The Newtown Pentacle

Thursday

– photo by Mitch Waxman

I’ve mentioned Pittsburgh’s Troy Hill section before, in posts focused in on one of its most iconic features – Rialto Street.

A few occasions have seen me driving up here, scouting and such. There’s a centuried graveyard up there that’s called the Voegtly Evangelical Church Cemetery.

There’s a great article found here which describes the history, and the story, of the Voegtly cemetery. It also advises that ‘Voegtly’ is a Swiss German family name that is pronounced in English as ‘VECKly.’ More interesting reporting can be accessed here, and here, and a 2003 report from the Smithsonian can be found here.

Quite obviously, this cemetery I was visiting is the second and surviving one, as the original one that was attached to a long demolished church is now a part of an interstate highway. Progress marches on, huh?

– photo by Mitch Waxman

The neighborhood up on Troy Hill looks mostly residential, wood framed buildings seldom taller than three stories. You can ‘see’ the ‘germanity’ in these structures, on the wood worked lintels adorning the windows and doors. The streets up here were definitely not built for a guy from NYC that’s driving a Japanese SUV around. Tight, narrow, and built for horse and carriage. The streets are steep as well. I left the car at home on this particular day, and arrived on Troy Hill via an Uber.

I chatted with some fellow who had volunteered to clean the place up, gathering wind blown trash and detritus which had collected along the fence line. Nice guy, and I always love meeting people who care.

– photo by Mitch Waxman

At the edge of the property, breaks in the tree line allow for views of the Allegheny River valley. Prominent, the 33rd street rail bridge connects right of way trackage across the river to Lawrenceville.

I maintained a pretty good margin of safety regarding the edge of the land here. Wouldn’t want to tumble down onto Route 28 below. I’ve walked that path before… shudder.

– photo by Mitch Waxman

Observation reveals that this cemetery seems to have been largely filled up by the early 20th century. A number of the interments reveal entire families lying together, and there are some extraordinary monuments to admire in this polyandrion. Observed interment dates started around the First Civil War and end during the 1920’s. Non scientific survey, this, just what I took notice of.

As was the case with First Calvary back in LIC, the industrial atmosphere and consequent ‘acid rain’ has absolutely consumed and degraded the monuments composed of marble, whereas the granite ones look brand new. The marble ones have that typical ‘melting ice cream’ look. At Calvary, the acidic rainit was due to the Phelps Dodge outfit operating an actual sulfuric acid factory right about where the Kosciuszcko Bridge currently stands.

In Pittsburgh, you can take your pick for ‘point source’ amongst all of the steel mills, railroads, and glass factories that used to be embedded around the place as being the origin point for corrosive gases in the atmosphere.

– photo by Mitch Waxman

Fascinating spot, this, for a wandering taphophile. As mentioned above, several of the people buried here seem to have been ‘people of means.’ Look at the Neeb family monument a couple of shots up from this one as an example, but everywhere I looked there were fine carvings which must have cost a pretty penny ‘back in the day.’ Many of these graves were obviously meant for working people, but clearly there were ‘bosses’ buried at Voegtly too.

Me? I was just getting started on the day’s exertions. This was the start of a fairly long scuttle of about ten miles, and the longest walk I was able to pull off in 2025 – due to the orthopedic incident.

– photo by Mitch Waxman

There’s a monument to Western PA.’s firefighters at the Voegtly Evangelical Church Cemetery. Thought it appropriate to get a shot of it. I plan on returning here sometime soon, as a note. Interesting spot.

Back tomorrow with more wonders – at this – your Newtown Pentacle.

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