PHLF Awards 16 Historic Landmark Plaques

PHLF Trustee Cynthia Underwood, Vice-Chair of the Historic Plaque Designation Committee, announced 16 Historic Landmark Plaque awards, as a result of the Committee’s meeting on December 10, 2012.  The 16 plaques recognize some 47 structures.

For the first time, the Committee also considered plaque applications from counties surrounding Allegheny, especially if the applicant site had some connection to the Greater Pittsburgh region––­­through property ownership, for example, or through the work of a distinguished Pittsburgh architect.

The 16 “Historic Landmark” sites (shown in order below) are listed here in chronological order:

1. Chalfant house, 89 Locust Street, Etna, c. 1850
2. 4841 Ellsworth Avenue, house (Alexander M. Guthrie), Shadyside, c. 1870
3. Fourth Avenue National Register Historic District (Boundary Increase), Downtown, c.1871-1934 [Forbes Avenue south side between Smithfield and Wood Streets; and extending along Wood Street to Fifth Avenue].
4. Allegheny City Electric Light Plant––1895 Building, 822 Riversea Road, Central Northside, David Hunter, Jr., Engineer
5. Pittsburgh & Lake Erie Railroad Coraopolis Station, Neville Avenue and Mill Street, Shepley, Rutan & Coolidge, 1895
6. West End Branch, Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh, 47 Wabash Avenue, West End, Alden & Harlow, 1899
7. Wylie Avenue Branch, Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh (now First Muslim Mosque of Pittsburgh), 1911 Wylie Avenue, Hill District, Alden & Harlow, 1899
8. St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church complex, 5801 Hampton Street, Highland Park, Carpenter & Crocker, 1905-09
9. St. James Terrace, 5300-5312 St. James Terrace, Shadyside, John E. Born, builder, 1915
10. Schenley Apartments, (now Schenley Quadrangle, University of Pittsburgh), 3959 Forbes Avenue, and 4000 Fifth Avenue, Oakland, Henry Hornbostel with Rutan, Russell & Wood, 1922-23
11. First United Methodist Church of McKeesport, Cornell Street and Versailles Avenue, Charles W. Bolton & Son (Philadelphia), 1924-25
12. Waverly Presbyterian Church, 590 S. Braddock Avenue, Point Breeze, Ingham & Boyd, 1928-30
13. Joseph Vokral house, 1919 Woodside Road, Shaler Township, Quentin S. Beck, 1936
14. Mr. & Mrs. Jack Landis house, 2717 Mount Royal Road, Squirrel Hill, Peter Berndtson and Cornelia Brierly, 1947
15. Miller–Cole house, 629 Oakhill Lane, Greensburg, Westmoreland County, Peter Berndtson and Cornelia Brierly, 1950-52
16. Mr. & Mrs. David Giles house, 1 Saxman Drive, Latrobe, Westmoreland County, Peter Berndtson and Cornelia Brierly, 1952

PHLF created the Historic Landmark Plaque program in 1968 to identify architecturally significant structures and designed landscapes throughout the Pittsburgh region. An Historic Landmark Plaque does not protect a building from alteration or demolition. To date, 562 plaques have been awarded to significant buildings, districts, landscapes, and structures throughout Allegheny County and now Westmoreland County that are 50 years old or more.

For further information, visit www.phlf.org or contact Frank Stroker, program administrator: frank@phlf.org; 412-471-5808, ext. 525.