Wilkes-Barre, PA South Tour (9/22/2020)

Tuesday, September 22, 2020

After checking out of the Fairfield Inn & Suites, with prepackaged breakfast buns, we first crossed the Susquehanna River to Wyoming, PA.

Roadside America: Queen Esther's Bloody Rock where the
legend is that Esther Montour, angered by her son's death at the
Battle of Wyoming, lined up 14-16 American colonist
prisoners and smashed their skulls with a tomahawk

Wyoming Monument stands over the remains
of those who died on July 3, 1778 at the Battle
of Wyoming or the Wyoming Massacre

The Iroquois/Seneca remained loyal to England during the American Revolution and laid in ambush when British troops in the Wyoming River valley met a line of patriot soldiers. The Seneca then attacked in close combat, and it is said they later hunted down survivors to torture and kill them.

The monument lists all those who were slain,
as well as those who survived; as most able-bodied
men had left the area to fight the war, the
defending patriots were mostly the youth and elderly

Wilkes-Barre, PA has quite an extensive walking tour. We started at Public Square that is actually situated like a diamond!

F M Kirby Center for the Performing Arts
(1937, by Charles A Ryan as Comerford Theater
in Art Deco-Moderne style) is named for
Fred Kirby, founder of a 5- and 10-cent store that
rivaled, then merged with F W Woolworth & Company

Luzerne Bank Building (1928-1930, by Bertram
Cunyngham  in Neo-Romanesque style) is the
tallest building in the Wyoming Valley

First National Bank (1906, by Albert H Kipp
in Neoclassical Revival style)

Public Square The Flood Beast (1977, by Peter Bohlin) (KSS)

No Place Like Home (1977, by Jan Conway)

Congressman Daniel J Flood Memorial

Congressman Flood served in the United States House of Representatives for 31 years, but had to resign due to a bribery conviction. Beloved by his constituents, he played "a key role in establishing national programs such as Medicare, Appalachian urban economic development, and Coal Mine Health and Safety Act. He promoted the strength of US military forces and proliferation of nuclear arms during the Cold War."

Wilkes-Barre Monument for the namesakes of
the city, John Wilkes and Isaac Barré, members
of British Parliament who were sympathetic
to the cause of American Independence

Plaques in Public Square make note of various "firsts," and
includes Wilkes-Barre as the Birthplace of HBO in 1972 (KSS)

Old Ship Zion Church bell (1811) was the
first known church bell in Luzerne County
and is now displayed in the location
of the original church bell tower

Christopher Columbus Memorial (1992) is
all cleaned up after being vandalized in June;
there has been talk of renaming the statue after
Amerigo Vespucci (since all Italians look alike?)

Chamber Building (1895, by P J Lauritzen for a department store)

PNC Building (1908, by McCormick & French)

Citizen's Bank Center (1911, by Daniel Burnham)

Wyoming National Bank (1914, by McCormick & French)

Hotel Sterling (1897) is totally missing!

Market Street Bridge (1929, by Carrere & Hastings)

Guard Center (1909, by Welsh, Sturdevant & Poggi
for the Lehigh and Wilkes-Barre Coal Company,
in Neoclassical Revival style)

Guard Center lamp post (KSS)

Chapman Hall (1911, by Welsh, Sturdevant & Poggi, as a
residence for coal baron Frederick Huber, in Craftsman style

McClintock Law Offices (1840s, in Italianate style)

McClintock Hall (1941, remodeled in 1863
by Calvert Vaux and F C Withers to become the
first High Victorian Gothic house in Wilkes-Barre)

Sterling Hall (1860, by Samuel Sloan for banker
Walter Sterling, in Italianate style)

All the mansions that are now "Halls" belong to Wilkes University (1933).

Rifkin Hall (1875, by Bruce Price in High Victorian Gothic
style) was once the home of Colonel Robert B Ricketts,
a hero from the Battle of Gettysburg

Catlin Hall (1843, in Greek Revival style)

Weiss Hall (1850 in Greek Revival style, remodeled in 1866
by Albert H Kipp in Queen Anne style)

River Common along the Susquehanna River (KSS)

Conyngham Hall (1897, by Charles Gifford in Chateauesque style)

Chase Hall (1917-1918 in Tudor Revival style)

Kirby Hall (1872, by F C Withers) was purchased
by F M Kirby of Woolworth & Company) in 1905

Bedford Hall (1878, by Bruce Price in High Victorian Gothic style)

Temple Israel (1925, by Ralph M Herr,
with Byzantine Revival elements)

Congregation Ohav Zedek (1930, by Austin Reilly
in Moorish Revival style) (KSS)

Max Roth Center (1895, by J H W Hawkins)
has H H Richardson-inspired rusticated walls

Max Roth Center also has a Louis Sullivan inspired frieze

Weckesser Hall (1916, by C H P Gilbert in Chateauesque style)

Mary (& George) Stegmaier Mansion (1911, by
Knapp & Bosworth for a descendant of the
Stegmaier brewing family, in Colonial Revival style)

Grand Portico of the Mary Stegmaier Mansion

Luzerne County Medical Society Auditorium (1914, by
Brice Hayden Long, based loosely on Rome's Pantheon)

Later, we had this view of the "Pantheon" from S Main Street

Moses & Gelso Law Offices (1907, by
Olds & Puckey in Beaux Arts style)

First Presbyterian Church (1889, by
James Cleveland Cady in Romanesque style
using Laurel Run redstone)

YMCA (1934, by Thomas Foster in Historical Eclecticism,
modeled after a medieval palace in Florence, Italy)

YMCA doorway (KSS)

Osterhout Free Library (1848, in Gothic Revival style as
the First Presbyterian Church until 1889)

Bishop Memorial Library (c 1875, by Willis Hale
in late Italian Villa style with Queen Anne revisions)

St Stephen's Episcopal Pro-Cathedral (1896,
by Charles M Burns modeled after Gothic
churches of Northern Italy)

Next: Wilkes-Barre North Tour.