Gumbo was visiting the Frick Museum and Gardens in Pittsburg, Pennsylvania, also known as The Frick Art & Historical Center or just plainly “The Frick.” No one solved where we were visiting this week.
The brochure says the museum is located on five acres of beautifully landscaped lawns and gardens in the city’s historic East End by Point Breeze. Visitors can tour Clayton, the meticulously restored Henry Clayton Frick family home and experience impressive presentations of art and learn about the Gilded Age history.
There was just so much to see and take in here that I was amazed. I lived in Pittsburgh until I graduated from high school but was never interested in culture or art so The Frick was never on my agenda. That was a real shame, but I realize that now after driving from my home in Virginia for a visit. The day I arrived I found no parking. The museum lot was cordoned off and there was a major children’s race and other events in the park across the street. Turns out the museum parking lot that day didn’t open until 10AM, but I took some liberties moving the orange cones and stanchion ropes and trespassed into the lot at 9AM. The museum is closed Mondays and open 10AM to 5PM the rest of the week with extended hours on Friday evenings until 9PM.
Arriving an hour before opening, I took the opportunity to walk the gardens where an attendant allowed me into the greenhouse which housed art displays alongside plants. The free brochure mentioned that some of the plants are used in the café menu items. There was a friendly Frick Café attendant who while setting up, allowed me to sit at a table and recharge my failing camera battery. The café had an exquisite menu including weekend only afternoon teas with indoor and outdoor patio seating.
Another building on the grounds was a full sized building used for office space, but back in the day it was constructed as a playhouse for Frick’s two living children and included a bowling alley.
Being one of the first people to enter the Visitor’s Center at opening, I asked for a ticket to tour the Clayton Mansion. Unexpectedly I was informed that all the mansion tour tickets were sold out for the day as they are booked in advance by tour groups and online customers. The Clayton houses 90% of its original furnishings from the turn of the 20th century. Next visit to the ‘Burgh I’ll have to be better prepared and get one of those online tickets. The remainder of the museum buildings were free.
Henry Clay Frick (1849-1919) was a native western Pennsylvanian with a somewhat checkered history who made his fortune as an industrialist primarily in the coal, coke, and steel businesses. Andrew Carnegie and Andrew Mellon were part of his inner circle. Frick and other rich Pennsylvanians founded a hunting and fishing club that owned the infamous reservoir Lake Conemaugh. When the club members failed to make adequate repairs on the weakening earthen dam a series of events led to the disastrous breach that practically wiped out the city of Johnstown and killed over 2,000 people. At the time it was America’s worst disaster ever.
When workers had a strike at the Carnegie Steel plant in Homestead (seven miles from Pittsburgh), Frick dispatched 300 armed Pinkerton detectives to breakup the workers picket lines. Nine workers were killed and 70 injured. 8,000 armed State militia were called in to stop the riots that followed. Frick then threatened to evict all striking workers from their homes. He survived an assassination attempt in his own office when he was shot twice and stabbed four times a few days after the riots. Allegedly he was known as “the most hated man in America.”
Frick accumulated one of the finest collections of European art in the United States. Most all are on display in the “Period Rooms” of the art museum where there are also other exhibitions.
The lace exhibition was featured during my visit. His daughter Helen Clay Frick was responsible for founding the Frick Museum.
The Car and Carriage Museum was the highpoint for me. A large collection of sleighs, carriages and early automobiles. There was an 1881 Brougham carriage the Fricks purchased on their honeymoon, a bright-red 1909 Stanley Motor Carriage Co. Model R Roadster with yellow wheels, a 1939 American Bantam Roadster and Henry Clay Frick’s 1914 Rolls Royce Silver Ghost. See some of the car collection in the photos at the bottom of this post.
Frick built a 104-room summer estate on Boston’s North Shore called “Eagle Rock” and also had a residence in New York on Manhattan’s Upper East Side. That New York City residence now houses the Frick Collection another art museum of note.
