Pittsburgh Promise Inspires Yard Sale Donation

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By Diane Averill

You can find almost anything at the Highland Park Yard Sale — including civic mindedness and a glimpse of real promise. That’s what folks found last September, among the artwork, toys, books and clothing on offer at the Key family home on Jackson Street. This particular sale took in $714, all of which was donated to Pittsburgh Promise in the name of Amber Key, a 2012 graduate of Pittsburgh CAPA (Creative and Performing Arts) and a Promise scholarship recipient. 

Amber Key

Having run track for both Westinghouse and Obama high schools, Amber accepted a track and cross-country scholarship at West Chester University, only to find her energies ignited while working in the university’s communications media projects. She gave up the track scholarship in order to devote more time to her true calling and was able to follow her dream thanks to her Promise scholarship.  

“The Promise gave me options,” Amber said in a recent conversation. ”I’m so grateful to have  graduated without debt.” As the eldest of three children in the family, she was grateful, as well,  that her scholarship allowed some financial breathing room for the education of her younger siblings. 

With her BA in communications studies, Amber entered the workforce selling TV ads and since then has become a producer at WUSA9, a CBS-affiliated TV station in Washington, D. C., where she currently resides.  

When Amber’s parents decided to participate in the COVID-belated Highland Park Yard Sale, she saw it as a multi-pronged opportunity and decided that she would come home to launch her new business, Jackson Street Media, from its eponymous location while using the sale as a platform for giving back to Pittsburgh Promise. On her Facebook page, she encouraged other Promise alumni to visit the yard sale and buy a Jackson Street Media t-shirt or simply make a donation in support of future Promise recipients. 

“A lot of people gave donations without buying anything,” said Marion Key, Amber’s mother.  She estimated that the bulk of the sale proceeds came from donations and t-shirt sales. 

“Amber has a very philanthropic spirit,” Marion said, adding that during the previous summer, her daughter had spearheaded a drive to collect cosmetics and personal hygiene products for distribution to D.C.’s homeless population. It’s a spirit that Amber comes by quite honestly; Marion Key is development director for FAME, Fund for Advancement of Minorities Through Education. 

With a day job as a TV producer and a new side business in website development and marketing plans, Amber Key might seem to be a very busy young woman. But wait. On May 7, she will receive a Master’s degree in Journalism and Digital Storytelling from American University. 

Did somebody say, “promise?”

HPCC Virtual Community Meeting – April 21, 2022 @ 7:00 PM

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The April community meeting will be virtual!  Please join via Zoom for updates from the HPCC and representatives from Zone 5 of the Police Department.  In addition, we will be welcoming John Stephen from the Negley Run Watershed Task Force.

What: April HPCC Community Meeting  

When: April 21, 2022 07:00 PM Eastern Time (US and Canada)

Register: You MUST Register in advance for this meeting by clicking this link. After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the meeting.

Note: You may also receive an invitation via our membership management system.  Please only register once.

Sunday May 1 – Marathon Party & Route Info!

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WHEN: Sunday, May 1, 2022 from 8:30am – 12 Noon

WHERE: The corner of N. Highland Ave & Bryant Street

Come join with your friends and neighbors in Highland Park to cheer on the racers of the 2022 Pittsburgh Marathon as they hit the 20-mile mark passing through Highland Park. Racers will enter from the corner of N. Highland Avenue and Bryant Street and run along Bryant Street to N. Negley Avenue.

Live music provided by neighborhood favorite’s Fusion Illusion all morning in front of Tazza D’oro coffee shop.

Cheering Section Headquarters – Bryant Street Market Parking Lot

·       Sign making supplies and noisemakers will be provided, courtesy of Pittsburgh Three Rivers Marathon

·       Face painter! free face painting will be offered from 9:00am – Noon

·       Free donuts, juice, water and fresh brewed coffee to help kick-start your morning and motivate you to cheer on the racers (while supplies last).


Partnering Businesses Include: Bryant Street Market and Tazza D’oro.  

Sponsored by Dick’s Marathon and the HPCC.

Also, please be aware that in the morning, the marathon route will be closed to traffic.  If you need to get somewhere Sunday morning, plan where you’ll park the night before accordingly.  See map here and below.

Neo-Nazi Flag in Neighborhood

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We’ve recently become aware of an individual flying a a flag that has been used by Neo-Nazi groups as a symbol of hatred, anti-semitism and white supremacy. Hate and symbols of hate have no place in our community. This situation has been reported to the authorities so that they can investigate. Please defer to law enforcement for engaging with the homeowners.  

After an antisemitic incident in the neighborhood last fall, the HPCC hosted a community dialogue led by the 10.27 Healing Partnership. The 10.27 Healing Partnership was created in the aftermath of the Tree of Life shooting to support community members in the aftermath of the attack as well as other victims of hate crimes. We discussed the nature and prevalence of antisemitism and ways neighbors can support one another. For more information on their services and resources, visit 10.27 Healing Partnership‘s website. For information on this particular flag, visit the Anti-Defamation League‘s website. For information on Hitler and Nazism, 10.27 Healing Partnership suggested this short video, Hitler’s Ideology: Race, Land, and Conquest. 

The HPCC is committed to welcoming and supporting all members of and visitors to our neighborhood. Although we are deeply saddened to see this display in our community, we know that it is an anomaly. Our community is filled with kind, generous, and warm-hearted people and we encourage you to support your neighbors in a communal way through solidarity, listening, and dialogue.

Houses, History, N’at: The Negleys and other notable names of Highland Park

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Houses, History, N’at is an occasional series of articles on the topics of, well, houses, history and related subjects. In this article, we’ll continue to draw from the application that resulted in Highland Park’s designation as a Residential Historic District by the National Register of Historic Places. The application was meticulously researched and developed by the late Mike Eversmeyer, a Highland Park resident and architect who worked in both government as the city’s historic preservation planner as well as in private practice. See our first article based on the application which includes an overview of the styles of houses in the neighborhood.

The first 100 years of European settlement in Highland Park had relatively little development of buildings and roads in the neighborhood but the families who put down roots at the time have made a lasting impact, including in the street names we’re all familiar with as well as in some of the most well-known houses in the area. In this post, we’ll describe the history of Highland Park starting with the first European settlers in the 1770s through the 1880s.

The initial wave of home building in the Highland Park neighborhood stretched from around 1860 – 1880, but Alexander Negley became the first permanent European settler 100 years earlier when he purchased 278-acres of land north of Bryant St. His son Jacob married Barbara Winebiddle, the daughter of local landowners, and purchased a 443-acre farm called Heth’s Delight adjacent to his father’s. Jacob and Barbara built a brick house in 1808 at what is now the corner of Stanton and Negley Ave. and Jacob ultimately owned all of the land he bought as well as his father’s property, becoming a prominent resident and building a grist mill, starting a bank and helping to found the East Liberty Presbyterian Church. His daughter Sara married Thomas Mellon, the patriarch of the banking family.

When Jacob died, Barbara divided the land among her children, a move that formed the division between East Liberty and Highland Park. Around this time, a county surveyor, Robert Hilands, laid out the first streets of Highland Park, including Negley Ave. and what was initially called Hiland Ave. but later changed to Highland Ave. in 1890.

Monument to the Negleys in Highland Park.
The plaque on the monument.

The Negleys left their mark in Highland Park and beyond. In addition to being the namesake of Negley Ave., a monument in Highland Park, to the northwest of the super playground, pays tribute to members of the Negley family and other early European settlers who were buried at the site. Other members of the Negley family are buried in a section of nearby Allegheny Cemetery.

Sallie Negley, born in 1852 and died in 1874, was buried alongside other members of the Negley family in Allegheny Cemetery.

Plus, the farmhouse to the southeast of the reservoir that is now a parks building was once a Negley family home. (Just outside of the Highland Park neighborhood in Friendship, a Negley family home recently sold. The listing on Zillow says it was built in 1903 and the photos show that it has been beautifully maintained over the years.)

The year 1872 was a notable one in Highland Park, with the extension of horse-drawn streetcar service from Pittsburgh to East Liberty and the beginning of construction of the reservoir in the park by the city Water Commission. The land purchased for the reservoir later provided the germ of the Highland Park landscape park that was founded in 1889.

During the 1870s and 1880s, large country houses and clusters of smaller suburban dwellings popped up in the neighborhood. The largest houses on substantial lots were scattered along Highland, Stanton and Negley Avenues. While the area feels close to downtown today, at the time it represented an escape to the country by the wealthy away from the crowding and pollution of the city center.

This house is much more modest but built in the same Second Empire style as the King Estate.

The grandest and surely most famous house built during this period is commonly called the King Estate. William Negley originally built a house on the site in 1869 but it was destroyed in a fire and rebuilt in 1880 by Alexander King, a glass manufacturer. The house has been meticulously restored by its current owners and is on the market for a mere $3m. It was featured recently by the New York Times, with additional photos included in the listing on Zillow. The King Estate is built in the Second Empire style and there are just a few others of the same style in the area.

The Italianate style was also popular during this period of home building and there are a few that retain their original appearance.

An Italianate style house in the neighborhood

Stay tuned for our next installment, which will highlight additional development in the 1880s as well as the 1890s.  

This blog post was written by Nancy Gohring, HPCC newsletter editor, and David Hance, president of the Highland Park Community Development Corp.