Pittsburgh Cemeteries

Tag: Sculpture

  • Calvary Group, St. Michael’s Cemetery

    Note: The pictures in this article disappeared with their image host, but we have added a more recent picture from 2023. The monument, dated 1888, commemorates priests of St. Michael’s parish.

    This grouping more notable for its position than for its artistic quality (which is quite good but not extraordinary); it stands at the edge of a steep slope with a panoramic view of the Monongahela valley below. St. Michael’s is a German Catholic cemetery, so the inscription (“I am the resurrection and the life…”) is in German (with “May they rest in peace” Latin, of course).

  • Alexander King Monument, Allegheny Cemetery

    Alexander King was the father of Jenny King Mellon, the grandfather of Sarah Mellon Scaife, and the great-grandfather of Richard Mellon Scaife. Baywood, the spectacular Second-Empire mansion he built in Highland Park, still stands near the end of Negley Avenue. This monument was put up in 1893.

  • Mittenzwey Monument, Allegheny Cemetery

    Time and industry have not been kind to this angel, but in spite of her blunted features and precarious-looking angle she still points heavenward. No inscriptions are visible except the shield with “Mittenzwey” (so Father Pitt reads it) at the angel’s feet; there may well have been other inscriptions, but old Pa Pitt could not detect any remnants of them. The monument probably dates from the early 1880s; a John G. Mittenzwey was buried in 1883.

  • Schertzinger Monument, St. Michael’s Cemetery

    A popular style; there are several similar statue-on-pedestal monuments in this cemetery. This one has been covered with inscriptions on every available space, the base being pressed into service when there was no more room on the sides.

  • Munhall Monument, Allegheny Cemetery

    An exceptionally beautiful monument obscured by another John Munhall’s ostentatious Gothic tomb right in front of it. The angel brings a palm and wreath to the Munhalls’ Romanesque grotto carved out of a rustic boulder. This John Munhall is the man for whom the borough of Munhall is named.