37th Street

37th Street
Neighborhood	Lower Lawrenceville
Origin of name	Sequential numbering up the Allegheny River
➤ Dravo Street (until 1868)
Portion	North of Butler Street
Origin of name	Peter Dravo
➤ Prospect Street (until 1868 or 1881)
Portion	Between Butler Street and Penn Avenue
➤ John Street (until 1881)
Portion	South of Penn Avenue

The original names of 37th Street were Dravo Street north of Butler Street, Prospect Street between Butler Street and Penn Avenue, and John Street south of Penn.

Dravo Street was named for Peter Dravo, whose heirs laid out a surrounding plan of lots in 1851. The Dravo mansion was on this street; the 1852 map of R. E. McGowin labels it "Mrs. Dravo," i.e., Peter's widow.

Bruce S. Cridlebaugh says that the original name of 37th Street was Lawrence Alley, named for "John Lawrence, naval commander." Unfortunately there seem to be two errors here: the famous naval commander was James Lawrence (1781–1813), after whom Lawrenceville is named; and Lawrence Alley was modern Ater Way, between 37th Street and 38th Street.

In 1868, Pittsburgh's modern sequence of numbered streets was created by renaming all the streets perpendicular to the Allegheny River; Dravo Street became 37th Street, though Prospect Street was not mentioned by the renaming ordinance. Prospect Street was labeled 37th Street in the 1872 Hopkins atlas, but it reverted to Prospect Street in the 1882 edition and was labeled "(Prospect) 37th St." in the 1890 edition. An 1881 ordinance establishing the names of all streets in Pittsburgh listed "Thirty-seventh street, from Neville street to Allegheny Valley Railroad, formerly part John street, Fifteenth and Sixteenth wards," which clearly renamed John Street and included the old Prospect Street too.

See also

• John Street, for other streets that have had that name
• Prospect Street
• West Prospect Avenue