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THIS WIKI WILL SOON BE MOVED OVER TO AN UPDATED WIKI PLATFORM. The Carrick-Overbrook Historical Society has been disbanded. Make way for "The Carrick Her-Story Society" More updates to follow soon.

Rest in Peace John Rudiak. We appreciate all you have done for the Carrick community.

Important Notice

• Questions or inquiries can be directed to carrickhistory@gmail.com

• If you are new to the Carrick Overbrook History web site and wish to be a contributor, as a courtesy please contact carrickhistory@gmail.com. We would like to meet with you to discuss our website and instruct you on how to contribute photos, files or information.

• Thank you for your interest and contributions to our website and Carrick Overbrook history.

• Use this link for calculating the worth of some amount of money then and now....Click Here

• The 2018 Carrick-Overbrook Historical Society calendar on sale beginning November 1, 2017. The Carrick Library is closed. Calendars may be purchased at the Carrick Blockwatch, Carrick Community Council Meetings $8.50. Purchase includes membership to the society and entrance to the Sen. John Heinz History Center for up to 4 people PER VISIT.

Feel free to browse the information here!

• We are constantly in the process of setting up the Wiki (in terms of look and feel and overall navigation).

Pittsburgh Celebrates 250 years of History

• As Pittsburgh celebrates 250 years of history it is also Carrick's and Overbrook's history as well. Listen and view our history here with a Happy Birthday Pittsburgh song by Mike Stout

Pittsburgh House Histories

• For the link on Facebook Pittsburgh House Histories click here

== Pittsburgh's Inclines ==

• Compilation of inclines click here

• Pittsburgh Post-Gazette Blog compilation of 22 Pittsburgh inclines click here

WELCOME TO CARRICK

Carrick is located on the southeastern edge of the City of Pittsburgh with Brownsville Road serving as the main commercial thoroughfare and the backbone of the community. In 1853, Dr. John H. O’Brien received permission from the U. S. Postal Service to establish a post office in the area; for his hard work he was given the honor of naming it, and he chose “Carrick” after his home town, Carrick-on-Suir, Ireland. Carrick became a Borough in 1904 and in 1926 voted to become part of the City of Pittsburgh. In 1927 it officially became known as the 29th Ward. Located between the suburbs of the South Hills and downtown, Carrick is well-served by public transportation. Once home to prominent mansions and wealthy families, the neighborhood currently has an affordable, solid housing stock and remains family-oriented. The Carrick section of Brownsville Road is approximately 2.2 miles long; it is generally comprised of three discrete business districts with residential areas in between.

Carrick prides itself as having two fine elementary schools, Concord Elementary School and Roosevelt Elementary School as well as Carrick High School. Along with well-kept modest and large grand homes, the neighborhood boasts of numerous parklet playgrounds, the Carnegie Library of Carrick, historic Phillips Park (comprised of walking paths, a disc golf course, a recreation center and swimming pool) and Volunteers Field (comprised of an expertly maintained baseball only field and a multipurpose athletic field.) Carrick includes many places of worship, including Catholic, Protestant, Evangelical, Jehovah Witness, Lutheran and Catholic Orthodox.

In 1997, Carrick was named the first “Cool Community” in the northern United States by the U.S. Department of Energy. “Cool Community” is a national recognition program for strategic tree planting for energy conservation purposes. Partnering with conservation organizations, community groups worked to weatherize homes and businesses, plant trees and flowers, and add elements of “green building” to the renovation of Carrick High School.

WELCOME TO OVERBROOK

Originally called Fairhaven, the name was changed to Overbrook when breaking away from Baldwin Township to become a borough. Overbrook is located at the edge of the city, south of Downtown, and is surrounded by the city neighborhoods Brookline and Carrick and the boroughs of Castle Shannon and Whitehall. Historically Overbrook Borough was one of the last annexed into the City of Pittsburgh. The historic Overbrook Community Center retains its borough origins and is still used by the community.

Overbrook is convenient to both Phillips and Brookline Parks, as well the Brownsville Road and Brookline Boulevard business districts. It is an easy trip on the South Busway to Downtown, Station Square, and Century III and South Hills Village Malls with a light rail and busway stations.

Overbrook residents maintain solid, family homes on quiet, tree-lined streets. Housing is very affordable for moderate income buyers, and the variety of architectural styles means that there's something for every taste.

Overbrook has experienced an influx of young families with children in recent years. The Overbrook Center and ballfield provide recreation for youth. These families have discovered a friendly neighborhood of 4,400 people, with good schools, lots of green space and neighbors who care about each other and their community.

Welcome to our community.

Historical society gives voice to lives of regular folks

July 5, 2014 12:10 AM

By Diana Nelson Jones / Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

Paul "Moke" Goettler was a grunt in the infantry during World War II and says he probably survived several close calls because he was so skinny. Honorably discharged, he returned to Carrick in November 1945, a 21-year-old who would go on to work hard for little money and raise six children in a three-bedroom house with a wife he has outlived for eight years.

He turned 90 Wednesday, still skinny, with a booming voice, keen eyesight and savant-like memory. Now his story is preserved for posterity, the first oral history of the Carrick-Overbrook Historical Society.

John Rudiak, a founder of the society, initiated the project to preserve something of the lives of people who remain grunts through life, who work hard, collectively carry the bulk of the load and don't have famous pall bearers.

Oral history project: John Rudiak interviews Paul Goettler

John Rudiak interviews Paul Goettler to initiate the Carrick-Overbrook Historical Society's oral history project, with video by Chuck Christ. The society will begin outreach to add to its oral history archive. (7/5/2014)

Videographer Chuck Christ, owner of Memory Maker, a video and editing business, is donating his time to the project. .

Mr. Goettler warns that he is "a talking machine" before launching stories with details that are unique but strike a tone of universality.

No one knows him as Paul, he said. When he was 2, his father was looking for his cigarettes, and little Paul ran in with one of them dangling from his mouth. "I said, 'Me moke, me moke.' I'‍ve been Moke ever since."

Mr. Goettler got his first job while in high school, delivering telegrams for Western Union.

"I made $13.60 a week, and my mother got $10" to support her and his stepfather, who had been hit by a car and disabled.

His father had died when the boy was 7. People would go "wildcatting," scratching coal from seams they found, and his father was endeavoring to do that when a shaft caved in on him, burying him alive.

"I don't know why he was digging coal," Mr. Goettler said. "He was a rolling engineer for J&L making $90 a week. That was good money then."

At 18, Mr. Goettler got a job with Oliver Iron and Steel on the South Side then joined the Army a year later. He served in the 88th Infantry Division, the Blue Devils, in Italy.

He brings out memorabilia that fill his dining room table.

"There were two of us from Pittsburgh," he said of his platoon, fingering images on a group photograph. "They called us the Pittsburgh kids, me and Henry Golembiewski of Polish Hill. That'‍s him, and there I am.

"Nobody remembers what happened two days before D-Day, but that was the day we took Rome," he said. "I was in Company C. We had the Germans on the run. I had some close calls, but I won't go into it. I had an angel on my shoulder."

At the end of the war, his company was in northern Italy when they heard people yelling, "La guerra e finita! We looked at each other and said, '‍I guess it'‍s over.'‍ Just like that."

He wasn't home long before a friend named Claire invited him to a corn roast, noting several girls would be there.

"I just looked at one," he said, Marie Lorraine Simon. "Claire asked if I would take [Marie] home afterward, but I didn'‍t have a car so my friend Jimmy drove us. I asked her, '‍Do you go with anyone?'‍ and she said, '‍I'‍m engaged to a sailor.'

"On the way we had a flat tire. Her mother waited up to see all of her kids get home. I met her mother at 1 o'‍clock in the morning. The next day, she called me and said, '‍My mother likes you.' ‍"

He took two streetcars and walked a half mile up a hill to visit Marie, who lived in Elliott. When the sailor came home, Marie returned his ring.

"She said, '‍Hey, Moke, let's get married.' We had nothing. She had a regular pink dress, and I had a regular suit, and I spent $27 for our wedding bands, but we lasted 60 years. I'‍ll be in this house 63 years in November."

He worked in the bottling house at the Duquesne Brewing Co. until the company was dissolved in 1972. Anxious with children to feed, he applied at 50 places, and a supervisor from his previous job called him to work at Iron City Brewery, where he retireed in 1987.

All six of his children live in greater Pittsburgh. Marie died of congestive heart failure and requested that she be cremated. Her ashes are in an urn he plans to have placed in his casket when he dies.

Most everyone dies without sustained remembrance, but the historical society will give more elders in Carrick and Overbrook a chance for the stories of their lives to live on.

"All those stories could vanish," Mr. Rudiak said, "yet the achievements of regular people are so important to our city."

Diana Nelson Jones: djones@post-gazette.com or 412-263-1626. Read her blog City Walkabout at www.post-gazette.com/citywalk.