Category Archives: Historic Preservation

914 8th Ave Beaver Falls

The Multrup Steel Mansion is still for sale. Open house on Sat 1/20. Now $49,000 or less!

914 8th Ave Beaver Falls

Sooo…. who is up for a little road trip to Beaver Falls this weekend!

I’ve been noticing that the two previous posts on the Moltrup Steel Mansion have been getting a lot of visits recently. So I thought I would check back and see if this house was still for sale.

The Multrup Steel Mansion located at 914 8th Ave is still for sale and the price has been reduced to $49,000.  There is a new listing agent for the property, Carol Tomayko, her team has been very responsive to questions.

You can read a history of the Moltrup Steel Mansion on our previous post here.

The house has been featured on several old house blogs and you can read some of the comments on Old House Dreams to learn more about the current condition of the house. Long story short… not good.

Here are a few notes from comments left by Philip Poburka who toured the home over the summer:

  • “One of the thing I noticed which has not been mentioned are the tension failures in some areas of the Masonry, which have occurred from the Home’s differential settling over time.”
  • “There is no Wood in any of the construction, other than for the small and modest Back Porch, and, of course, the Sash Windows and Interior Wood Moldings and Paneling and Stair Treads and.”
  • “Let alone, all the lovely Wood work which has not ever had any second coats of varnish or other finish.”

914 8th Ave, Beaver Falls Open House This Saturday

I have just confirmed with the listing agent that there is an open house at 914 8th Ave, Beaver Falls for this Saturday, January 20 from 1-4pm.

Price Drop $49,900 or Less?

The realtor has also told me that while the price is listed at $49,900, the property is now in foreclosure and the bank intends to sell the home via auction in the next few weeks.

See more photos and learn more about 914 8th Ave:

 

And now, a word from our sponsors…

Winter got you down? Need to plan trip for some fun in the sun? The Southwest Rapid Rewards Visa can help you get out of town for free!

Earn 50,000 bonus points when you spend $2000 in the first 3 months of getting your card. Learn more about the Southwest Rapid Rewards Visa from Chase here.

 

 

Price Drop. The Moltrup Steel Mansion in Beaver Falls Reduced to $62,500

Update 1/18/2018 – Open house on Saturday, January 20, 2018.

Beaver Falls Mansion

This Beaver Falls mansion was built by the family who owned the Moltrup Steel manufacturing plant in 1914.  When I first profiled this building for historic preservation month in May, 2017. The house was listed for $80,500. (You can see all of the posts that I wrote for historic preservation month here.)

The post on the Moltrup Steel Mansion that is for sale in Beaver Falls has continued to be popular and I went to see if the house had sold.  The 5 bedroom, 4 bath house is still available and the price has been reduced to $62,500. Looking at the comments about this property on Old House Dreams site, there has been some interest in this property from a buyer on the other side of the country.

Hubzu Auction for Beaver Falls Mansion

The house is also listed for auction on Hubzu.com. The auction has one day left and the starting bid $49,500, which is still below the reserve price.

See more photos and learn more about 914 8th Ave:

For more historic information on Beaver Falls, PA:

The Ladies’ GAR Home in Swissvale: How would you repurpose this building with a Civil War history?

This postcard of the GAR Home is available for sale on Ebay.

This spring the Post-Gazette published an article about the Ladies’ GAR Home in Swissvale. (“Diana Nelson Jones’ Walkabout: Swissvale home has history on its side, but little else” Post-Gazette, March 13, 2017). The online version of the article doesn’t have a photo, but I knew that if this building was visible from the train, it was worth learning more about.

It is so oddly ob­scure that a very ob­ser­vant and his­tory-lov­ing Barry Al­fonso, a writer who lives in Swiss­vale, saw it for the first time on an Am­trak train. The tracks pass along what used to be the front gate.

The Ladies’ GAR Home — GAR stands for Grand Army of the Re­pub­lic — was built for in­di­gent fe­male fam­ily mem­bers of Union Army vet­er­ans. The orig­i­nal struc­ture was a 12-room home built in 1890 that burned down in 1900. A 53-room fa­cil­ity was built to re­place it. In 1937, a 30-room ex­ten­sion was built.

Mr. Al­fonso con­tacted the Pitts­burgh Post-Ga­zette hop­ing to give it some ex­po­sure in case some­one with ex­tremely deep pock­ets might con­sider a fu­ture for it. That’s un­likely, though. Bor­ough man­ager Clyde Wil­helm said liens go back to 2003.

Photo credit: Love Place Photography

More photos of the GAR Home in Swissvale are available from Love Place Photography here.

Ever since I read the article about this building, I have been thinking that there has to be use for this historic building. Before the LGAR moved to a new facility in Turtle Creek in 1996, this building was home to some 80+women.

Could this become offices? Artists studios? Micro apartments? A hotel? If it could be saved, what would you like to see in this building in the future?

 

Location of GAR Home in Swissvale

National Negro Opera House in Homewood.

National Negro Opera Company House: The Most Historic House in Pittsburgh You Probably Have Never Heard Of

National Negro Opera House in Homewood.

National Negro Opera House in Homewood. Photo taken April 2016.

If there is one house you learn about from our month long series for historic preservation month, the The National Negro Opera Company House in Homewood is the house to remember. This house needs some love and unlike the other properties that I have posted about this month, I don’t know what the future holds for this place. I believe there is a huge opportunity for this building, but it is also a huge challenge.

The house, located at 7101 Apple Street in the Homewood Neighborhood, was built in 1908.

Three Reasons the National Negro Opera Company House is Important

  • This building was home to the first African-American opera company in the United States.
  • The house belonged to Woogie Harris, brother of photographer Teenie Harris.
  • It is rumored that the Steelers franchise was won in a card game in the basement of the house.

Learn more about the National Negro Opera Company House

Photo credit: Secret Pittsburgh.

For an in depth look at the history of the National Negro Opera House, check out this post on Secret Pittsburgh. (Also, how interesting is it that Pitt offers a class called Secret Pittsburgh? Another fascinating thing I learned while writing about historic Pittsburgh places). The Curbed post from May 2016 offers some more information on efforts to save this building.

Location of the National Negro Opera Company House

The Gardener-Bailey House in Edgewood

I learned about the Gardener-Bailey house from this photo from Cam Miller (@CatLadyCam) on Instagram. Built in 1864, this building was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1974. Does anyone know the history of this grand old Victorian home?