What I Did On My Summer Vacation: Pittsburgh and Steubenville, Part 1

 

View from the Monongahela Incline

It’s been quiet around here, I know, but I’ve actually managed to do a fair amount of research behind the scenes these past few months – what else are weekends for? Throw in a vacation or two and a girl can learn a lot! In fact, I just returned yesterday from a trip to western Pennsylvania and eastern Ohio to learn more about my Whaley roots. And in the spirit of back-to-school season, here’s a “What I Did on My Summer Vacation” trip report.

The first part of my trip was more a family vacation than a research trip – my mom, dad, sister and I drove out to Pittsburgh, PA and spent a few days wandering around, exploring the sites, marveling over the architecture and bridges, and – at least in my case – eating pierogies whenever the chance arose. (I made the chances; no pierogies were stumbled upon in the wild.) 

We visited the Heinz History Center to learn about glass, Mister Rogers, and, of course, canned and bottled foods; dropped by Point State Park to enjoy the sight of the Allegheny and Monongahela Rivers becoming the Ohio; rode up and down the Monongahela Incline, which is not for the faint of heart; and ate dinner in a beautiful old church now used as a brewery and restaurant.

Here are a few snaps:

Views from the Monongahela Incline

Pittsburgh City Views

But here is the most surprising part of the trip: it turns out we had a family connection to one of Pittsburgh’s most famous places. I’ve known for years that we had a Whaley connection to Pittsburgh: one of my great-grandfather Morris Lee Whaley’s older half-brothers, David Whaley, moved to the city to live with what appears to be his maternal aunt Emma (Jones) Wilson sometime before 1918. (Morris and David shared the same father, Kit Whaley, but David was one of Kit’s children with his first wife, Julia Jones, while Morris was one of his children with his second wife, Grace Kyler/Kylen or Sanders/Saunders.)

David sadly died of heart disease in 1918, when he was about 14 years old, while the family was living at 1633 Napoleon Street. A couple of years later, between 1920 and 1921, his aunt Emma, her husband Willis, and their two sons, Oscar and Willis Jr., moved into a new home just a block away, at 1554 Canton Street. And this is the fun bit: Canton Street is known as “the steepest street in the Continental United States.”

It has a 37% grade at its steepest point, and according to this 1924 Sanborn Fire Insurance map, the Wilsons lived at the top of the hill.

The Wilson's home on Napoleon outlined in purple, their later home on Canton outlined in green. Citation at bottom.

 So, of course we drove over there to explore. 

 

The 1600 block of Canton Avenue.

Pictures do not do the steepness of Canton Avenue justice. The sidewalk is a staircase; one of many across a city built on hills. In fact, there are a bunch of staircases across the city that are named as streets – there’s even a book about them:

But, I digress.

Here’s a sign telling cars not to try driving down it.

And here’s me hiking up it and then by the sign at the base of it, proud to have survived. (Yes, the fam also got out and walked some or all of it.)

Pic on left courtesy of my sister, M. Whaley.

 

Okay, but what did we see at the top? Well, nothing. The Wilson’s home, 1554 Canton Street, burned in a fire in 1956. I’ll perhaps write about that another time. But now, there’s not even a trace from street level that the road continued past the celebrated 1600 block – it’s completely wooded, reclaimed by nature.

The dead end at the top of the 1600 block of Canton Street.

Google Maps shows the ghost of the street, and even a streetlamp that used to light the road - I wonder if it illuminates the woods today?

 

There’s a staircase – Graymore Avenue – that curves through the woods to the bottom of the hill, but not a visible trace from the street that there used to be a home just on the other side.

The top of Graymore Avenue, a staircase, runs perpendicular to the top of Canton Street.

If I were more daring – and dressed appropriately – maybe I would have walked a ways in, but this was definitely not the day for it. But, who knows – we’ve said we’ll go back to Pittsburgh again. And when we do, we need to actually visit Napoleon Street, where David Whaley actually lived, to see what remains of the street he may have known.

Until then, I’ll be very satisfied with this jaunt to a surprisingly famous location tied to my family tree.

Meanwhile, stay tuned for Part 2 of my Pittsburgh and Steubenville trip report. 

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Do you know anything about the Wilsons of 1554 Canton Street? Or have a picture of the house that used to stand there? Please drop that info – and any other comments or questions – down below!

 

Map Citation

1. Pittsburgh, Allegheny County Sanborn Fire Insurance Map. Snippet from 1924, Vol. 8, Sheet 834, accessed via the Pittsburgh and Allegheny County Sanborn Fire Insurance Maps collection of the Donald W. Hamer Center for Maps and Geospatial Information, Penn State University Libraries. https://digital.libraries.psu.edu/digital/collection/maps1/id/30524