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map of Beltzhoover.
Beltzhoover was named for Melchor Beltzhoover, a German landowner and member of a prominent family which settled the area.
On June 25, 1794, Beltzhoover purchased his property (248.5 acres) from John Ormsby for 745 pounds, 10 shillings (about $1,800 today). He and his wife Elizabeth farmed the purchase and raised a large family. In 1806, he willed the property to his sons Henry, George, Jacob, Daniel, Samuel, William and daughter, Elizabeth. Jacob took over the family farm, tavern and tanyard.
When the area was still farmland, Warrington Avenue was known as Washington Road, the main route from Pittsburgh to Washington, Pennsylvania.
In the 1860’s, the firm of McLain and Maple bought the farms and laid out plots and streets. Thomas Maple, son-in-law of Benjamin McLain, named a street for each of his children; Florence, Eugenia, Howard and Harriet, now Delmont, Michigan, Estella and Industry, respectively, and the unchanged Vincent, Lillian and Walter.
Areas of Beltzhoover bear colorful names. Houses on Freeland Street, made of grey sandstone from a nearby quarry, were termed Quarry Row. Butchers’ Grove, once a favorite spot for oxen roasts held by butchers and slaughterhouse employees, is now McKinley Park. Slag Hollow, below Butchers’ Grove, was named for the slag from coal mines. Magazine Hill was the site of a brick powder magazine constructed in 1863 when Lee’s northern campaign posted a threat.
Most housing in Beltzhoover dates from 1850 to 1900. The neighborhood is currently the subject of a revitalization effort by several local organizations, such as the Beltzhoover Concerned Citizens Development Corporation, the Hilltop Housing Initiative, and the Urban Redevelopment Authority. German in its earliest years, the neighborhood is populated mostly by African Americans and people of Italian extraction today, although some descendants of its original families still remain. Beltzhoover takes pride in having a touch of the past while creating a link for the future. Beltzhoover was annexed to the city of Pittsburgh on March 1, 1898.
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