New Girl in Town: On the Mexican War Streets

I stumbled upon the Mexican War Streets on my first visit to Pittsburgh and was struck by their similarity to San Francisco:  row upon row of thisclose Victorians – Queen Annes, Italianates – painted in bright hues.

“What is THAT about?” I said to Fen.

Finally finding the time to get an answer, I arrange to meet with Susan Larkin, a past president of the Mexican War Streets Society.  I invite my friend Molly along, since she belongs on one of those HGTV shows.

Susan has been in the neighborhood since 1982 and is on her fifth house.  Numero cinco is a brick-front row house on tidy Garfield Street with sumptuous stained glass windows and rooms filled with the kind of antiques that appear to have been in the family for years.

“I want one of those settees,” Molly purrs.

We take a seat at the dining room table and no sooner do I attempt to move a porcelain lamp base than our hostess gracefully plucks it out of my hand.

“I’ll take that,” Susan says.  “That was my great-grandmother’s lamp.”

We proceed to receive a riveting history of the neighborhood as well as Pittsburgh.  Twenty-seven years ago, nearly half of the houses in the Mexican War Streets were empty.  A former reporter, Susan already had a good sense about Pittsburgh and knew it to be a city of strong neighborhoods.  Our fair city was not only the foundation of American wealth, it was the richest city in the world at the start of the 20th century.

Not Even a General
Landing in this ten-by-five block neighborhood much earlier was one General William Robinson, whose family received a sizable land grant in Pittsburgh after the Revolutionary War.  Shortly after the Mexican American War ended in the late 1840s, Robinson, caught up in his own personal victory parade, laid out a neighborhood whose streets bore the names of several key battles within that War:  Monterey, Palo Alto, Resaca.  Oddly enough, Robinson did not participate in the War of which he was so enamored.

“He wasn’t even a general!” Susan exclaims.

Seizing on the architectural fashion of the day, Victorian houses started popping up in Mr. Robinson’s neighborhood, each more elegant than the last in a spirited game of can-you-top-this.  Things were great until the late 20th century, when suburban sprawl rendered the neighborhood a shell of its former self – literally:  when Susan bought her house, there was no working plumbing, heat or electric and it was raining inside!  Thankfully, the neighborhood wasn’t razed and the last couple of decades have seen a spirited attempt at urban renewal.  With that in mind, we set about on a whirlwind tour.

First stop is Beleza Community Coffeehouse, opened by seven college students from Michigan eager to change the world.  One wall is lined with architectural renderings that are part of a visioning process spearheaded by neighborhood residents.  The barista at Beleza is alarmingly slow and I chalk it up to a visioning breakthrough.

A few doors down on Buena Vista Street, a woman in an incredible Lucy Ball dress (think cinched waist) enters a fixer-upper.  A man who appears to be her contractor walks over to us.

“Are you a member of the historical society?” he asks me.

“She IS the historical society,” I reply as I point to Susan.

The man asks Susan what he thinks of the copper trim used on the faux Lucy Ball’s house.

“I don’t like it,” Susan says.  “It should be wood.  They used wood back in the day and you can still find that wood trim.”

Across the street is a community garden lying fallow in the late winter chill and everywhere we look, residents are walking, talking, engaging.

At 1523 Monterey, we pop in for a quick visit with the owner, Dan Wintermantel, a graphic designer whose linear posters have promoted everything from the annual Mexican War Streets House Tour to Pittsburgh bridges.  His narrow row house is right out of Architectural Digest and exudes fabulocity.

“It’s our third house in the neighborhood,” he tells Molly and me.

Passing a row of stone houses with wide front porches, we round a corner and come face-to-face with a graceful Queen Anne owned by Franco (yes, that Franco).  George Ferris (as in Ferris Wheel) once owned a house on Arch Street and it’s safe to say both gentlemen took us for a really sweet ride.  Our last stop is The Inn on the Mexican War Streets, an imposing mansion that once belonged to the Boggs family (of department store fame) and now houses a sybaritic eight-room bed and breakfast.

“The woodwork and mantels alone are worth a fortune,” Susan tells us.  As we walk through the various rooms, I can imagine myself here on a Friday evening, falling asleep to the thought of someone else cooking breakfast on Saturday morning.

“It’s just darling, isn’t it?” Molly whispers.

Fittingly, Susan gets the last word.

“This isn’t just a neighborhood, it’s a village.”

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...Where will I find the best mojito in Pittsburgh?  I know the 'burgh is a beer town but there's room for one singular drink.  Point me in the right direction and maybe I'll do a contest...What was with the silver-haired scribe at the P-G who pronounced the Pittsburgh Penguins dead just a month ago?  Did he also give up on the Steelers when they were down with 2 ½ minutes to go in the Super Bowl?  The Pens deserve our support because they’re our team and hockey is the most exciting professional sport to watch, televised or live...Pittsburgh has the good fortune to be about an hour away (by car) from three states and closer to even more by plane.  Vacation or stay-cation for spring break this year?  An argument can be made for both – I’d love to hear your thoughts!

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Elaine Labalme moved to Pittsburgh with her family from San Francisco after an 18 month search for the best city in which to live. Now that she's here, she's exploring happily as the New Girl in Town. Got suggestions or comments? Email her here.

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Photographs copyright Brian Cohen