re: #101 FFL (GOP Delenda Est)

I remember all the good series like “Things That Aren’t There Anymore” that WQED ran. They had some good documentary producers who really loved the region. And my father had a coffee table book of Pittsburgh architecture that covered both whole buildings and just small decorative parts of other buildings, especially the art deco stuff.

This site is worth posting every year or two. It was established by a Pitt Communications professor and maintained by his students. The core of it is the huge photo archive of the Department of Public Works—a great starting point for the history of PGH infrastructure. The preservation and technical quality of some of the ancient large-format shots is incredible. The site’s design lets you find locations via GIS, compare them to the spots today. I found a shot from 1950 of the Forbes St. corner where and when I used to run free.

(Note: The site creator will help other cities’ historical groups use the framework to organize their collections.)

retrographer.org