In 1902, the Standard Steel Car Company opened its factory in Butler, right on top of the old fair grounds and the surrounding meadows. The Butler plant would one day set the record for the highest production of steel rail road cars in the United…

Though the rest of the city has grown up around it, the Historic Lafayette Apartments building was Butler’s first skyscraper, originally the Butler County National Bank. Its facade is constructed in the French Renaissance Revival style, and the sign…

Today the Penn Cinemas is an abandoned building, a ruin that calls back to the time of bright marquee signs and silver screens. The Paramount Theater's Service Corp., based out of Altoona, constructed Penn Cinemas in 1938. James E. Casale designed…

Over a hundred years ago, World War I began with the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand. The Great War was the end of an era and the beginning of another. The years after the war would see the rise of the Jazz Age, Women’s suffrage,…

On October 16, 1937, Slippery Rock University's North Hall caught fire and burned to the ground, all because of one unfortunate ox. October of 1937 was a big month for Slippery Rock. As of October 6th, six thousand letters had been sent out to…

Just off of South Eberhart Road in Butler Township is an eighty-eight acre English garden, unchanged since 1959: Preston Park. The park was originally created, cultivated, and finally given to Butler by Frank and Jane Preston, a couple who left…