AVAILABLE LECTURES
These engaging professional presentations of primary source expert research may be booked by contacting Sue Morris. Talks are one hour in length.
Allegheny Arsenal: Extent of the Damage
Even as the Civil War’s Battle of Antietam raged on a September afternoon in 1862, Pittsburghers were transfixed by a local tragedy that would traumatize a generation. What was the extent of the damage from the explosion at Lawrenceville’s Allegheny Arsenal?
Bettis
(available Fall 2024)
American aviation took wing in the 1920s in fabric-covered biplanes from local airports that were little more than reclaimed cow pastures — like Allegheny County’s Bettis Airfield. Join Sue Morris and Heinz History Center’s Director of Publications Brian Butko as they share details from their book recounting the pioneering aviators who flew out of Bettis.
The Horne’s Lingerie Lady
Explore the lives of shoppers and shopgirls through the experiences of a lingerie buyer for Pittsburgh’s beloved Joseph Horne Company Department Store in the early 1900s.
Pittsburgh Department Stores…Then and Now
Department stores emerged in the 1800s, forever changing the retail landscape
and reshaping how people interacted. Trace three landmarks from their reign as local “palaces of consumption” to the present day.
Pittsburgh Makes Merry:
Gilded Age Holiday Traditions
Explore how Pittsburghers from all walks of life celebrated the holiday season during America’s Gilded Age of the late 1800s and early 1900s.
Pittsburgh’s Gilded Age Conservatories
Garden conservatories enjoyed a Golden Age in the late 19th century. Pittsburghers of the era also enjoyed glass garden palaces that shimmered across the city in their day.
Pittsburgh: American Garden Spot
Industrial Western Pennsylvania of the late 19th and early 20th centuries hardly seems the place to showcase American gardening history! But flora flourished here, from Old Economy Village to expansive East End estates, and scores of small flower and vegetable patches in between.