East Liberty Valley Historical Society

06/09/2026

Save the dates, mates?

Marilyn Evert Lecture Series
Autumn 2026

Wednesday, Sept. 2, 7 p.m.
“The Cathedral of Learning at 100”
Drew Armstrong has some thoughts about Charles Klauder's iconic 1926 Neo-Gothic design for what is still the tallest educational building in the Western Hemisphere. Dr. Armstrong is Director of Architectural Studies in the University of Pittsburgh’s history of art and architecture department, where he has taught for more than 20 years.

Wednesday, Oct. 7, 7 p.m.
“Homing: Instincts of a Rustbelt Feminist"
Pittsburgh author Sherrie Flick will read from and discuss her recent memoir, which explores her Beaver Falls childhood, her coming of age as a writer in the 1990s, and how place and geography shaped her experience of sexism and formed her feminism. Flick lived on the East Coast, West Coast and Great Plains before circling back to Pittsburgh. Road trips, eight-ball pool, Andy Warhol, Gen-X, food, faith, longing and loss are strung together across the 13 essays in “Homing,” published in 2024 by the University of Nebraska Press.

Wednesday, Nov. 4, 7 p.m.
“The Mellons and Their Mansions"
For a century and a half, the Mellons were the most influential family in the Pittsburgh area; the Mellon name adorns landmarks across the region, and their wealth has funded countless public and private initiatives. But on a personal level, the family often has shunned the limelight. Nolan Grimes' illustrated talk will explore the Mellons' extensive family tree and the numerous mansions they once owned across Pittsburgh's East End, from Highland Park to Shadyside to Squirrel Hill, as well as the grand estates they still occupy in the Ligonier Valley. Mr. Grimes is Carnegie Mellon University's Facilities Archives and GIS Manager.

Wednesday, Dec. 2, 7 p.m.
“Pittsburgh Parlor Song”
Soprano Brady Collins will discuss Pittsburgh's music publishing scene during the late 19th and early 20th centuries and perform such local favorites as "Pittsburgh, You're a Grand Old Town," "Pittsburg, City of Smoke," and "My Youghiogheny Girl." Ms. Collins also will feature East Liberty composer Ernest B. Lydick and perform his song, "The Wreck of the Flyer Duquesne." It commemorates the December, 1903 Duquesne Limited accident on the B&O Railroad, where Laurel Run meets the Yough at a serpentine curve and more than 60 passengers lost their lives. Ms. Collins is on the board of the Avonworth Historical Society.

All talks are free to the public and held in the Parish Hall of Calvary Episcopal Church, 315 Shady Ave., 15206. (Use Marchand Street entrance.) Free parking in church lot.

06/05/2026

Thanks to Mark Fatla for Wednesday's enlightening and entertaining survey of Pittsburgh ballparks, from an 1850s field in Allegheny Commons to PNC Park, as told in his 2023 book, “Pittsburgh’s Historic Ballparks.” The 40 folks in the audience appreciated his research and humor as well as the display of artifacts and memorabilia he’s collected over many decades as a Pirates fan. Mark will join us again next year to talk about his second book, “Pittsburgh’s Historic Stadiums and Arenas.” That’s a wrap for our Spring lecture series; we’ll return in September with a new round of talks we’ll post next week. At our annual meeting before the talk, ELVHS president George Clark introduced two new board members, Pittsburgh historians Frank Kurtik and Susan Morris, both long familiar to our audiences for their past talks. We are grateful for their longtime support and so pleased to welcome them as we plan for the future. Thanks as ever to Calvary Episcopal Church for hosting, thanks to all who came out and thanks to E.J. Donnelly and Mike Staresinic for the pix.

06/03/2026

Tonight...

05/28/2026

Wed., June 3 🌼 ELVHS@Calvary
6:45 p.m. Annual Meeting
7 p.m. Mark Fatla on "Pittsburgh's Historic Ballparks"

05/13/2026

Many thanks to Dr. Edda Fields-Black for last Wednesday’s illustrated talk on her Pulitzer-winning book, “Combee,” which tells the story of the Union Army's 1863 raid on coastal South Carolina rice plantations. In six hours the army, led by Harriet Tubman, freed 756 enslaved men, women and children and destroyed the mansion houses, outbuildings and fields of seven rice plantations as their owners fled into the woods.
“Descendants of the slave-holders call it ‘The Great Skedaddle,’ ” she said.
For the research and writing she had three goals, she told an audience of 31 in Calvary Episcopal Church's Parish Hall. The first was to document Harriet Tubman's Civil War service as a spy and scout, infiltrating the rice plantations along the coast and training others who found and defused Confederate torpedoes in advance of the raid. Her second goal was “to tell the story of the raid in the voices of the people who were freed.” Because 153 of the freed men immediately joined the Union Army, their names are in the Civil War pension files, “and with the pension files you can get back to the plantation.” With plantation records and pension files full of firsthand narratives, she was able to reconstruct an enslaved community. One of those captives-turned-soldiers was her great-great-great-grandfather Hector Fields; it was, in fact, her own family history research that led her to investigate the Combee raid and to the landmark achievement that is this book.
Her third goal was to put the reader in the rice fields during the raid, which began at the wharf in Beaufort. For her, that meant getting down barefoot into the cold, thick, squishy pluff mud, home to crabs, snakes and alligators, in the middle of the night.
Dr. Fields-Black, who teaches history at CMU, is currently working with colleagues there to make the Civil War pension files free and accessible online to the public, creating an enhanced opportunity for those with enslaved ancestors to find them.
Thanks to everyone who came out for this inspiring evening and especially to Riverstone's Kari Johnson for selling books. – Patricia Lowry (EFB photo by Sue Morris)

05/11/2026

Wednesday, June 3, 7 p.m.
“Pittsburgh's Historic Ballparks"
Mark Fatla, attorney, author and lifelong baseball fan, reports on the city's nine Major League ballparks, including the Negro Leagues, showing how Pittsburgh, from 1876 to the present, often was a leader in their design and development. A vintage memorabilia display and sale and signing of Mark's books on historic local ballparks, stadiums and arenas will follow. Parish Hall, Calvary Episcopal Church, 315 Shady Ave., 15206. (Use Marchand Street entrance.) Free parking in church lot.

05/06/2026

TONIGHT...WEDNESDAY MAY 6

Ever since her book won the 2025 Pulitzer Prize for History, CMU's Dr. Edda Fields-Black has been traveling the country, telling its riveting stories at history conferences, Civil War round tables, colleges and community libraries. This week, she's back in Pittsburgh to present her illustrated talk to the East Liberty Valley Historical Society. It's free...please join us.
Wednesday, May 6, 7 p.m.
“Harriet Tubman and the Combee Plantations Raid"
Carnegie-Mellon University history professor Dr. Edda Fields-Black shows how the Union Army, led by Harriet Tubman, freed 756 enslaved rice plantation workers in South Carolina in June, 1863 – as told in her 2024 book, “Combee: Harriet Tubman, the Combahee River Raid, and Black Freedom During the Civil War,” winner of the 2025 Pulitzer Prize for History. Parish Hall, Calvary Episcopal Church, 315 Shady Ave., 15206.

05/03/2026

"Although encyclopedic in its breadth, the amount of information alone does not begin to describe the pull of this book. We are compelled by the power and humanity in the storytelling, tugged by the relationship of the author to the material, by her passion—and by her own story. Dr. Fields-Black has literal skin in this story; she tells the reader early on that she learned from her uncle’s pension files that her great-great-great grandfather was a soldier in the Second South Carolina Volunteers and fought in the raid. Along the way, the reader senses the power of memoir here—the story of how she gathered the information for this book is as powerful as the book."

It was Edda Fields-Black’s Op Ed in the NYTimes that led me to COMBEE: Harriet Tubman, the Combahee River Raid, and Black Freedom During the Civil War (Oxford University Press 2024). In the editorial, she describes how the newly digitized US Civil War Pension Files made it possible for African Ame...

05/03/2026

Ever since her book won the 2025 Pulitzer Prize for History, CMU's Dr. Edda Fields-Black has been traveling the country, telling its riveting stories at history conferences, Civil War round tables, colleges and community libraries. This week, she's back in Pittsburgh to present her illustrated talk to the East Liberty Valley Historical Society. It's free...please join us.
Wednesday, May 6, 7 p.m.
“Harriet Tubman and the Combee Plantations Raid"
Carnegie-Mellon University history professor Dr. Edda Fields-Black shows how the Union Army, led by Harriet Tubman, freed 756 enslaved rice plantation workers in South Carolina in June, 1863 – as told in her 2024 book, “Combee: Harriet Tubman, the Combahee River Raid, and Black Freedom During the Civil War,” winner of the 2025 Pulitzer Prize for History. Parish Hall, Calvary Episcopal Church, 315 Shady Ave., 15206.

12/03/2025

TONIGHT!

Wednesday, December 3, 7 p.m.
“From Hoboken to Blawnox: History of a Company Town”
Tom Powers, president of the Lawrenceville Historical Society, will show and tell how the borough of Blawnox developed along the Allegheny River out of the 1860s planned community of Hoboken after the arrival of the Blaw Steel Construction Company in 1912. To celebrate the borough’s 100th anniversary this year, Tom has written and designed a 52-page commemorative book; copies will be available for purchase at his talk. This talk is free to the public and held in the Parish Hall of Calvary Episcopal Church, 315 Shady Ave., 15206. Free parking in church lot.