East Liberty is a neighborhood in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania‘s East End. It is bordered by Highland Park, Morningside, Stanton Heights, Garfield, Friendship, Shadyside, and Larimer and is represented on Pittsburgh City Council by Councilwoman Deborah Gross and Rev. Ricky Burgess. One of the most notable features in the East Liberty skyline is the East Liberty Presbyterian Church, which is an area landmark.
Around the time of the American Revolution, East Liberty was a free grazing area in Allegheny County located a few miles east of the young, a growing town called Pittsburgh, PA . (In older English usage, a “liberty” was a plot of common land on the outskirts of a town.)
Two farming patriarchs owned much of the nearby land, and their descendants’ names grace streets in and around East Liberty today. John Conrad Winebiddle owned land west of present-day East Liberty, in Bloomfield, Garfield, and Friendship, and his daughter Barbara inherited a portion close to what is now East Liberty. Alexander Negley owned a farm called “Fertile Bottom” north of present-day East Liberty along the southern bank of the Allegheny River. Negley’s land included some of present-day East Liberty and much of nearby Highland Park, Morningside, Larimer, and Stanton Heights.
Alexander Negley’s son Jacob married Barbara Winebiddle, built a manor house, and developed a village that he called East Liberty after the old grazing commons. In 1816, Negley saw that the Pittsburgh-Greensburg turnpike was built through East Liberty, which made the area a trading center and ensured its future growth. Bed Bug Exterminator Pittsburgh
Development
East Liberty began to develop as a commercial area in 1843 when Jacob’s daughter Sarah Jane Negley married the ambitious lawyer Thomas Mellon. Mellon had first visited the area of modern-day East Liberty in 1823 when as a 10-year-old, he saw the Negley mansion for the first time and decided he wanted something like it. He achieved this goal and much more: after becoming a prosperous lawyer, he made his true fortune by marrying Sarah Jane Negley, selling or renting the land near East Liberty she inherited, and using the proceeds to finance Pittsburgh’s nascent industries. Like Jacob Negley, Thomas Mellon worked to make East Liberty a transportation hub: Mellon convinced some of Pittsburgh’s first trolley lines to pass through East Liberty.
In 1979, Mellon Bank, Pittsburgh National Bank, local property owners, and other businesses created a nonprofit community development corporation, East Liberty Development, Inc. (ELDI). and hired an executive director, David Feehan. During the 1980s, several important developments occurred, spearheaded by ELDI, which acquired and renovated a vacant hotel (now 100 Sheridan Square); purchased the block that included the Regent Theater and Penn Highland Building, and worked with developers to bring the first market-rate condo to the community, and a new shopping center called East Liberty Station on Penn Avenue, east of Penn Circle. During the 1980s, the collection of small shops on Penn Circle South expanded, more than 200 businesses were located in East Liberty, and more than $80 million was invested in real estate development. In the fifteen years following its founding, ELDI focused on rehabilitating some of East Liberty’s historic commercial spaces. These included the Regent Theater (now called the Kelly-Strayhorn Theater) and Motor Square Garden.
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