00:07 - Hi, I'm Carson and today PCN is in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

00:10 - Founded in 1878, decaying university has a ton of history.

00:14 - So we're going to talk with their archivists today.

00:29 - I'm here with Tom white.

00:30 - He's a university archivist here at Deakin University.

00:33 - Could you tell us how was the founded?

00:35 - Sure.

00:36 - Duquesne University actually started out as Pittsburgh Catholic College.

00:40 - It was founded in 1878 when the Holy Ghost.

00:44 - Fathers came to Pittsburgh, and they were an order of

00:48 - priests from Germany mainly, but also from France and Ireland,

00:53 - who came here, not intending to form a school,

00:56 - but the local bishop asked them to start a college that would also have a seminary.

01:01 - And so they actually formed an elementary school, a high school and a college

01:05 - all at the same time.

01:07 - The original college building was a rented space

01:10 - that direction out near,

01:12 - what's today, the Lower Hill District on Center Avenue and Crosstown Boulevard.

01:17 - It's been torn down now,

01:19 - but at the time it was.

01:21 - They rented the upper floors of a building.

01:23 - It had downstairs a tailor and a bakery.

01:26 - And so the early students, they started a little late

01:28 - when the first year they opened in October.

01:31 - And, the students initially had,

01:34 - the problem of always smelling baked goods as they were trying to study.

01:38 - But the school was only there for a few years

01:40 - until they eventually bought property up on Old Main St.

01:43 - But this area right here in Pittsburgh was called The Bluff, the neighborhood.

01:47 - It was originally, called Boyds Hill before that.

01:51 - But the bluff, it overlooks the city.

01:53 - You can see downtown Pittsburgh in the background.

01:55 - And this the, Duquesne was built up here on this property,

02:00 - in the in the 1800s when the city didn't extend this far.

02:03 - And the property actually wasn't as sought after because it was uphill.

02:07 - This was actually the buildings that Duquesne at one point,

02:09 - would be the highest point in the city until the skyscrapers were built later.

02:27 - So when Duquesne officially received their charter

02:29 - from the city, they need a permanent location.

02:31 - So they end up moving into this building.

02:33 - What is this building?

02:34 - This building is known today as Old Main.

02:36 - It was originally just called the Main Building.

02:38 - So it was the only building the school used in the beginning.

02:41 - And, they bought this property.

02:43 - It was the site of a former hospital.

02:45 - It was actually a stop on the Underground Railroad.

02:47 - The hospital owner was an abolitionist.

02:50 - And the Holy Ghost Fathers bought this property,

02:53 - and they used it then to,

02:56 - build this building.

02:57 - And in fact, the Holy Ghost Fathers made the bricks by hand themselves

03:01 - in a brickyard right over the hill where the School of Health Sciences is now.

03:05 - And this building was assembled and put together, and it became

03:08 - kind of the heart of the university for many years, and still is.

03:12 - And there's a lot of stories about this building.

03:14 - For example, in 1975, lightning struck the roof and burned the roof off,

03:18 - and they had originally wanted to tear the building down.

03:21 - The engineer said it wasn't safe.

03:22 - They got second opinions, and they determined it was stable

03:25 - because there were thick load bearing walls,

03:28 - and it really hadn't damaged that much of the structure.

03:30 - So Old Main was repaired and has still continue to house

03:33 - the administration of the university all these years.

03:37 - There's other anecdotes.

03:38 - For a while

03:39 - we had the only source of clean water in Pittsburgh during the 1936 flood.

03:43 - Our second or third president, Father Murphy, installed a pump

03:47 - and it became a meeting spot for students behind this building.

03:50 - They had clean water.

03:51 - After the Johnstown Flood in 1889, it polluted the rivers of the city

03:55 - with debris, so they drilled down into the aquifer.

03:59 - Pittsburghers call it the fourth River underneath the city

04:02 - and poured clean water up, and it was there until 1938.

04:06 - And it was one of the only sources of clean water

04:08 - during the famous 1936 Saint Patrick's Day flood in downtown Pittsburgh.

04:13 - They eventually took it out when students would all drink

04:15 - from the same, same way to get the flu the same time every year.

04:19 - But Old Maine has, plenty of stories like that, and it's still kind of

04:22 - the heart of the university.

04:33 - So we're currently on.

04:34 - Academic Walk,

04:35 - which is located in the upper side of campus, and you were telling me earlier

04:39 - that this was developed after World War Two.

04:41 - Could you tell us a little bit more history about it?

04:43 - Sure.

04:43 - Originally, the whole school was contained to that end of the bluff

04:46 - in a few buildings, but as time went on, they decided to expand and,

04:52 - stake out a claim up here on the bluff.

04:54 - So one of the early, the presidents after World.

04:58 - War two, Father Vernon Gallagher came up with the master plan

05:01 - to stretch all the way out to the far end of the bluffs.

05:05 - And he purchased property at the far end to build the first dorm,

05:09 - which was all the way down near Mercy Hospital.

05:12 - So he kind of took the stake.

05:13 - The claim out there, this was all a neighborhood at the time.

05:16 - Back, were coming up on one of the last remaining houses from that neighborhood,

05:20 - which is now used by the university as Laval House.

05:23 - But the, the idea was to buy these properties in the old neighborhood

05:27 - and then convert them to newer, a newer, modern university.

05:30 - And at that time, the school had the option to maybe leave downtown Pittsburgh.

05:34 - But they decided to stay here and build this kind of little oasis close to town

05:38 - for students to have access.

05:39 - But still, you know, be immersed in the city,

05:41 - but still be a little bit isolated as well up here.

05:44 - And so throughout the 50s and 60s, Father Gallagher and then his successor,

05:48 - father McKinley, who was one of the most popular presidents in the university,

05:52 - started to purchase these properties and build new buildings on campus.

05:56 - But they maintained a wall house for a variety of purposes over the years.

06:00 - But they

06:01 - constructed new buildings, like across the street,

06:04 - Mellon Hall, which became our Science Building,

06:06 - which was designed by the famous architect Mies van der Rohe.

06:09 - And then the student union was constructed and dorms

06:13 - and other buildings were recycled,

06:14 - including three parking garages that are now campus buildings.

06:18 - The Berg Library, College Hall, which is the School of Liberal Arts,

06:22 - Mackinaw City School of Liberal Arts, and the Music School were all originally

06:25 - parking garages that were recycled and repurposed,

06:29 - for academic buildings.

06:48 - Once Duquesne becomes a university, there's a great need for lawyers.

06:51 - So they end up setting up one of the first schools of law. Yes.

06:55 - So Duquesne gets it, gets its university charter in 1911.

06:59 - Immediately they established the School of Liberal.

07:01 - Arts, of course, which was the standard.

07:02 - But the first other independent school they established as a school of law

07:06 - and the School of Law appealed to, a certain audience that was in,

07:10 - you know, in search of, lawyers and, legal training.

07:14 - And that was like

07:15 - the children of immigrants and people

07:17 - who weren't traditionally allowed in law schools.

07:20 - And so Duquesne catered to immigrants to,

07:24 - the people who were kind of rejected from other law programs,

07:27 - not because of skill, but because of who they were.

07:30 - And, the law schools become very established over the years.

07:33 - It's one of the preeminent law schools in western Pennsylvania.

07:37 - And it you know, that

07:39 - what you see behind us now is the newest incarnation, recently renovated.

07:43 - The client school

07:45 - was after a generous donation from Thomas Klein.

07:48 - But it started out actually in downtown Pittsburgh.

07:51 - They placed the school

07:52 - in downtown Pittsburgh away from campus in the same time as building

07:56 - with the business school, which was established in 1913.

08:00 - And the idea behind that was to let immigrants

08:02 - be able to work during the day and still get an education at night.

08:07 - So they would go to law school or business school at night,

08:10 - and they could get their degree and not have to worry

08:12 - about being impoverished, trying to learn.

08:14 - And so, many of our early graduates

08:17 - functioned primarily out of the downtown building.

08:20 - Eventually they decided to move the law school up to campus

08:23 - in the 50s as part of Polly Gallagher's expansion plan.

08:26 - And they built Rockwell Hall, which is on the edge of the bluff

08:29 - over there overlooking the city.

08:31 - They purchased the houses there and built

08:33 - new Rockwell Hall that held both the law school and the business school.

08:36 - Eventually, this building that you see here was originally

08:40 - the far end of it was the original library, which

08:43 - existed as the library until 1978 or so, when they moved the library

08:47 - across the street

08:48 - through the renovated parking garage, which is now the Youngberg Library.

08:51 - That library became the law school library, and they expanded.

08:54 - In 1981, they opened Henley Hall, which was the law school building up here,

08:58 - separate from business. So business got a time building.

09:01 - Old school got its own building.

09:02 - It worked out very well for everyone.

09:04 - And in the years since, you know, the reputation of the law

09:07 - school has increased and they, added all kinds of new programs and,

09:12 - you know, produced a lot of, prominent local lawyers.

09:29 - So we came down to the.

09:30 - Cooper Fieldhouse, and Duquesne University has produced quite a lot of athletes.

09:34 - Could you tell us about a few of them? Sure.

09:36 - This fieldhouse actually named after Chuck Cooper, one of the.

09:39 - He was the,

09:39 - he played for Duquesne basketball in the early 50s, late 40s, early 50s.

09:43 - He was actually the first African American drafted in the NBA.

09:47 - He was a player here.

09:48 - And you Kane has a long history with basketball.

09:51 - He produced other famous players like Norm Nixon.

09:54 - But basketball's been pretty successful, too, since the very beginning.

09:57 - Even in the early years, we had some famous, players who,

10:01 - like Cumberland Posey, who was famous for playing in

10:04 - what was then the Negro Leagues and baseball, played baseball

10:07 - and basketball for Duquesne in the 19 teens.

10:10 - But you can also has connections to other areas like football, the Rooney family.

10:14 - Art Rooney, senior

10:15 - founder of the Pittsburgh Steelers, attended Duquesne and played sports here.

10:19 - Dan Rooney,

10:21 - attended Duquesne.

10:22 - And so there's connection with the Rooney family.

10:24 - There's a connection with, it's long basketball tradition.

10:28 - It peaked in the 70s, maybe with basketball, but it's come back again

10:32 - two years ago, as you can say, basketball team made it to the NCAA.

10:35 - March madness made it two rounds into into March Madness.

10:39 - So for a school, it it's not as big as the other schools.

10:42 - We we do pretty well with sports.

10:44 - Thank you guys so much for joining PCN.

10:46 - I hope you guys enjoyed learning a little bit

10:47 - more about the history of Duquesne University.