Miscellaneous Pittsburgh

I have one more single-topic Pittsburgh post still to come, but since it's not ready, here are some miscellaneous photos and moments from the trip.

From a shop called Kards Unlimited:


These masks are right near the front door. It was kind of startling, but gives you an idea what kind of store it is!

Along the main business street on the south side of the Monongahela River, I saw this business sign:


If you don't watch or read Game of Thrones, it won't make any sense. I did want to add an apostrophe, of course.

Just off the same street, a cool bit of street art:


Someone is taking matters into their own hands, or at least their own stickers:


Pittsburgh, you may have heard, is a city of murals. I didn't shoot very many of them, but the boisterousness of this neighborhood piece was particularly fun:


Here's a bit of politics I saw along the way:


These T-shirts were on sale in the Strip neighborhood.

Finally, a couple of images from Photo Antiquities, the Museum of Photographic History. I was expecting an overview of photographic history, but it turns out the small, storefront museum is currently almost completely taken up with an exhibit about Abraham Lincoln and photography. Which was a nice surprise, and particularly these two artifacts:


First is the last photograph taken of Lincoln. As the photographer, Alexander Gardner, recorded:

On Sunday, April 9, 1865, Abraham Lincoln returned from City Point to Washington. On board the River Queen he relaxed, reading aloud from Macbeth, in particular the verses following Duncan’s assassination…. Lincoln with his son Tad went to Gardner’s studio to have his picture taken. It was the last time.

Second is this life mask made by Clark Mills. The accompanying description reads:

On February 11, 1865, about two months before his death, Abraham Lincoln permitted sculptor Clark Mills to make this life mask of his face. This was the second and last life mask made of Lincoln. The strain of the presidency was written on [his] face. His secretary, John Hay, remarked on the dramatic difference in Lincoln’s two life masks. He noted that the first mask, produced by Leonard Volk in 1860, “is a man of fifty-one, and young for his years. It is a face full of life, of energy, of vivid aspiration. The other is so sad and peaceful in its infinite repose a look as of one on whom sorrow and care had done their worst without victory is on all the features.”

Now that's something I didn't expect to see in Pittsburgh.