I took a little walk this morning in Pittsburgh, two miles, tracing the steps Jack Kerouac took about three-quarters of a century ago. I tried to find a few illustrations of the landmarks contemporary to his visit.
The author of On the Road (1957) spent little time in Pittsburgh, always passing through, but he noted one brief visit in Visions of Cody (written 1961/62; pub. posthumously 1972).
ON THE ROAD, HARRISBURG, PA —4 A.M., just took jog in cold narrow street—bus to Frisco—all closed in New York—thinking—fast bus—Pittsburgh—Jogged across my bridge—sternwheelers of old used as tugs pushing barges in freezing Ohio River—same that will transfer its waters to the warmth of New Orleans—long lines of freights snaking along cliffbottoms—ancient blackstone monument of some kind— I ran to P. & L. E. R. R. waiting room so ornate and dignified …
… I no go in with dungarees blackjacket—new visions of Pittsburgh, old orange trolleys—skyscraper Ward Morehouse office buildings rising in the joyous winter morning—boys in a parking lot plotting jazz—
I walked from the bus station (new building, same location) to the former Pittsburgh & Lake Erie Railroad1 station, taking the route Kerouac likely took: Liberty Avenue to Smithfield Street and across the Smithfield Street Bridge, a lenticular bridge built in 1883.
Kerouac referenced the Ohio River but the bridge crosses the Monongahela River which meets the Allegheny River a few hundred yards west to form the head of the Ohio. Standing on the bridge facing west he could easily see the confluence.
The railroad station (built in 1898) waiting room, now a restaurant, remains as grand as Kerouac’s impression.
Today, freights continue to “snake along cliffbottoms” at the base of Mt. Washington—the station standing between the cliff and the river. The “ancient blackstone monument”? It’s a mystery.
Next author-walk? I’ll be tracing John O’Hara’s steps from his room on the 12th floor of Pittsburgh’s historic William Penn Hotel to the 14th floor of the Investment Building, the former offices of the Bulletin Index magazine where O’Hara worked during the wild summer of 1933.
Kerouac either thought the “L” stood for Lackawanna or Lehigh, or it simply reminded him of those other railroads, as he makes a reference to both in the same paragraph.