The Hill District

This weeks blog post is going to be about one of my all time favorite neighborhoods (At least this neighborhoods history).

This week im going to talk about the notorious Hill District. First thing that should be known about the Hill District is that it is actually 5 different neighborhoods grouped into 1. The 5 neighborhoods are Crawford-Roberts, Upper Hill, Middle Hill, Bedford Dwellings, and Terrace Village. I will explain real quick that the land was first used as farmland until immigrants of all kinds started moving to the neighborhood. During the years leading to world war I African Americans were urged to move to the Hill from the south to escape the segregation laws and this happened all the way until around 1960. In September 1955, the government approved of a plan in the lower hill for demolition. Redevelopment displaced over 8,000 residents, about 90 families refused to move and ended up in substandard housing. Relocatees received little relocation compensation, with minimal benefits coming from the government. the deconstruction made way for the Civic arena, I went and asked a few of the residents how they felt about the construction of the civic arena and needless to say the folks living in the Lower Hill part of the Hill District have nothing but extremely terrible things to say about it.

Even though most don’t know it, the Hill District was one of the biggest scenes of Jazz around the 30’s and 40’s. Some of the great names that made an impact on the Hill were Rudy Vallee, Paul Whiteman, Ramsey Lewis, Oscar Peterson, Cannonball Adderly. The Hill was one time considered a beautiful area and a go to spot for African Americans visiting Pittsburgh as well as any Jazz enthusiast to kick back and enjoy the music, or go to one of the clubs located there.
the deconstruction made way for the Civic arena, I wen’t and asked a few of the residents how they felt about the construction of the civic arena and needless to say the folks living in the Lower Hill part of the Hill District have nothing but extremely terrible things to say about it.

After the assassination of the late great Martin Luther King Jr in 1968 riots began in the Hill District and lasted all the way until April 12. During this time 505 fires, $620,000 in property damage, only one death and almost 1,000 arrests were made. Back in 1968 this was a significant amount of money. Though the riots were intense only one person had died and I think its easy to understand why it happened.

Currently the Hill district is sort of going through a gentrification. If you go into Crawford-Roberts you can see there is some sort of construction going on. It has been 5 years that they have been trying to gentrify this neighborhood, personally I don’t believe it will get done anytime soon due to all the effort trying to fix up East Liberty. As far as recommending this neighborhood to anyone I would recommend avoiding lower Hill and stick as close to Upper Hill as you can. I would also only recommend this neighborhood to those with a vehicle since its really difficult to make your way up that hill. All in all I wouldn’t exactly recommend moving to this neighborhood yet, once it goes through a bit of gentrification I would highly recommend because the view is beautiful and the people are fairly nice in the upper hill part.

Polish Hill

This week i’m going to discuss my favorite neighborhood and the neighborhood I am moving to in 2 weeks, Polish Hill.
A large number of Polish immigrants settled in Polish Hill in the late 1800s. most of the residents at the time were folks who worked in the steel mills and the neighborhood slowly started losing population over time.
Now a days Polish Hill, also called “Punk Retirement” is a haven for Polish families and people around the age of 20-40 who tend to live alternative lifestyles and would like to keep a distance from a lot of the other folks within Pittsburgh.
I would have liked to have done an extended post about this neighborhood but unfortunately its a rather small neighborhood with a very limited past which makes it very difficult to say too much about it.
Some memorable locations in Polish Hill Would be the bar “Gooski’s” and “Rock Room”. Rock Room is the greatest bar in Pittsburgh, if you go in on a Tuesday night you can get a cheeseburger and up to 7 beers for $10 total, its the cheapest food/bar in Pittsburgh from what i’ve seen and it’s a wonderful atmosphere. Also the “Immaculate Heart of Mary Church” is in my opinion the most beautiful church in Pittsburgh.

There is also a coffee shop in Polish Hill called “lili’s” Above the coffee shop there is also a record store, and above the record store there is a book store.
Feel free to leave a comment if you have any other information/would like to see the neighborhood because I would be happy to show anyone coming into the city a tour! I would say that Polish Hill is recommended for anyone between 20-80 because the young crowd and the older families get along really well. I would suggest this neighborhood to anyone who likes to get drunk, are generally accepting of the weird, and would like a bit of quiet whilst in the city limits but be warned, its very hard to get into this neighborhood.

Historic Lawrenceville

 

The first neighborhood I am choosing to blog about I have decided on the Lawrenceville. I chose the Lawrenceville because it has such a huge history and it stretches out over so much land that I really believe I could talk about it for hours. I think I would like to start with the earliest colonization which started with the Delaware Indians and then later was taken by a man named George Croghan and he acquired it around the eighteenth century. In addition to Lawrenceville he also owned neighborhoods such as Bloomfield, Garfield, East Liberty, Squirrel Hill, Oakland, and Hazelwood.

I am going to start with some of the early development facts about the neighborhood then move on to how it has flourished. The neighborhood was then founded by William Barclay Foster who had a son named Stephen Collins Foster. He is considered one of the founders of pop music and his work is world renown and the University of Pittsburgh maintains the Stephen Foster Memorial Center in his honor.

Thought thee founder of Lawrenceville is named William Foster, the neighborhood is named after Captain James Lawrence who was a hero of the War of 1812 and famous for the phrase “Don’t Give Up The Ship!”. Though the neighborhood is named after this Captain I don’t believe much significance comes from him and Pittsburgh.

In 1814 an Arsenal was built around what is now 39th and 40th street because it had prime location to the river for easy access to and from. In unfortunate events in 1862 the arsenal exploded killing almost 80 workers. A team hauling a wagonload of powder was the first vehicle to use the road. People believe that possibly due to the not so well paved road that possibly a fire was struck by the horse pulling the wagon and caused a terrible explosion, which in turn caused a terrible explosion that rumbled the entire area and killed so many.

A few years after the horrible events a lot of business started to flourish in this neighborhood and more specifically a brewery and a few steel mills. If you go through Lawrenceville now you can still meet some of the old steel workers though most are retired. Even though a lot of Lawrenceville is changed if you take a good look at it you will notice how a lot of this history makes good sense and you can almost picture it when you take a walk down the hill of 40th street towards the river.

Now a days when you go to Lawrenceville you notice that even though it has a fairly dark history of war and death, specifically a great reminder is its gigantic cemetery between middle and upper Lawrenceville you will also noticed a very active and beautiful neighborhood. A lot of the current residents are around the age 20-30 and its almost a haven for Pitt, CMU, CARLOW graduates who want to stay in the city but really are not interested in all the crazy college atmosphere that Oakland has to offer. For those considering a neighborhood within the city limits I would suggest this neighborhood to people around 20-30+ and I believe its a very diverse and safe neighborhood (maybe excluding upper Lawrenceville at times), but it has most definitely a great neighborhood. I would consider Lawrenceville to be my third favorite neighborhood behind Polish Hill and Hill District. You will be hearing more about these neighborhoods in my next posts so please feel free to follow my blog and hopefully after reading what I have to say you will be able to find your niche in this beautiful city.

So if you consider yourself fairly liberal, open-minded, possibly artistic I think you would find Lawrenceville to be a great place to move.