Fineview

On orders from the Supreme Executive Council of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, surveyor and Pennsylvania Vice-president David Redick visited the area north of Pittsburgh during the winter of 1788. He reported back to the Supreme Executive Council and its then-president, Benjamin Franklin, on February 19, 1788, warning that the land, including the Fineview area, "abounds with high Hill and deep Hollows, almost inaccessible to a Surveyor. . . . I cannot think that ten acre lotts [sic] on such pitts [sic] and hills will possably [sic] meet with purchasers, unless like a pig in a poke it be kept out of view."^[3]

Las monjas de la Orden de Santa Clara (« Clarisas ») fueron de las primeras pobladoras de la zona de Fineview en 1828, cuando adquirieron 60 acres para un convento y una academia para señoritas. ^{[ 4 ]} Completaron la construcción de su institución, el Seminario de Santa Clara, y comenzaron a aceptar solicitudes en 1829. ^{[ 5 ]} El seminario consistía en una estructura de madera que se ubicaba en el actual extremo sur de Belleau Drive. El seminario cerró en 1835 tras una disputa con los superiores eclesiásticos de las monjas. ^{[ 4 ]} Antes de subastar el terreno en 1839, un subastador elogió las «muchas ventajas del terreno en cuanto a salud, la abundancia de manantiales de agua purísima y las vistas panorámicas de la ciudad, los ríos y los alrededores». ^{[ 6 ]} El edificio del seminario permaneció en la cima de la colina hasta 1881, dando a la zona de Fineview su antiguo apodo: «Colina del Monasterio». ^{[ 7 ]}

El siguiente desarrollo significativo se produjo bajo la propiedad del banquero Thompson Bell, quien adquirió los mismos 60 acres en 1847–1848 y comenzó a anunciar lotes de tierra subdivididos para la venta en 1849. Hizo renovar el antiguo Seminario de Santa Clara para alquilarlo como casa de verano y mandó construir una casa de ladrillo más pequeña para sí mismo en 1850–1851 a lo largo de "Belle Avenue" en la intersección actual de Mountford Avenue y Belleau Street. ^{[ 8 ] [ 9 ] [ 10 ]} En 1854, Bell vendió un terreno de cinco acres a la Parroquia de Santa María, cuyos feligreses predominantemente católicos alemanes adoraban en East Allegheny , para un cementerio. ^{[ 11 ]} El cantero e ingeniero James Andrews compró su primera sección de "Nunnery Hill" en 1864 y encargó su Heathside Cottage para el sitio poco después. ^{[ 12 ]} Otros compradores importantes de la época incluyen a Robert Henderson, quien mandó construir la Casa Henderson-Metz alrededor de 1860.

While wealthy residents of Allegheny established country estates on Nunnery Hill in the late 19th century, others put the hilltop area to other uses typical of the rural-urban fringe. Stone quarrying, brick-making, and coal mining occurred throughout the hill.^[13][14][15] St. Mary's laid the cornerstone for a mortuary chapel at its Nunnery Hill cemetery in 1870.^[11] After searching for several years for a "hill district" site for a municipal smallpox hospital ("pest house"), in 1883 the city of Allegheny bought a house and land on Warren Street for this purpose.^[16]

Still, new private and public sector services encouraged settlement of Nunnery Hill in the 1870s and 1880s. The Twelfth Ward school district bought land for a new school on Willis Street (now Meadville Street) in 1877, which opened to students within the next several years. The city built a pumping station at Howard Street in 1882 to pump water along the present-day location of the Rising Main steps to tanks (and later a reservoir) atop Nunnery Hill.^[17] But no improvement accelerated speculation and homebuilding so much as the Nunnery Hill Incline, completed in 1888.^[18] The curved incline carried passengers from the present-day intersection of Henderson Street and Federal Street to its terminus on Meadville Street. (The old retaining wall that was built for the incline can still be seen running up the side of Henderson Street.)

Other developments during the late 19th century included the founding in 1880 of a "Home for Colored Orphans," located for a few short years at the intersection of Fountain Street and Sandusky Street; demolition of the old St. Clare's Seminary in 1881 to make way for James Andrews' second and final Nunnery Hill residence, Ingleside Place; installation of a sewer system; establishment of the McNaugher Memorial United Presbyterian Mission, in 1896; forming of a Nunnery Hill Athletic Association; and opening of at least one grocery store.^{[19][20][21][22][23][24][25]}

By the time the Nunnery Hill Inclined Plane Company closed its titular funicular in 1895, due to safety concerns,^[26] the area it had served had transformed over the previous century from an "inferior," "inaccessible" hillside, per surveyor David Redick, into an urban neighborhood of such a size that could support a school, a church, a baseball team, and two grocery stores.

New institutions, organizations, and services accrued in Fineview in the first half of the 20th century. Despite challenges involving public health, housing, and abandonment, the neighborhood's population remained relatively stable during this period.

The McNaugher Memorial Mission, which had begun in 1896 in a home on Pilsen Street, built a church on Parkview Avenue (Catoma Street) in 1900, adding a yellow-brick facade and bell tower in 1907.^[22] That same year, classes began at a new school located on Fineview Avenue.^[27] The Pittsburgh Railways Company began operation of its Nunnery Hill streetcar line months later, on March 31, 1908, ending the neighborhood's 13-year transit drought.^[28] The City of Pittsburgh built a fire station to house Engine No. 59, a horse-drawn fire engine, around 1912.^[29] And in 1915 the Nunnery Hill Board of Trade (organized the previous year) successfully lobbied the Pittsburgh City Council to discard the neighborhood's old, irrelevant name — the "nunnery" being long gone — in favor of a title that might boost local real estate and business activity: Fineview.^[30]

But not all in Fineview was necessarily "fine" during this period of social organization and improvement. Ailing Allegheny City residents strained the Municipal Hospital on Warren Street during a smallpox epidemic in 1903. Dozens died at the hospital, which remained at or near capacity during the outbreak.^[31]

Aunque las cimas de las colinas de Fineview estaban coronadas por mansiones y casas de clase media, las laderas estaban apiñadas con edificios de viviendas. Como describió posteriormente un informe, junto con una fotografía de las calles Henderson y Fountain de Fineview: "estructuras laberínticas injertadas en las laderas, sin espacios de juego al aire libre excepto los verticales". ^{[ 32 ]} Una de estas hileras de viviendas, "Rafferty's Row", se encontraba junto a una escalera que conectaba las calles Fountain y Henderson, y albergaba a 50 personas, 34 de ellas negras, según el censo de 1900. Los desalojos eran frecuentes; un vecino recordó más tarde que un agente de policía acompañaba al propietario de las viviendas para el cobro semanal del alquiler. ^{[ 33 ]} Un incendio destruyó la hilera de casas de madera en 1907, dejando a más de una docena de familias negras sin hogar. ^{[ 34 ]}

Otro lugar emblemático del barrio desapareció poco después: la capilla funeraria del antiguo cementerio de Santa María. Dos décadas después de que la iglesia abandonara el lugar, la apartada y ruinosa capilla se convirtió en un sitio ideal para combates de boxeo, peleas de gallos y partidas de cartas. La capilla fue demolida en 1913. ^{[ 35 ]}

Esta mejora y abandono simultáneos continuaron en Fineview durante las siguientes décadas. La comunidad dedicó un monumento de guerra en la intersección de Meadville Street y Catoma Street en 1919, ^{[ 36 ]} y luego se enteró del cierre de su estación de bomberos de diez años tres años después. ^{[ 37 ]} La Cámara de Comercio de Fineview construyó una nueva tribuna en su campo de béisbol (hogar de los "Highlanders") en 1923; ^{[ 38 ]} para finales de la década, la finca con vista al campo de béisbol, Ingleside Place de la familia Andrews, estaba vacía.

Ingleside Place sat empty and weather-beaten until 1941, when the Housing Authority of the City of Pittsburgh chose the estate as the site of its fifth low-income housing project, Allegheny Dwellings.^[39] By the time applications for its 282 apartments opened in July 1942, war had intervened, and the project had been reclassified as being for defense workers first, low-income families second.^[40] Allegheny Dwellings' first residents began moving in on December 15, 1942.^[41] 988 people lived there by 1944, 791 of whom were white and 197 of whom were Black. The single largest age group were those under five years old.^[42] Between 1940 and 1950, the population of the census tract comprising much of Fineview (25C) grew from 1,654 to 2,688, an increase of 1,034 people. Allegheny Dwellings accounted for approximately 96 percent of that growth, Fineview's last through the present day.