Owners and dates of purchase can be traced through the Allegheny County Registrar of Deeds. Deeds are traced backwards from present owner's name. Information on current owners of many existing houses and buildings can be found at the Allegheny County Real Estate Web site. Ownership of property in Pittsburgh can also be traced in real estate plat maps, many of which are available in the Historic Pittsburgh Maps Collection.

You can find out this information by calling our office and giving us the address of the property. Please allow us twenty-four (24) hours to retrieve this information.

Visit your local library. There you will learn about the development of your town and begin to put your building into the framework of local history. Libraries, whether large or small, generally house local history books, documents, and publications including City Directories, a useful tool in learning about previous owners of your building and its prior use. Photographic collections housed at either the library or the museum may provide valuable information.

Please forward as much information as possible to the relevant local cemetery office. A fee is applicable for searching our records.

It's best to start with old maps to see if the house is marked; the earliest Ordinance Survey maps go back to the 1850's and there may also be a tithe map from the 1840's. Earlier maps might exist, but it will take some tacking back. Otherwise, you are reliant on occasional sources such as manorial court rolls, land tax and rates.

You may consult the Adami collection where marriages (c. 1575-1818) are listed by locality. But information to be gleaned from here is limited. We recommend that information regarding post-1863 marriages be acquired from the Public Registry in Valletta. Regarding pre-1863 marriages, one must refer to the parish where the marriage would have been held.

This is our most common request and unfortunately, it would take a full time staff to help with this alone. For this reason, we encourage you to visit our links section on tracking down relatives and history at www.sicilianculture.com/links/roots.htm -- best of luck!

You can also see if the records of that business are maintained in a local archive. Search the Library & Archives at the History Center catalog, read about the holdings at the University of Pittsburgh's Archives Service Center, or search our Historic Pittsburgh Finding Aids Collection for inventories and information about relevant archival collections. The Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh's Pennsylvania Room maintains an extensive clippings file of articles from local newspapers.

The Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh provides a well-documented explanation of the Pittsburgh spelling online. Please visit their How to Spell Pittsburgh page to learn more about why we spell Pittsburgh the way we do.

The Digital Research Library cannot appraise books or antiques. You will need to speak with a reputable antique appraiser, a rare book dealer, or book conservator. There are many cultural heritage institutions or Web sites that specialize in preserving, documenting, or teaching about Pittsburgh's history, industrial past, and genealogy. Many of the following Web sites also provide contact information for research inquiries.

Covenant House, Canada’s largest shelter for homeless youth, offers a second chance to thousands of kids annually. Covenant House Toronto was established in 1982 by a community group led by the late Cardinal Gerald Emmett Carter. Since then we have continued to expand our shelter and services in response to the growing and changing needs of the youth we serve. In 1997, a second Canadian site opened in Vancouver.

The Opera House was built in 1909 by U.S. Martin, who served as Shepherdstown's mayor. Within that same year, it was sold to the Musser family who installed one of the earliest motion picture projectors. The Opera House ran nightly, often showing as many as three different films each week. In 1928 the Opera House became the first motion picture theatre in West Virginia with sound, enabling it to show the newfangled "talkies.

The Lockwood deForest House is locatd at 7 East 10th Street. This well-preserved facade with elaborate wood detailing was designed by Lockwood De Forest, one of the founding members of the Associated Artists, the decorative arts aetelier he co- founded with Louis Comfort Tiffany and Candace Wheeler in 1879.

Pitzhanger Manor-House was once owned and designed by the revered British Architect, Sir John Soane, (1753-1837). Soane bought the house is 1800 and re-designed it over the following four years. From 1804 he used Pitzhanger as his rural retreat, displaying his collection of artefacts and artworks whilst entertaining his famous contemporaries, including the painter Turner.

Yes. As we have already mentioned on this page, historic brick was fired at a lower temperature and is typically softer than modern brick. Construction techniques have changed, but it's still important that the mortar accomodate the historic brick. Due to the prevalence of portland cement mortars (notably the standard Type N), very few masons have worked with traditional lime mortars.

Fullback complements fiberglass and other conventional insulation materials, which are traditionally installed between studs in the walls of new homes. It provides a continuous blanket of insulation around your home and can reduce energy costs compared to the most commonly used underlayments.

Yes, while we don’t normally design buildings primarily for residences, many of them have been used as such. Special considerations need to be given to such areas as insulation and ventilation requirements. Check out our website photo gallery for some really attractive pole building houses!

Response: Yes. We are currently working with local realtors evaluating other locations in the Grambling/Ruston area.

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