Downtown Pittsburgh Buildings
Erected by Henry Clay Frick

Portrait of Henry Clay Frick, from the
Senator John Heinz Pittsburgh Regional History Center.

Master Index for
History of Industrialist, Art Patron, and Philanthropist
Henry Clay Frick

Buildings Erected by Henry Clay Frick

Frick Building (1902)	William Penn Hotel (1916)
Union Arcade (now Union Trust Building) (1917)	Frick Annex (now Allegheny Building) (1906)

Buildings Erected With Close Involvement of Henry Clay Frick

Carnegie Building (1895-1952)

Union Trust Co. Building (now Pittsburgh Engineers' Building) (1898)

Some of the earth and stone from The Hump was used to fill-in a small off-shoot of Panther Hollow known as St. Pierre's Ravine, in the central portion of Pittsburgh's Oakland section. This new land became Schenley Plaza and includes the present site of the Henry Clay Frick Fine Arts Building, Library, and Auditorium of the University of Pittsburgh, built by Helen Clay Frick in memory of her father. Interestingly, when filling-in St. Pierre's Ravine to create Schenley Plaza, a stone arch bridge known as the Bellefield Bridge crossing the Ravine (close to the present site of the Frick Fine Arts Building), was literally buried where it stood! The Mary E. Schenley Memorial Fountain, dedicated to the memory of the woman who donated the land for Schenley Park, now sits above the former bridge site--in front of the Frick Fine Arts Building. Ironically, the Frick Fine Arts Building(on the south side of Schenley Drive) and Carnegie Library and Lecture Hall(on the north side of Schenley Drive) frame the Oakland entrance to Schenley Park.

At the beginning of the Twentieth Century, Oakland, located three miles east of Downtown Pittsburgh, was beginning to become Pittsburgh's "civic center," spurred by the "City Beautiful" urban and architectural movement of that era. Also, since Pittsburgh's topography was so rugged, and, hence, Downtown Pittsburgh was confined to a very small area, Downtown land values were much too high for the incorporation of cultural assets within the Golden Triangle. So, facilities such as the University of Pittsburgh(a.k.a. Pitt); Mellon Institute of Industrial Research; Carnegie Technical Schools(now Carnegie Mellon University); Henry Clay Frick Training School for Teachers(now the Frick International Studies Academy of the School District of Pittsburgh); Pittsburgh Board of Public Education headquarters; Carnegie Library, Institute Museums of Natural History and of Art, Music Hall, and Lecture Hall; Phipps Conservatory; Soldiers and Sailors Memorial Hall; Syria Mosque(razed); Masonic Hall (now part of Pitt); Pittsburgh Athletic Association; Young Men's and Women's Hebrew Association(now part of Pitt); Twentieth Century Club; the first small museum of the Historical Society of Western Pennsylvania(now physicians' offices); Forbes Field(razed; second home of the Pittsburgh Pirates National League professional baseball team); and several hospitals were built in Oakland.

The new building name was prompted by the reorganization of Mellon office buildings, following the opening of the 56-floor One Mellon Bank Center, across Grant Street from the Union Trust Building. The 41-floor Mellon Bank Building, across William Penn Place from the Union Trust Building, became Three Mellon Bank Center; in the 1950s, this was built as the U.S. Steel/Mellon Bank Building, when an annex to Kaufmann's Department Store was scheduled to replace the Carnegie Building(previous home of U.S. Steel Corporation; was located just below the Frick Building, on Fifth Avenue). The landmark Mellon National Bank and Trust Company Building on Smithfield Street, with its huge vaulted banking lobby, became Four Mellon Bank Center; this building was recently converted into a Lord and Taylor Department Store. It turned-out that the latest name change of Union Arcade was not very practical; few people knew where Two Mellon Bank Center was located, while everyone knew the location of the Union Trust Building. Today, the building goes by the dual monikers of Union Trust Building/Two Mellon Center(the word "Bank" is left-off, since the company now goes by the name Mellon Financial Corporation). By the way, the nameplates on those two public mailboxes have been changed again, from Two Mellon Bank Center to Union Trust Building!

Jenkins Arcade was a very busy three-level arcade, which, along with the Joseph Horne Company Department Store, anchored the lower end of the Downtown Pittsburgh retail district. Jenkins Arcade was designed in such a way that it served as a pedestrian link between Horne's and Fifth Avenue. When the Jenkins Arcade was razed in the mid-1980s, the link between Horne's and Fifth Avenue was severed, and Horne's business started to decline. Eventually, the Horne's Department Store chain was bought by Lazarus, the midwest division of Federated Department Stores, Inc. Lazarus built a new downtown store in the heart of the Fifth Avenue retail corridor; the Joseph Horne Co. building was sold to Oxford Development Company which now leases the building to Highmark Blue Cross-Blue Shield. On the site of the former Jenkins Arcade in 1988, the Hillman Company built the 31-floor Fifth Avenue Place building(had City zoning allowed, it would have been 60 floors!) as the headquarters of Blue Cross of Western Pennsylvania. This building includes a two-level "Arcade Shops," an attempt to create a modern Jenkins Arcade. Except for the pedestrian traffic generated by the much larger office building, these Arcade Shops, with their larger stores, have never replicated the pedestrian traffic of the Jenkins Arcade.