[PRCo] Re: Pittsburgh MO Car Operation

[Bob Rathke]

Into the early 1970's, my grandparents who grew up in Allegheny in the 
1890's always referred to that area as Observatory Hill...not Fineview. My 
maternal grandmother was born on James St. between present day Allegheny 
General Hospiotal and Fineview, and my grandfather was born on Itin St. on 
Spring Hill - right acrosss the street from the route 5 derail.

The house where I grew up was near the top of Spring Hill.  The house faced 
west, providing a view of the east side of Fineview accross the East St. 
valley. In winter months, when the trees were bare, my bedroom window 
provided a view of  21-Fineview trolleys traveling outbound along the 
hillside between the WWSW radio tower (later channel 11) and the East St. 
Bridge.

Bob 10/25/09


----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Schneider Fred" <fwschneider at comcast.net>
To: "Chick Siebert" <csiebert at paonline.com>
Cc: <pittsburgh-railways at dementia.org>
Sent: Sunday, October 25, 2009 9:40 AM
Subject: [PRCo] Re: Pittsburgh MO Car Operation


> This needs to be forwarded not only to the Pittsburgh Railways
> address list because of the list but because the man who runs the
> list, Chick, is a descendant of Brashear who founded the observatory
> at the original college along Perrysville Avenue a half mile or so
> above Federal Street.
>
> It is astounding to me that today people think of Observatory Hill
> and forget the original observatory.   They think of the new
> observatory in Riverview Park.   They don't understand all the
> history prior to the merger of the City of Allegheny with the City of
> Pittsburgh when the predecessor of the present University of
> Pittsburgh, then called the Western University of Pennsylvania was
> located prior to 1908 off Perrysville Avenue in that large loop where
> it circles around to gain altitude after leaving Federal Street (and
> before it returns to the straight line alignment of Federal Street),
> and that Brashear had his original observatory co-located with the
> university.   The original Observatory Hill Passenger Railway, the
> Bentley and Knight operation with conduit that was a predecessor of
> part of route 8 PERRYSVILLE, went up the hill to serve the school.
> Without going into my route card file, I don't believe it even went
> as far as Charles Street originally because there was no need to.
> The object was to serve the university.
>
> Fred Schneider
>
> On Oct 24, 2009, at 11:27 PM, Chick Siebert wrote:
>
>> Dear Fred:
>>
>> I am pleased to hear that you were able to confirm MU car operation
>> on 82 Lincoln and 88 Frankstown, although for my own memory, such
>> verification was not necessary.  I remember such MU operation as
>> though it were last week.
>>
>> In the summer of 1926 my grandmother and I were visiting her
>> brother and sister in Pittsburgh east end.  Uncle Billy was a
>> bachelor, and Aunt Lottie divorced.  They lived in a little house
>> at 907 or 909 Lincoln Avenue.  Aunt Lottie and Uncle Billy were my
>> dad's aunt and uncle, my great aunt and great uncle.
>>
>> Uncle Billy taught machine shop at Pitt, and was a serious
>> astronomer as well, conducting programs at the Allegheny Valley
>> Observatory one or two nights a week, lecturing in English or in
>> German, as desired. There were still a lot of German-speaking
>> people in Pittsburgh in 1926.  Uncle Billy had served an
>> apprenticeship with Brashear Optical Company, manufacturer of
>> telescopes, and had worked with Samuel Pierpont Langley, who was at
>> the Allegheny Observatory before going to Washington to become
>> secretary of the Smithsonian Institution. His older brother Joseph
>> had gone with Langley to Washington, built several engines used in
>> Langley's flying experiments, was in the US Bureau of Standards,
>> which Langley founded, from its inception. He was foreman of the
>> Bureau's scientific instrument shop for 40 years. But that's
>> another story.
>>
>> Uncle Billy took me on a two-car train from his house to downtown,
>> after supper.  This was toward the end of the rush hour, and we
>> were travelling inbound, so there weren't many passengers  We
>> transferred to a Perryville car to the observatory.  At the end of
>> the program, when the attendees had left, Uncle Billy aimed the big
>> telescope on Vega, had me at the eyepiece, and turned off the
>> telescope clock. Vega drifted out of the field of vision.  What a
>> way for a ten-year-old to learn that Earth really spins.
>>
>> But there is one item that I am not sure of.  I seem to remember
>> that the Perryville car was red, which would mean it was a high
>> floor car, and that may be wrong.
>>
>> On the same visit to Pittsburgh, I rode with my grandmother from
>> East Liberty to Lawrenceville and
>> return in high floor red cars on Route 96.
>>
>> On an earlier visit, when I was only four years old, I rode with my
>> mother in the front seat on the top deck of a double-decker on 73
>> Highland on a rainy day.
>>
>> Best regards.
>>
>> Chick
>>
>>
>>
>>
>
>