Tom Foerster Papers

Tom Foerster (1928-2000) was a political force in the city of Pittsburgh and Allegheny County for more than 40 years.  First elected as a state representative in 1958, he would go on to serve as an Allegheny County commissioner for 28 years.  An outspoken Democrat, he was instrumental in the creation of the Community College of Allegheny County, the Greater Pittsburgh International Airport, the Kane Regional Centers, and the Senator John Heinz History Center. Due to his involvement in many construction projects throughout his political career, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette called him “perhaps the greatest builder in the history of Allegheny County government.”

Tom Foerster

The Library and Archives recently processed a collection of Foerster’s records that relate to the development of the Pittsburgh International Airport.  The construction of the airport created 14,000 construction jobs and brought several new businesses to the area.

Groundbreaking for the Pittsburgh International Airport, June 26, 1987.

One of the main concerns after the construction of the airport was the financial distress that USAir, a major investor in the project, was experiencing in the 1990s. With Pittsburgh serving as its main hub, USAir’s continued operation was vital to the airport’s success. British Airways proposed to invest 300 million dollars in the company, and USAir in return planned on sharing ticket codes. The alliance would also provide a non-stop flight from Pittsburgh to London. The sharing of codes, however, is a transaction that must be authorized by the US Department of Transportation. In 1993, under the Clinton administration, the alliance was approved.

Letter from President Bill Clinton to Tom Foerster and his co-commissioners regarding the code sharing alliance between USAir and British Airways.

Click here to view the finding aid for the Tom Foerster Papers.

Elizabeth Voelker Papers and Photographs

Judging from past posts on this blog, one might get the impression that all of the images held in our archives are black and white or sepia-toned.  There are, however, occasional bursts of vibrant color, as is the case with the images of artwork created by Elizabeth “Betty” Voelker.

"Dominion," Oil on Canvas, 1955

Voelker, an internationally known artist and colorist from Pittsburgh, attended Carnegie Institute of Technology (today known as Carnegie Mellon University), where she studied under Samuel Rosenberg.  Rosenberg, whose 1940 painting Bigelow Boulevard under Construction currently hangs in the reading room of the Detre Library and Archives, also taught artists Andy Warhol and Philip Pearlstein.  Graduating with a B.F.A. in 1953, Voelker was active with Associated Artists of Pittsburgh and exhibited at Carnegie Museum of Art before moving to San Francisco in 1958.

"Butoh," Collage with photogram, tape, handmade paper, burnt envelope

During the course of her career, Voelker received three grants from the Pollock-Krasner Foundation, held two residencies at the American Academy in Rome, and particapated in the U.S. State Department’s Art in Embassies program, which promoted American art abroad. Her pieces have been purchased by a number of museums in the U.S. including the National Museum of American Art in Washington D.C., the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, the Santa Barbara Museum of Art, and the Carnegie Institute Art Museum in Pittsburgh.

"Blue Ridge II," Oil Pastel, 18"x24"

The Elizabeth Voelker Papers and Photographs contain prints and roughly 500 annotated 35mm slides of her artwork. Click here to view the finding aid for the collection.

Lenore Kight Wingard, A Pittsburgh Olympian

It’s not too often that an Olympic athlete’s most famous race is the one that he or she did not win.  But this is the case with Lenore Kight Wingard, an Olympic swimmer from the 1930s and a Pittsburgh-area resident.

At the 1932 Los Angeles Olympics, she won the silver medal in the 400-meter freestyle, finishing second to American teammate Helene Madison.  The finish was incredibly close, so close in fact that it took the judges 20 minutes to decide who won the race.  In the end, they ruled that it was Madison who won with a time of 5:28.5, compared to Wingard’s 5:28.6.  Both swimmers beat the previous world record by two seconds.

“No second-place competitor deserves more fame than Lenore Kight… Her coronet should be just as bright as that of the winner,” legendary sportswriter Grantland Rice wrote of the race.

In addition to her silver medal that year, she returned home with a gold medal in the International Relay.

Lenore Kight Wingard is welcomed home after the 1932 Olympic Games at Stahl’s Theater in Homestead, Pa. This photo was taken on August 22, 1932.

The time in between the 1932 and 1936 Olympics was busy for Lenore.  She married Cleon Wingard in 1935 and moved with him to Cincinnati, where he accepted a teaching job.  They went on to have two children, Cleon Jr. and Diane.

In 1936, she continued to make her mark on the record book.  By that year she had broken 21 American freestyle records and seven world records.

The 1936 Berlin Olympics brought an entirely different experience for her.  Not only was she competing off of American soil, but that was also the year the Olympics were held in the politically unstable country of Germany.

She remembered a time where it took her two hours to get back to where she was staying because Adolf Hitler was coming down the street.

“Where we stayed, we were fenced in, always guarded by soldiers,” she told The Cincinnati Enquirer in 1991.  “When it was over, I was glad to get home.”

Following the 1936 Olympics, she became a professional swimmer and gained a sponsorship with Wheaties in 1937.  She was even featured on a Wheaties box.  At the time, Olympic regulations prohibited professional athletes, those earning money for playing or sponsorship, to compete in the Olympics.  It wasn’t until after the 1988 games that the International Olympic Committee abolished this rule, making all professional athletes eligible for the Olympics.

As she got older, the accolades continued.  She was inducted into the International Swimming Hall of Fame, the Pennsylvania Sports Hall of Fame, Helms Hall of Fame (Los Angeles), Maryland Hall of Fame, and the Western Pennsylvania Hall of Fame.

Pictured here in 1986, Wingard is holding her bronze medal from the 1936 Olympics.

Wingard’s love for the sport continued even as she got older.  She was a swimming instructor for many years and at the age of 75 she set another American swimming record.  She set an American record of 36.17 seconds in the 50-yard freestyle meet for women ages 75-79.

On February 9, 2000 Wingard died at the age of 88 from Alzheimer’s disease at Mercy Franciscan Hospital-Mount Airy Campus in Cincinnati.

Several photos and objects from her collection are on display in the Western Pennsylvania Sports Museum.  To view an online finding aid of the collection, click here.

Pittsburgh Blind Association

If you used a broom to sweep your Pittsburgh home during the 20^th century, there is a chance it was made by the blind and visually impaired men and women of the Pittsburgh Blind Association (PBA). For nearly a century, the PBA provided training assistance, service clinics, rehabilitation sessions, and other programs to foster independent living skills among blind citizens throughout the community. One of the PBA’s most successful programs was a broom manufacturing operation, which provided employment to blind and visually impaired workers between 1910 and 2009.

A blind employee during one stage of the broom making process at the PBA workshop during the mid-twentieth century.

Located on South Craig St. in Oakland, the PBA workshop employed anywhere from 50 to 200 workers at a time. The workshop relied heavily on its broom manufacturing, which produced everything from small whisk brooms to three-and-a-half pound rail switch sweepers. Often production was stimulated by government contracts, especially during times of war. A surge of blind workers, many taking the place of enlisted men, turned out pillow cases, mops, and brooms to aid the war effort during World War II. Likewise, broom making spiked during the U.S. involvement in Vietnam. Most frequent were sales to local Lions and Kiwanis Clubs or Allegheny County housewives associations. “Brooms made by the Blind” were promoted at special benefit sales at local Giant Eagle supermarkets and other participating businesses from the 1950s onward.

A sale of “Brooms from the Blind” in the mid-twentieth century. Notice the “Skilcraft” designation.

Blind and visually impaired workers weren’t limited to simply generating brooms, however. These able-bodied men and women operated lathes, sewing machinery, rotary machines, and hand tools to produce a variety of products. The workshop produced paintbrushes, tea towels, clothespin bags, aprons, ironing board covers, mops, and packaged industrial cleaning goods. Brooms and mops contracted through the Federal Government underwent rigorous inspections. Goods were then labeled with the designation “Skilcraft,” the tradename of the National Industries for the Blind (NIB). The NIB is a federally legislated organization providing employment opportunities for blind Americans. Mandates such as these generated high standards for all PBA products.

A man constructs paintbrushes at the PBA workshop in the 1940s.

The blind and visually impaired workers of the PBA workshop were proud of their jobs- and quick to defend them. In 1954, a proposed salary cut combined with increased production demands caused broom-makers to call a strike, which lasted for five months before an agreement was reached. Heightened community awareness over the course of the next 20 years led to a $4.8 million dollar facility in 1977, where 55 different types of brooms and mops went into swift production.

In 2005, the PBA was renamed the Blind and Vision Rehabilitation Services of Pittsburgh following a merger with the Greater Pittsburgh Guild for the Blind in Bridgeville, Pa. While broom making operations were discontinued in 2009, Blind and Vision Rehabilitation Services of Pittsburgh continues to provide important employment and support services to the blind and visually impaired throughout Allegheny County.

The collection is one of the History Center’s “hidden collections” that has been processed as part of the NHPRC Basic Processing project that began in 2011.  Click here to see the collection’s finding aid.

Construction of the Civic Arena

If you’ve been downtown lately, you may have noticed that the demolition of the Civic Arena has begun. If the demand for ornaments fashioned from the Civic Arena’s roof is any indication, there are many who feel an emotional attachment to the iconic structure and will be sorry to see it go.  Those interested in seeing the beginnings of the Civic Arena can head over to Historic Pittsburgh, where the Heinz History Center’s William V. Winans, Jr. Photograph Collection has recently been posted online.

Bulldozer working on the construction site of the Civic Arena

Winans was an assistant superintendent for the Dick Company, a firm that was involved in the construction of the arena.  The images document the construction process, from groundbreaking in March 1958 until May 1961, just a few months before the grand opening.

Inspecting the base of the arena's dome

Primarily home to the Pittsburgh Penguins, the arena also served as the venue for events as disparate as Civic Light Opera productions, Harlem Globetrotters games, monster truck races, boxing matches, political rallies, roller derbies, dog shows, and rock concerts.  The construction of the Civic Arena also drastically altered life in the Hill District by displacing 8,000 residents and disrupting the street grid connecting the neighborhood to Downtown.

View the William V. Winans, Jr. Collection images and finding aid.

“A Sisterhood of Faithful Women:” the Zonta Club of Pittsburgh Collection

Among the “hidden collections” that have been processed thus far through the NHPRC grant awarded to the Heinz History Center Library and Archives is one donated by the Zonta Club of Pittsburgh.  To those not acquainted with Zonta International (as I was not before processing this collection), here’s a little overview of the history and vision of this organization:

Founded in 1919, Zonta International was formed to advocate for women’s place in business and other professional fields. Central to its mission was raising the status of women in the workplace and furthering the interests of female professionals across the globe.  Following the founding of this international organization, a local Pittsburgh chapter of Zonta International was established on April 19, 1934.

The Zonta Club of Pittsburgh was comprised of professional women working in Pittsburgh who had risen to high positions within their respective fields, including education, medicine, oil manufacturing, law, advertising, and banking.  From its founding, this local Zonta chapter served the female worker population of Pittsburgh by organizing various education events.  Beyond this, the Zonta Club of Pittsburgh also became actively involved in current issues surrounding women’s rights in the workforce.  In one instance of this involvement, the Zonta Club of Pittsburgh became engaged in legally contesting a 1937 Pennsylvania state bill that would limit a woman’s work week to 40 hours.

Comprised of six scrapbooks, the Zonta Club of Pittsburgh collection documents in an engaging way the actions of this organization from 1934 to 1980.  Countless newspaper clippings, pamphlets, programs, photographs and letters collectively chronicle the various ways in which the Zonta Club of Pittsburgh advocated for and educated female workers.

Even more striking, however, are the remaining materials included in the pages of these scrapbooks that relate to individual female professionals of Pittsburgh.  Magazine articles, newspaper clippings, and other publications interspersed in these scrapbooks tell the story of prominent female professionals in Pittsburgh.  Some women featured in this way include Dr. Zoe Johnston, Pittsburgh general chairman of the Radiological Society of North America; Sandra McLaughlin, the first female vice president of Mellon Bank; and Virginia Lewis, the first director of the Frick Arts Museum.  In this way, the materials in these scrapbooks serve as a patchwork history of female professionals and their rise in  Pittsburgh’s professional circles.

The image above (taken from the earliest club scrapbook) demonstrates the manner in which the Zonta Club of Pittsburgh filled their scrapbooks. As can be gleaned from the newspaper headlines, this page was dedicated to recording the rise of Zonta member, Dr. Zoe Johnston, in the field of Radiology.

Gateway Center

The Gateway Center is a high-rise office complex consisting of four buildings in downtown Pittsburgh.  The development of the site was part of the Point State Project, an effort by the city of Pittsburgh to redevelop a 59-acre section of its downtown following World War II.  The plan also called for the creation of a state park adjacent to the Gateway site at the confluence of the Allegheny and Monongahela rivers, known as Pittsburgh’s “point.”

Before the project could begin, the existing businesses and residences at the site had to be demolished. Like other cities at the time, Pittsburgh sought to use eminent domain as a method to reshape its downtown. Through the use of this power, the state is able to claim private land and repurpose it, typically for public use.  The use of eminent domain for the Gateway Center was disputed, however, since the land was intended for commercial development.

The Lichti building on the corner of Stanwix Strett and Penn Avenue. The signs displayed in the window of Tumpson & Co. declare that the building was "bought by city," and thus having a "forced to vacate sale."

In 1945, the Urban Redevelopment Authority (URA) was formed to manage the negotiations between property owners and the Gateway Center’s primary investor, the Equitable Life Assurance Company.  Although most citizens agreed that the park would be beneficial for the city, the business owners who were being forced to move for the construction of the Gateway Center disagreed, not surprisingly, that their buildings should be demolished. Arguing that their buildings were similar to other buildings in the city, and that they should be given the option of improving the structures themselves, more than 100 business owners organized the Property Owners & Tenants Protective Committee and brought their case to the State Supreme Court. In January 1950, the Court ruled in favor of the URA, and demolition began. The business owners, still not satisfied, appealed their case to the U.S. Supreme Court, but the case was dismissed in October of 1950. With the ruling, the Gateway Center Project was well on its way, and several acres were cleared for the new buildings and the national park.

An elderly man sits on a bed located in a room within the Society for the Improvement of the Poor building. The building, located at 428 Duquesne Way, was designated for destruction.

In 1993, the Library and Archives received a collection consisting of photographs, blueprints, reports and notes that document the property negotiations and ensuing demolition that preceded the construction of the Gateway Center.  Click here to view the finding aids for the Gateway Center records and photographs.

More information about the project can also learned by reading “Gaining Gateway Center: Eminent Domain, Redevelopment, and Resistance” by Rachel Balliet Colker in the Fall 1995 issue of Pittsburgh History (also available online).