Tag: Bronze

  • A. J. Sunstein Mausoleum, West View Cemetery

    Another Egyptian mausoleum that hits all the expected marks, except that it is too small (or cheap) for lotus columns. This one, however, adds the delightful detail of pharaoh’s-head door pulls, which more than makes up for the missing columns.

    Little smiley characters like the one at upper left occasionally appear on mausoleum doors in Pittsburgh cemeteries. It’s a cheerful little mystery.

  • Bronze Angels on the James Oliver Monument, Allegheny Cemetery

    The monument to steel baron James B. Oliver and his family is one of the largest heaps of bronze in the Allegheny Cemetery. Four beautiful angels stand guard at the corners.

  • General Alfred L. Pearson Monument, Allegheny Cemetery

    General Alfred L. Pearson

    Died January 6, 1903

    Prominent in Civil and Military Life

    Took active part in 28 great battles and many skirmishes during the War of the Rebellion, including Antietam, Fredericksburg, Peebles Farm, Gettysburg, Wilderness, and Appomattox. Brevetted a major general at 27 years of age, and awarded a medal of honor by Congress for conspicuous bravery.

    A worthy friend or foe.

  • Porter Angel, Allegheny Cemetery

    The original pictures in this article disappeared with the server that hosted them. This picture was taken in October of 2022. More pictures are at our more recent article on the Porter monument.

    This striking angel is the work of Brenda Putnam, but the cemetery’s site is vague and confusing on dates. It says that the bronze angel was cast “after 1910” as a replica of an original granite sculpture. The earliest dated Putnam work listed in her sparse Wikipedia article is from 1917. Brenda Putnam would have been twenty years old in 1910; she would thus have been a teenager when the granite version was done, if the date “1910” means anything at all. Henry Kirke Porter, identified as “the best-known Porter here” by the cemetery site, died in 1921, and perhaps that gives us a better guess at the date of the sculpture.

  • Moorhead Column, Allegheny Cemetery

    Erected in 1877, this column is unusual in carrying two distinguished works of sculpture in different media. The bronze relief is by Carl Conrads (who actually signed it); the cemetery site does not attribute the stone statue, and old Pa Pitt’s eye for sculptural style is not good enough to say whether it is or is not Conrads’ work.