How would Pittsburgh be different if we ended up in WV? (Lebanon: mineral rights, neighborhoods)

[Herodotus]

Originally Posted by LIRefugee

A couple things about the Civil War, some of which has been mentioned by others:

1. Virginia with Pittsburgh in it would have had a significantly larger pro-union population at the outset of the civil war. Virginia didn't even secede until after Fort Sumter and there is a chance it might not have seceded if there was a much larger population in the west. Without looking at figures, though, I'm sure the eastern population would have been much larger even if southwestern PA was included in the state.

2. Even if Virginia still did secede, the likelihood of Pittsburgh being lost to the union cause would have been infinitesimal. West Virginia as we know it now was never effectively under Confederate control, so a West Virginia with Pittsburgh included wouldn't have been any different and possibly even more thoroughly wedded to the union. It's likely there would have been a Pittsburgh Convention instead of a Wheeling Convention and the capital may have been eventually moved to Morgantown or something, but I don't think the experience for Pittsburgh would have been all that different otherwise.

This is the point I was trying to make when i said there would be political ramifications to Pittsburgh being in the state. I was talking about Virginia, not West Virginia. The decision to secede would have been much more contentious with Pittsburgh a part of the mix.

[Clint.]

That's interesting...I figured that Pittsburgh and present day WV would still be part of the Union effort, but didn't consider that Pittsburgh might politically counterbalance Richmond on the matter of secession altogether.

[LIRefugee]

Originally Posted by Herodotus

This is the point I was trying to make when i said there would be political ramifications to Pittsburgh being in the state. I was talking about Virginia, not West Virginia. The decision to secede would have been much more contentious with Pittsburgh a part of the mix.

I agree. Also, as went Virginia, so did Robert E. Lee. The Civil War might not have lasted so long has Lee not been at the head of the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia. Though Virginia may also have tried to stay neutral the same way Kentucky did in reality (until the CSA took Columbus).

I'm curious, so I'm going to look up population figures in Virginia and SW Pennsylvania in 1860 to see how things might have swung.

[Katarina Witt]

This post is interesting as an intellectual exercise, but really, how do we know what "would" have happened? And what's all this talk about West Virginia? It wasn't even a state until 1863, halfway through the Civil War. Possibly western VA wouldn't have seceded if the lower counties of PA had been a part of it. WHO KNOWS???

[Craziaskowboi]

If Pittsburgh was part of West Virginia, then everybody in rural West Virginia would hate it and say it'd be better off with Pennsylvania.

By the way, if you think Pittsburghers are insensitive for automatically equating West Virginia with incest, then be grateful you don't live in Cleveland. Some *******s there automatically equate Pittsburgh with incest, so somebody from West Virginia would probably be slandered even more there.

[UKyank]

There may have been no Republican party (or more likely just formed somewhere else)

[jimmyev]

Allegheny City would be Pennsylvania's version of East St Louis. Or Camden.

[LIRefugee]

For those who are interested, here we go.

1860 Populations:
East Virginia
747,136 free, 472,494 slave

West Virginia
358,317 free, 18,371 slave

Woulda-coulda Virginia
295,396

So who knows? Maybe with the extra population coming from the Pittsburgh area, it would have been enough to prevent secession, even if the free population didn't quite equal east Virginia's.

[Clint.]

Originally Posted by Katiana

This post is interesting as an intellectual exercise, but really, how do we know what "would" have happened? And what's all this talk about West Virginia? It wasn't even a state until 1863, halfway through the Civil War. Possibly western VA wouldn't have seceded if the lower counties of PA had been a part of it. WHO KNOWS???

I think it was tacitly acknowledged that WV was borne out of the civil war by a couple posters who referenced Virginia's secession and how Pittsburgh, if it was in Virginia, may have influenced that event, and the consequences for Robert E. Lee, etc. I think someone may have even explicitly stated it formed following the war.

Seems like the consensus is that WV would be more changed if Pittsburgh was part of it (because it would have provided a large urbanized industrial base that was lacking elsewhere in the state, thus generating more wealth) than Pittsburgh would be changed...at least that's my opinion.

Until the modern technology and finance oriented economy developed, and when manufacturing was a primary economic engine, WV was at a distinct advantage because of its terrain and historically sparse population. That's obviously changed now that economic activity is more dependent on knowledge, which is easy to distribute through education, than on activities that didn't have a natural fit in WV because of its geography. Geography is destiny, which was even more true in the past.

Also, Allegheny City would be a preservationist's utopia.

[Herodotus]

Originally Posted by jimmyev

Allegheny City would be Pennsylvania's version of East St Louis. Or Camden.

Not even close. You are underestimating the effect that Philly influences had on Pittsburgh. Everything that flowed here via Philly, would have gone to Allegheny instead. Even without all of that, Allegheny was a substantially bigger, and more important city than either Camden, or E. St. Louis. No way would it have become what those two places are. The Pennsylvania Railroad would have been routed differently as well. Instead of coming through the East Liberty Valley, it likely would have been routed to run along the north bank of the Allegheny. Allegheny would have been very densely built up, as the lay of the land resembles Cincy's basin, which was the most densely populated place in the US outside of Manhattan in the 1870's.