A Detailed History of Crescent Hills

OUR HISTORY

As a development Crescent Hills goes back to the 1920s. Before then, European influences in the area begin with Frederick Stoner, a Bavarian German, who settled in Penn Hills in 1796 and owned and operated a whiskey distillery. The graves of Frederick, and his wife, Barbara Stoner are among the oldest in Mt. Hope Cemetery. They owned the land from Mt. Hope Cemetery on Frankstown Road to Lime Hollow Road.

In 1927 a developer, Porter Beck, bought 30 acres of this land from Stoner’s descendants. Beck subdivided the farm into 453 lots and named the development “Crescent Hills” because of the crescent shaped curve along Frankstown Road. Beck named Earlwood Road in honor of Frederick Stoner’s great-grandson, Earl Stoner.

The pillars at the Frankstown entrance of Crescent Hills Road were installed by Beck and taken from what had been a stone home on the tract. The Crescent Hills development was the first large scale development in Penn Hills and one of the first in the entire area that pre-dated World War II.

By the next year two model homes had been built and were opened to the public. The identical homes were 531 Springdale and 106 Crescent Hills Road. Beck sold the plots during the depression, a tough sell but apparently one which he handled quite ably. He had instructed the engineers to spare as many trees as possible while clearing a path for their plumb lines, which helped maintain the development’s beauty.

Soon after this, the Reeds, who owned a farm adjacent to Beck’s land, sold their property to William Garlow, a later developer who added Garlow Drive, parts of Earlwood Road and Glenfield Drive to the plan. Sycamore Drive, Wisteria Drive and McCurdy Drive, originally named Willoston Acres, were the final additions to Crescent Hills.

The oldest existing home in Crescent Hills is the white farmhouse at 100 Garlow Drive, built in 1897. None of the few original homes that were built by the Stoners before they sold their land are still standing, but some of their remnants remain to this day. In 1812 the Stoners built an impressive three-story farmhouse on what is now Sycamore Drive near Mt. Hope Cemetery. The stone from that house was later recycled to build the home at 116 Spring Grove Road. Similarly, the house at 127 Glenfield was built from the stones of a Stoner farmhouse originally constructed in the 1880s.

Also of note is the home at 162 Crescent Hills Road which was built in 1932 using stone left over from the construction of the University of Pittsburgh’s Cathedral of Learning. Built for Harry and Ruth Klemm, it was in that home that the Crescent Hills Women’s Club was founded.

The Crescent Hills Civic Association’s beginnings date back to 1935. That year a group of neighborhood women met informally and decided to form the Crescent Hills Civic Club. The purpose of the club was to assist in beautifying the Crescent Hills plan as well as to procure improvements.

When the club started it was only for women. In 1938 when the men started their own club, they took the respective names – Crescent Hills Men’s and Women’s Civic Clubs. Together they arranged for getting the roads paved, telephone service added, coverage of the area by the Rosedale Volunteer Firemen’s Association and bus service for the neighborhood school children. They worked on property tax questions, attended commissioner’s meetings, wrote letters to utility companies and assisted with landscaping at the entrances of the neighborhood.

There were no bus routes on Frankstown in the early days; they had to walk to Wilkinsburg. So the clubs secured a bus route. Before the roads were paved they were red-dog dirt, which turned to mud when they got wet. So club members put a big box of old boots at the bus stop for people to use and they were returned under an honor system.

In 1942 the clubs voted to not cancel social activities because of the war but all money earned at the events would be donated towards the war effort. The club sent a carton of cigarettes (or candy for those who didn’t smoke) to each boy from the Crescent Hills area serving in the Armed Services.

The clubs raised funds to buy a 2.8-acre parcel of land on Sycamore Drive. They were able to raise the $3,000 to purchase the land and they named it Crescent Hills Park. Later fund drives were launched to raise money for a clubhouse and pool but they failed to raise enough.

In 1947 the children’s playground was established and then later the tennis courts were added, a shelter was built and a ball field created. Two bus shelters were built; a third was added decades later.

Countless neighborhood wide lawn parties, sauerkraut suppers and outdoor Christmas tree parties were held. Activities were also expanded to include a bridge club, book club, hospitality committee, gourmet club, choral group and drama group.

In 1948 the Women’s Civic Club licensed and operated a preschool at Mt. Hope Community Church. Both clubs held monthly meetings complete with food and entertainment. Guest speakers were brought in from the community to educate and entertain. Philanthropy was important to many members as well.

In 1953 the Women’s Civic Club helped sponsor a local fund drive to assist in the foundation of the first educational TV Station in the nation, WQED.

By the end of the fifties sewers were the final major improvement the clubs sought. After that the main focus became the neighborhood preschool and Penn Hills schools.

In 1960 the Civic Club donated money to create the newly formed Penn Hills Service Association. Crescent Hills resident and member, Mildred Jones, was a founder and first president.

The sixties and seventies saw the establishment of a bowling league, the start of luminaria at Christmas, an ecology committee and the formation of tennis families. A salad luncheon and white elephant auction were held every January and an Easter Egg Hunt and Newcomers Coffee events every year.

By the mid-seventies the men’s club had long been disbanded and men started joining the women’s club, leaving membership open to any resident over the age of 18. The name was then changed to the Crescent Hills Civic Association (CHCA).

The annual plant sale was added in the late seventies, which proved to be a major fundraiser. During the next twenty years activities remained unchanged except for the addition of a neighborhood wide yard sale which proved to be popular.

In 1984 a sidewalk along Frankstown Road between Glenfield and Spring Grove was finally built. The Association had tried to get it installed since 1957.

An anti-litter committee was formed in 2005. CHCA adopted portions of the three major state highways that bound our community: Frankstown Road, Saltsburg Road and Lime Hollow Road. Saltsburg was later dropped. Litter pick up volunteers meet four times a year to keep our community clean.

In the current decade several of the social activities were discontinued and the preschool was disbanded long ago. The focus remains on improving the Crescent Hills and greater Penn Hills community. Effort is given to weighing in on municipality-wide issues and the enforcement of zoning laws and codes.

CHCA publishes a newsletter about four times a year and this neighborhood directory which is distributed to all members and new residents. Volunteers distribute the newsletters door to door, paint and maintain the three bus shelters in our neighborhood, plant flowers at the street corners, maintain the park and raise funds to support all those amenities.

The Memorial Day Picnic and Martin Luther King Day salad luncheon remain our two biggest social events. Much effort is also given to cleaning and maintaining our park where concerts, movies and carnivals are held. In recent years we have had a Storytime in the Park one day a week in the summer for kids and group playtime with some light snacks and arts and crafts.

We hope you will join us, if you haven’t already, in better getting to know your neighbors and become part of the history that makes Crescent Hills a great place to live!