The model of Fort Pitt at the Fort Pitt Museum is an original museum fixture dating to the 1960s. The museum commissioned the local Pittsburgh business Holiday Displays to create the model of the fort at a scale of 10 feet to one inch. Introducing visitors to the fort in 1765, the model rests in the museum’s first floor William Pitt Memorial Hall and is a primary point of interest for any visitor.
Like all exhibits at the Fort Pitt Museum, the model requires routine cleaning. First, a staff member removes all mobile pieces – such as barges and docks that reside on the rivers – then a quick sweep with a dust mop takes care of the rivers’ painted, flat surfaces. Cleaning the land and the fort, however, involve a more delicate and tedious process.
Small vacuum attachments remove a year’s worth of dust from the grounds in the model of Fort Pitt. See how the grass, dirt roads, and gardens brighten up after a thorough brush with the miniature tools!
Click on the photos in the photo galleries below to see them larger.
Care must be taken when navigating across the model and all of its tiny figures, homes, trees, and gardens.
A staff member then uses damp Q-Tips to lift dust from the rooftops and drawbridges as well as the tiny soldiers and livestock. All of this meticulous work revitalizes the model’s color for Fort Pitt Museum visitors.
Jaclyn Sternick is a customer service associate at the Fort Pitt Museum.
I have fond memories of coming to the Fort Pitt Museum as a young boy. The models and dioramas were my favorite part of the exhibit. Sadly it seems very few of these are on display. Whatever became of those not on display?
Thank you for your question, Gary.
Holiday Displays, a Yoest family company based in Pittsburgh’s South Side, made the dioramas you are referring to for the Fort Pitt Museum’s original exhibits. After two floods forced the museum to close its doors in the 70s and 90s, a second floor was added to the museum. At that time, the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission operated the site, and some of the dioramas were removed from the exhibits.
Today, the Fort Pitt Museum has four dioramas by Holiday Displays, and is operated by the Senator John Heinz History Center.
One of my ancestors was at Ft. Pitt (I have a digitized copy of him on the Day Report of Capt. Sullivan of the 13th Virginia of March 17, 1778,); James A. Colvin is listed as “sick, absent from duty,” on that roll. Where at Ft. Pitt was the infirmary? Was there an infirmary?
Kind regards,
A.