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1405432Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, Volume XIX — PittsburghJames Fairchild Hudson
PITTSBURGH, the second largest city of Pennsylvania,and the leading iron, steel, and glass manufacturing centreof the United States, lies at the confluence of theAllegheny and the Monongahela, which unite here to form theOhio, 250 miles west by north of Philadelphia. Thebusiness quarter of the city is built on a nearly leveltriangular plain, between the two rivers, measuring aboutthree quarters of a mile on each side back to the hillswhich rise to the east.
Plan of Pittsburgh.
The manufacturing establishments stretch for a distanceof 7 miles up the Allegheny, 7 up the Monongahela, and2 down the Ohio, and occupy the strip of low groundusually a few hundred feet broad between the river banksand the hills which generally face them. The slope ofthe hills to the east of the business quarter is closely builtwith residences and retail stores for the distance of a mileand a half, but the summits, 400 or 500 feet high, arepartially unoccupied. Beyond the hills extends a rollingcountry which, for a space of about 5 miles long by 2wide is occupied by the villas of the citizens. The hillsfacing the rivers are generally precipitous, and vary inheight from 300 to 600 feet, but at different points theyrecede from the river banks and afford sites for thesuburbs of Lawrenceville (on the Allegheny), Hazlewood,and Birmingham (on the north and south banks respectivelyof the Monongahela), which are within themunicipality of Pittsburgh, and (on the north bank of theAllegheny and Ohio) for the city of Allegheny, which,with its separate municipal government and population of78,000 inhabitants, is commercially and socially a part ofPittsburgh. The two cities together cover an irregularspace of 9 miles between the extreme eastern and westernpoints, with a breadth varying from 2 to 4 miles.
From the character of its site Pittsburgh would naturallybe very attractive, but the free use of the bituminouscoal which has been the principal agent in its developmenthas so spoiled its beauty as to give it the name of theSmoky City. Not only do the manufacturing quartersshow long lines of smoke-stained buildings, but the businessquarter, which is composed of rather narrow streetslaid out early in the century, is mainly constructed ofbrick and iron, and in spite of the presence of some finepublic buildings in granite and brown stone—the municipalhall, the petroleum exchange, the new United States postoffice and court-house (1884), the new county court-house(1884), &c.—has a generally grimy and unattractiveappearance. A better opinion of the wealth and taste ofthe city is obtained from a view of the suburban quartersof the East End and the parks and residence quarters ofAllegheny. And, all disfigurement and dirtiness notwithstanding,it is full of interesting and striking sights. Theinteriors of its rolling-mills and glass-houses, and the viewsof the city from the surrounding hills, with the manufacturingquarters marked out by their smoke by day andtheir fires by night, are of a unique and picturesquecharacter. Along the rivers are fleets of steamers towingbarges laden with coal for consumption at this point andfor shipment to the cities lower down. Joining thevarious quarters of the city are ten bridges for ordinarytraffic and four railway viaducts, among which the PointBridge and the Smithfield Street Bridge are fine examplesof engineering in iron. Six inclined-plane railways affordaccess to the summits of the high hills.
Pittsburgh is of historical interest from the struggle (1755-1758)for its possession between England and France in the Seven YearsWar, and the fact that the public and military career of GeorgeWashington was commenced with those campaigns (see Washington).With the termination of that struggle in the capture of theruins of Fort Duquesne by the British, the history of the placebecomes that of an ordinary frontier town. A new fort was erectedand named Fort Pitt in honour of the prime minister whose energyhad urged the war forward to its capture,and wrested the Ohio valley and Canada fromFrench control. After one or two Indianwars, in which the post was threatened, andon one occasion nearly taken, Fort Pitt lostit* military character and became a tradingtown. The first streets were laid out nearthe fort in 1764, and in 1769 the first surveyof the unsettled lands in the vicinity wasmade for the proprietors, the heirs of WilliamPenn, under the name of the manor ofPittsburgh. After the termination of the revolution,the legislature of Pennsylvaniaincorporated Pittsburgh as a village on April 22,1794, and on March 18, 1816, its charter as acity was granted. During the colonial perioda dispute arose between Virginia andPennsylvania as to the possession of the territorysurrounding the town, and in the first fewyears of its history under the United Statesit attracted attention from its proximity tothe famous “Whisky Insurrection” of WesternPennsylvania. After it had attained apopulation of 30,000 it was visited on the 10th ofApril 1845 by a disastrous conflagration inwhich the buildings in the business centre,covering a space of 56 acres, and valued at$5,000,000 dollars, were consumed.
In the Pittsburgh of to-day there is littlebesides names of streets, hills, and suburbs to recall the strugglewhich decided the Anglo-Saxon character of the country. Thelocality known as the Point, where Fort Duquesne stood, is coveredwith thickly built factories and dingy tenements. In a squalid andobscure court a portion of the wall of a blockhouse erected in 1763by Colonel Boquet, one of the British commandants of Fort Pitt,still forms a part of a building, and on the wall of the staircase ofMunicipal Hall is a stone bearing the inscription with which thatofficer commemorated its erection. Immediately across the Monongahelaa range of precipitous hills some 500 feet high bears the namesof Mount Washington and Duquesne Heights. On the first hillrising to the east of the level part of the city, a red granite courthouse,to cost $2,000,000, is in process of construction near to thespot where Major Grant was defeated and slain, and the new building will replace the brown stone structure which for many yearsfronted on the street bearing that unfortunate officer's name.Twelve miles away, the suburb long known as Braddock's Fieldand now as Braddock's, attracts attention chiefly by the roar andglare of its great steel manufacturing establishment,
Deriving its early importance in commerce from its position atthe head of the Ohio, which was until 1855 the principal routebetween the middle States and the west and south-west, Pittsburghhas since obtained its greatest growth from the coal which underliesnearly all Western Pennsylvania. This has made the city andits immediate suburbs the most important manufacturing districtin America, in both pig and bar iron, steel, glass, and copper. In1883 Allegheny county produced 11½ per cent. of the pig ironproduced in the United States, and 21 per cent. of the rolled ironand steel. The iron industry consists of 16 blast furnaces,producing, in 1883 592,475 tons; 32 rolling mills, producing 472,351
tons of finished iron; and 91 other establishments, turning out alarge variety of other manufactures of iron, from boilers to safesand steam pumps. The steel industry comprises 20 large millswith an output for 1883 of 405,530 tons. The blast furnaces androlling-mills of Pittsburgh employ a capital of $23,910,000 and21,190 workmen, the steel industry $10,170,000 and 7060 workmen.Next in importance is the glass manufacture, in which 75establishments are engaged, 24 making table ware, 24 windowglass, 10 green glass bottles, and 9 lamp chimneys. The capitalinvested in them is $5,985,000. They employ 6442 hands, and thevalue of their last reported annual production is $6,832,683. Thecoal and co*ke industry of the district, which is controlled mainlyby Pittsburgh, comprises a capital of $26,406,500, employs 23,621miners and other labourers, and makes an annual output of7,720,000 tons of coal and 2,760,000 tons of co*ke, valued at$16,600,000. The total of all the manufacturing industries of thecity is 1380 establishments, with $105,401,481 of capital, employing85,936 workmen of all kinds, and producing to the value of$149,721,619. The wholesale trade of the city is much lessimportant than its manufacturing industries, and with a fewexceptions is confined to the immediate vicinity. It includes 90firms with an aggregate capital of $11,206,000 and total sales of$125,390,472. Within the last year a new and unique industryhas been developed. By drilling in the earth to a depth of1200 to 2000 feet, what is practically the fire-damp of the coalmine is tapped in such quantity that it comes to the surface ingreat force. It has been found to be useful as a fuel for all thepurposes of coal except the smelting of ores in blast furnaces; and,as it is cheaper both for making steam and for the heating of theiron and glass furnaces, its adoption has been general among themanufacturers.
As the railway system has developed, the important boatinginterest of Pittsburgh has become confined to the transportation ofcoal from the Monongahela river mines to the down-river cities.The coal is only taken out when freshets have raised the river, andat that time fleets of steamers, each towing from eight to fifteenbarges, covering acres in extent and carrying thousands of tons ofcoal, start down stream. The total steam tonnage of Pittsburghis 36,845 tons with 163 vessels, but the addition of the barges bringsthe tonnage up to 1,359,972 and the number of vessels to 3208.
Pittsburgh is stated to be the origin of more railway freight thanany other point in the country. There are a large number of lines,under the control of three great companies. The most importantis the Pennsylvania Railroad, whose trunk lines pass through thecity, and number amoung their feeders the West Pennsylvania;the Allegheny Valley; the Pittsburgh, Virginia, and Charleston;the Pittsburgh, Cincinnati, and St Louis; the Pittsburgh, FortWayne, and Chicago; and the Cleveland and Pittsburgh Railroads.The Pittsburgh division of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad givesa connexion with that trunk line, and by the Pittsburgh andWestern, and the Pittsburgh, Cleveland, and Toledo, reaches theChicago branch of the same system to the west. The Pittsburghand Lake Erie affords the New York Central and the New York,Pennsylvania, and Ohio lines an access to Pittsburgh, while itsextension under the name of the Pittsburgh, MacKeesport, andYoughiogheny penetrates the coal and co*ke district to the southeast.
In 1796, by the first accurate census on record, the populationof Pittsburgh was 1395. By 1810 it had increased to 4968; by1820 to 7248; by 1830 to 12,452; by 1840 to 21,115; by 1850 to36,601; by 1860 to 49,221; by 1870 to 86,076. In 1874 theconsolidation of outlying boroughs made the population, accordingto the census of 1870, 121,799; and in 1880 this had increased to156,389. These figures do not comprise the population ofAllegheny, which was 28,702 in 1860, 53,180 in 1870, and 78,682 in1880. Including the manufacturing and residential suburbs, thetotal population by the census of 1880 was 274,160; and, with thelarge extension of manufacturing and building that has gone onsince then, it was estimated in 1884 at 325,000.
The municipal governments of Pittsburgh and Allegheny are eachcomposed of a mayor, controller, and treasurer, with city councilsin two branches styled respectively select and common. These areelected by the people, and appoint other administrative officials totake charge of the police and fire departments, assessments, andpublic works. The total assessed valuation of the city ofPittsburgh for purposes of taxation is $101,508,603, on which a revenueis collected for all purposes of $2,777,405. Allegheny has anassessed valuation of $10,707,858, and spends $650,000 annually.The total indebtedness of Pittsburgh is $14,497,800, of whichnearly $10,000,000 was expended for water-works and streetpavements. The debt of Allegheny is but $1,400,000.
The school system of each city is governed by a central board ofeducation and ward boards, both elected by popular vote. ThePittsburgh system comprises a fine stone high school overlookingthe city, and 52 ward schools, in which are 469 teachers and23,629 scholars, the approximate annual expenditure being$550,000. In the Allegheny system there are the high school
and 18 ward schools, with 207 teachers, 9392 scholars, and anannual expenditure of about $200,000. The principal institutionsestablished by public taxation are the Riverside State Penitentiary,completed in 1884 in the lower part of Allegheny; theMorganza Reform School; the workhouse at Claremont, on theAllegheny river; and the Pittsburgh, Allegheny, and Countypoorhouses.
The churches and chapels in Pittsburgh and Allegheny number237: 57 are Roman Catholic, including 13 monastic and conventualestablishments; 53 represent the various branches of Presbyterianism;39 are Methodist Episcopal, and 16 Protestant Episcopal.Among the leading examples of church architecture are St Paul'sCathedral (Roman Catholic), Trinity and St Peter's (ProtestantEpiscopal), the First and Third Presbyterian and the GermanLutheran churches in Pittsburgh, and the North Presbyterianin Allegheny. Private charity has established the West Penn.Hospital with a large branch for the treatment of the insane atDixmont, the Homeopathic Hospital, the Mercy Hospital, thePittsburgh Infirmary, the Free Dispensary, the North Side Hospital,and St Francis Hospital; and 18 asylums for orphans and theaged and infirm are maintained throughout the two cities. Thecollegiate institutions comprise the Western University, theWestern Theological Seminary (Presbyterian), the United PresbyterianSeminary, the Catholic College, the Pennsylvania FemaleCollege, and the Pittsburgh Female College. (J. F. H.)
