the Golden Triangle, Point State Park
Point State Park
Point State Park is a Pennsylvania state park on in Downtown Pittsburgh, Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, USA, at the confluence of the Allegheny and Monongahela rivers, forming the Ohio River....
was completed. Although air quality was dramatically improved, and Pittsburgh's manufacturing base seemed solid, questions abound about the negative effects Urban Renewal continues to have on the social fabric of Pittsburgh. Pittsburgh, however, was about to undergo one of its most dramatic transformations.
Reinvention (1973–present)
1973 oil crisis
The 1973 oil crisis started in October 1973, when the members of Organization of Arab Petroleum Exporting Countries or the OAPEC proclaimed an oil embargo. This was "in response to the U.S. decision to re-supply the Israeli military" during the Yom Kippur war. It lasted until March 1974. With the...
, and increasing use of other materials. At this critical juncture, free market
Free market
A free market is a competitive market where prices are determined by supply and demand. However, the term is also commonly used for markets in which economic intervention and regulation by the state is limited to tax collection, and enforcement of private ownership and contracts...
, anti-union policies, and deregulation
Deregulation
Deregulation is the removal or simplification of government rules and regulations that constrain the operation of market forces.Deregulation is the removal or simplification of government rules and regulations that constrain the operation of market forces.Deregulation is the removal or...
, especially under President Ronald Reagan
Ronald Reagan
Ronald Wilson Reagan was the 40th President of the United States , the 33rd Governor of California and, prior to that, a radio, film and television actor....
, came into play.
Collapse of steel
Free market pressures exposed the U.S. steel industry's own internal problems, which included a now-outdated manufacturing base that had been over-expanded in the 1950s and 1960s, hostile management and labor relationships, the inflexibility of United SteelworkersUnited Steelworkers
The United Steel, Paper and Forestry, Rubber, Manufacturing, Energy, Allied Industrial and Service Workers International Union is the largest industrial labor union in North America, with 705,000 members. Headquartered in Pittsburgh, U.S., the United Steelworkers represents workers in the United...
regarding wage cuts and work-rule reforms, oligarchic management styles, and poor strategic planning by both unions and management. In particular, Pittsburgh faced its own challenges. Local coke and iron ore deposits were depleted, raising material costs. The large mills in the Pittsburgh region also faced competition from newer, more profitable "mini-mills" and non-union mills with lower labor costs.
In 1984 the Homestead Works was demolished, replaced in 1999 by The Waterfront shopping mall. As a direct result of the loss of mill employment, the number of people living in Homestead dwindled. By the time of the 2000 census, the borough population was 3,569. The borough began financially recovering in 2002, with the enlarging retail tax base.
Beginning in the late 1970s and early 1980s, the steel industry in Pittsburgh began to implode. Following the 1981–1982 recession, for example, the mills laid off 153,000 workers. The steel mills began to shut down. These closures caused a ripple effect, as railroads, mines, and other factories across the region lost business and closed. The local economy suffered a depression, marked by high unemployment and underemployment, as laid-off workers took lower-paying, non-union jobs. Pittsburgh suffered as elsewhere in the Rust Belt
Rust Belt
The Rust Belt is a term that gained currency in the 1980s as the informal description of an area straddling the Midwestern and Northeastern United States, in which local economies traditionally garnered an increased manufacturing sector to add jobs and corporate profits...
with a declining population, and like many other U.S. cities, it also saw white flight
White flight
White flight has been a term that originated in the United States, starting in the mid-20th century, and applied to the large-scale migration of whites of various European ancestries from racially mixed urban regions to more racially homogeneous suburban or exurban regions. It was first seen as...
to the suburbs.
Corporations
Top corporate headquarters such as Gulf OilGulf Oil
Gulf Oil was a major global oil company from the 1900s to the 1980s. The eighth-largest American manufacturing company in 1941 and the ninth-largest in 1979, Gulf Oil was one of the so-called Seven Sisters oil companies...
(1985), Koppers
Koppers
Koppers is a global chemical and materials company based in Downtown Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States in an art-deco 1920s skyscraper, the Koppers Tower.-Structure:...
(1987), Westinghouse
Westinghouse Electric (1886)
Westinghouse Electric was an American manufacturing company. It was founded in 1886 as Westinghouse Electric Company and later renamed Westinghouse Electric Corporation by George Westinghouse. The company purchased CBS in 1995 and became CBS Corporation in 1997...
(1996) and Rockwell International
Rockwell International
Rockwell International was a major American manufacturing conglomerate in the latter half of the 20th century, involved in aircraft, the space industry, both defense-oriented and commercial electronics, automotive and truck components, printing presses, valves and meters, and industrial automation....
(1989) were bought out by larger firms, with the loss of high paying, white collar headquarters and research personnel (the "brain drain") as well as massive charitable contributions by the "home based" companies to local cultural and educational institutions. At the time of the Gulf Oil merger in 1985 it was the largest buyout in world history involving the company that was #7 on the Fortune 500 just six years earlier. Over 1,000 high paying white collar corporate and PhD research jobs were lost in one day.
Today, there are no steel mills within the city limits of Pittsburgh, although manufacture continues at regional mills, such as the Edgar Thomson Works in nearby Braddock.
| Year | City Population | City Rank | Population of the Urbanized Area |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1950 | 676,806 | 12 | 1,533,000 |
| 1960 | 604,332 | 16 | 1,804,000 |
| 1970 | 540,025 | 24 | 1,846,000 |
| 1980 | 423,938 | 30 | 1,810,000 |
| 1990 | 369,879 | 40 | 1,678,000 |
| 2000 | 334,563 | 51 | 1,753,000 |
The Pittsburgh Urban Area remains the 22nd largest in the U.S., between those of Cleveland, Ohio
Ohio
Ohio is a Midwestern state in the United States. The 34th largest state by area in the U.S.,it is the 7th‑most populous with over 11.5 million residents, containing several major American cities and seven metropolitan areas with populations of 500,000 or more.The state's capital is Columbus...
and Portland, Oregon
Oregon
Oregon is a state in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States. It is located on the Pacific coast, with Washington to the north, California to the south, Nevada on the southeast and Idaho to the east. The Columbia and Snake rivers delineate much of Oregon's northern and eastern...
.
Higher education
Carnegie-Mellon University and the University of PittsburghUniversity of Pittsburgh
The University of Pittsburgh, commonly referred to as Pitt, is a state-related research university located in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States. Founded as Pittsburgh Academy in 1787 on what was then the American frontier, Pitt is one of the oldest continuously chartered institutions of...
had evolved in the mid-20th century along lines that followed the needs of the heavy industries that financed and directed their development. The collapse of steel put pressure on those two universities to reinvent themselves as research centers in science and technology which acted to pull the regional economy toward high-technology fields.
Beginning in the 1980s, Pittsburgh's economy shifted from heavy industry to services, medicine, higher education, tourism, banking, corporate headquarters, and high technology. Today, the top two private employers in the city are the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center
University of Pittsburgh Medical Center
The University of Pittsburgh Medical Center is an $9 billion integrated global nonprofit health enterprise that has 54,000 employees, 20 hospitals, 4,200 licensed beds, 400 outpatient sites and doctors’ offices, a 1.5 million-member health insurance division, as well as commercial and...
(26,000 employees) and the West Penn Allegheny Health System
West Penn Allegheny Health System
West Penn Allegheny Health System is an academic medical center located in the Pittsburgh metropolitan area. The second-largest provider of healthcare in its region, WPAHS was formed by the merger of the Western Pennsylvania Hospital , founded in 1848 as Pittsburgh's first chartered public...
(13,000 employees).
Civic improvements
Despite the economic turmoil, civic improvements continued. In the mid-1970s, Arthur P. Ziegler, Jr. and the Pittsburgh History and Landmarks FoundationPittsburgh History and Landmarks Foundation
The Pittsburgh History & Landmarks Foundation is a nonprofit organization founded in 1964 to support the preservation of historic buildings and neighborhoods in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA....
(Landmarks) wanted to demonstrate that historic preservation could be used to drive economic development without the use of eminent domain or public subsidies. Landmarks acquired the former terminal buildings and yards of the Pittsburgh and Lake Erie Railroad
Pittsburgh and Lake Erie Railroad
The Pittsburgh and Lake Erie Railroad , also known as the "Little Giant", was formed on May 11, 1875. Company headquarters were located in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The line connected Pittsburgh in the east with Youngstown, Ohio at nearby Haselton, Ohio in the west and Connellsville, ...
, a 1 miles (1.6 km) long property at the base of Mt. Washington facing the City of Pittsburgh. In 1976, Landmarks developed the site as a mixed-use historic adaptive reuse
Adaptive reuse
Adaptive reuse refers to the process of reusing an old site or building for a purpose other than which it was built or designed for. Along with brownfield reclamation, adaptive reuse is seen by many as a key factor in land conservation and the reduction of urban sprawl...
development that gave the foundation the opportunity to put its urban planning principles into practice. Aided by an initial generous gift from the Allegheny Foundation
Allegheny Foundation
The Allegheny Foundation is a philanthropic organization in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania and part of the Scaife Foundations. Richard Mellon Scaife endowed the foundation and serves as the chairman. It makes grants to historical, educational, political, and environmental organizations, especially...
in 1976, Landmarks adapted five historic Pittsburgh and Lake Erie Railroad buildings for new uses and added a hotel, a dock for the Gateway Clipper fleet, and parking areas. Now shops, offices, restaurants, and entertainment anchor the historic riverfront site on the south shore of the Monongahela River
Monongahela River
The Monongahela River is a river on the Allegheny Plateau in north-central West Virginia and southwestern Pennsylvania in the United States...
, opposite the Golden Triangle (Pittsburgh). Station Square is Pittsburgh’s premiere attraction generating over 3,500,000 visitors a year. It reflects a $100 million investment from all sources, with the lowest public cost and highest taxpayer return of any major renewal project in the Pittsburgh region since the 1950s. In 1994, Pittsburgh History and Landmarks Foundation sold Station Square in to Forest City Enterprises
Forest City Enterprises
Forest City Enterprises is a $9-billion diversified real estate management and development company based in Cleveland, Ohio, United States. Its portfolio includes interests in retail centers, apartment communities, office buildings and mixed-use projects in the U.S...
which created an endowment to help support its restoration efforts and educational programs. Each year the staff and docents of Pittsburgh History and Landmarks Foundation introduce more than 10,000 people — teachers, students, adults, and visitors — to the architectural heritage of the Pittsburgh region and to the value of historic preservation.
In 1985, the J & L Steel site on the north side of the Monongahela river was cleared and a publicly subsidized High Technology Center was built. The Pittsburgh Technology Center, home to many major technology companies, is planning major expansion in the area soon. In the 1980s, the "Renaissance II" urban revitalization created numerous new structures, such as PPG Place
PPG Place
PPG Place is a complex in downtown Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, consisting of six buildings within three city blocks and five and a half acres. Named for its anchor tenant, PPG Industries, who initiated the project for its headquarters, the buildings are all of matching glass design consisting of...
. In the 1990s, the former sites of the Homestead, Duquesne and South Side J&L mills were cleared. In 1992, the new terminal at Pittsburgh International Airport
Pittsburgh International Airport
Pittsburgh International Airport , formerly Greater Pittsburgh Airport, Greater Pittsburgh International Airport and commonly referred to as Pittsburgh International, is a joint civil–military international airport located in the Pittsburgh suburb of Findlay Township, approximately west of...
opened. In 2001, the aging Three Rivers Stadium was replaced by Heinz Field
Heinz Field
Heinz Field is a stadium located in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. It primarily serves as the home to the Pittsburgh Steelers and University of Pittsburgh Panthers American football teams, members of the National Football League and National Collegiate Athletic Association respectively...
and PNC Park
PNC Park
PNC Park is a baseball park located in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. It is the fifth home of the Pittsburgh Pirates, the city's Major League Baseball franchise. It opened during the 2001 Major League Baseball season, after the controlled implosion of the Pirates' previous home, Three Rivers Stadium...
, despite being rejected by voter referendum.
Pittsburgh today
Present-day Pittsburgh, with a diversified economy, a low cost of living, and a rich infrastructure for education and cultureCulture of Pittsburgh
The Culture of Pittsburgh stems from the city's long history as a center for cultural philanthropy, as well as its rich ethnic traditions. In the 19th and 20th centuries, wealthy businessmen such as Andrew Carnegie, Henry J...
, has been ranked as one of the World's Most Livable Cities
World's Most Livable Cities
The world's most liveable cities is an informal name given to any list of cities as they rank on a reputable annual survey of living conditions. Two examples are the Mercer Quality of Living Survey and The Economists World's Most Livable Cities .Liveability rankings are designed for use by...
.
See also
- Pittsburgh
- List of mayors of Pittsburgh
- List of Pittsburgh neighborhoods
- List of major corporations in Pittsburgh
- University of PittsburghUniversity of PittsburghThe University of Pittsburgh, commonly referred to as Pitt, is a state-related research university located in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States. Founded as Pittsburgh Academy in 1787 on what was then the American frontier, Pitt is one of the oldest continuously chartered institutions of...
- Pittsburgh RiotPittsburgh RiotThe Pittsburgh Riot was a 19th century race riot in which an armed clash between Irish and Italian-American laborers resulted in one man seriously injured and the death of another on September 19, 1886....
- Pittsburgh Flood of 1936
Secondary sources
- Baldwin, Leland D. Pittsburgh: The Story of a City University of Pittsburgh Press, 1937 online edition, popular history by leading scholar
- Bauman, John F. and Edward K. Muller. Before Renaissance: Planning in Pittsburgh, 1889-1943 University of Pittsburgh Press,(2006). 331 pp. online review
- Cannadine, David. Mellon: An American Life (2006), major biography of Thomas MellonThomas MellonThomas Alexander Mellon was a Scotch-Irish American, entrepreneur, lawyer, and judge, best known as the founder of Mellon Bank and patriarch of the Mellon family of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.-Early life:...
and Andrew Mellon, top financial leaders - Carson, Carolyn Leonard. Healing Body, Mind, and Spirit: The History of the St. Francis Medical Center, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Carnegie-Mellon U. Press, 1995. 246 pp.
- Couvares, Francis G. The Remaking of Pittsburgh: Class and Culture in an Industrializing City 1877-1919 State University of New York Press, 1984 online edition
- Crowley, Gregory J. The Politics of Place: Contentious Urban Redevelopment in Pittsburgh. U. of Pittsburgh Press, 2005. 207 pp.
- Devault, Ileen A. Sons and Daughters of Labor: Class and Clerical Work in Turn-of-the-Century Pittsburgh. Cornell U. Press, 1991. 194 pp.
- Glasco, Laurence A., ed. The WPA History of the Negro in Pittsburgh. U. of Pittsburgh Press, 2004. 422 pp.
- Greenwald, Maurine W. and Anderson, Margo, eds. Pittsburgh Surveyed: Social Science and Social Reform in the Early Twentieth Century. U. of Pittsburgh Press, 1996. 292 pp.
- Hays, Samuel P., ed. City at the Point: Essays on the Social History of Pittsburgh. U. of Pittsburgh Press, 1989. 473 pp.
- Heineman, Kenneth J. A Catholic New Deal: Religion and Reform in Depression Pittsburgh. Pennsylvania State U. Press, 1999. 287 pp. online edition
- Hinshaw, John. Steel and Steelworkers: Race and Class Struggle in Twentieth-Century Pittsburgh. State U. of New York Press, 2002. 348 pp.
- Hoerr, John. And the Wolf Finally Came: The Decline of American Steel. U. of Pittsburgh Press, 1988. 689 pp.
- Holt, Michael. Forging a Majority: The Formation of the Republican Party in Pittsburgh, 1848-18 (1969)
- Ingham, John N. Making Iron and Steel: Independent Mills in Pittsburgh, 1820-1920. Ohio State U. Press, 1991. 297 pp.
- Kleinberg, S. J. The Shadow of the Mills: Working-Class Families in Pittsburgh, 1870-1907. U. of Pittsburgh Press, 1989. 414 pp.
- Krause, Paul. The Battle for Homestead, 1880-1892: Politics, Culture, and Steel. U. of Pittsburgh Press, 1992. 548 pp.
- Lopez, Steven Henry. Reorganizing the Rust Belt: An Inside Study of the American Labor Movement. U. of California Press, 2004. 314 pp.
- Lorant, Stefan. Pittsburgh: The Story of an American City, (1964), well written, heavily illustrated popular history
- Lubove, Roy. Twentieth Century Pittsburgh: Government, Business, and Environmental Change (1969)
- Lubove, Roy. Twentieth-Century Pittsburgh. Vol. 2: The Post-Steel Era. U. of Pittsburgh Press, 1996. 413 pp. the major scholarly synthesis
- Nasaw, David. Andrew Carnegie (2006), major scholarly biography
- Rishel, Joseph F. Founding Families of Pittsburgh: The Evolution of a Regional Elite, 1760-1910. U. of Pittsburgh Press, 1990. 241 pp.
- Rose, James D. Duquesne and the Rise of Steel Unionism. U. of Illinois Press, 2001. 284 pp.
- Ruck, Rob. Sandlot Seasons: Sport in Black Pittsburgh. U. of Illinois Press, 1987. 238 pp.
- Seely, Bruce E., ed. Iron and Steel in the Twentieth Century. Facts on File, 1994. 512 pp.
- Slavishak, Edward Steven. Bodies of Work: Civic Display and Labor in Industrial Pittsburgh (2008)
- Smith, Arthur G. Pittsburgh: Then and Now. U. of Pittsburgh Press, 1990. 336 pp.
- Smith, George David. From Monopoly to Competition: The Transformation of Alcoa, 1888-1986. Cambridge U. Press, 1988. 554 pp.
- Tarr, Joel A., ed. Devastation and Renewal: An Environmental History of Pittsburgh and Its Region. U. of Pittsburgh Press, 2003. 312 pp. online review
- Trotter, Joe W., and Jared N. Day. Race and Renaissance: African Americans in Pittsburgh Since World War II (University of Pittsburgh Press; 2010) 328 pages. Draws on journalism, oral histories, and other sources to study the city's black community, including its experience of the city's industrial decline and rebirth.
- Wade, Richard C. The Urban Frontier: The Rise of Western Cities, 1790-1830. (1959)
- Wall, Joseph. Andrew Carnegie (1970). 1137 pp.; major scholarly biography
- Warren, Kenneth. Triumphant Capitalism: Henry Clay Frick and the Industrial Transformation of America. U. of Pittsburgh Press, 1996.
- Weber, Michael P. Don't Call Me Boss: David L. Lawrence, Pittsburgh's Renaissance Mayor. U. of Pittsburgh Press, 1988. 440 pp.
Primary sources
- Lubove, Roy, ed. Pittsburgh 1976. 294 pp. short excerpts covering main themes
- Kellogg, Paul Underwood, ed. The Pittsburgh survey: findings in six volumes (1914), famous in-depth study of society and government online edition
- Thomas, Clarke M. ed. Front-Page Pittsburgh: Two Hundred Years of the Post-Gazette. U. of Pittsburgh Press, 2005. 332 pp. readable copies of key front pages
- Digital Library, 500 published works from the 19th century and early 20th century that document Pittsburgh history. The scope of the collection includes poetry, fiction, genealogy and biography. Contains both primary and secondary sources.
External links
- Historic Pittsburgh. Provides historic materials from the University of PittsburghUniversity of PittsburghThe University of Pittsburgh, commonly referred to as Pitt, is a state-related research university located in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States. Founded as Pittsburgh Academy in 1787 on what was then the American frontier, Pitt is one of the oldest continuously chartered institutions of...
's University Library System, the Library & Archives of the Historical Society of Western Pennsylvania at the Senator John Heinz Pittsburgh Regional History Center, and the Carnegie Museum of ArtCarnegie Museum of ArtThe Carnegie Museum of Art, located in the Oakland neighborhood of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, is an art museum founded in 1895 by the Pittsburgh-based industrialist Andrew Carnegie...
. - Pittsburgh History maintained by the Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh
- Life in Western Pennsylvania Contains digitized films and photographs from the Library and Archives of the Senator John Heinz History Center
- German Historical Sites in Pittsburgh
- The History of Pittsburgh's Skyline