History & local legend
The Lawrenceville branch of Pittsburgh’s Carnegie Library was built in 1898 on part of the former Washington Burial Ground. During construction, workers uncovered a broken gravestone and stored it in the library basement. The fragment eventually became a public reminder of the cemetery beneath the neighborhood’s later buildings.
Historian Alan Becer identified the inscription as belonging to Henry Snowden, who died in December 1830 at fifteen months old. Henry’s family had moved his remains to another cemetery, leaving the damaged marker behind. By the time writer Jeff Belanger visited in December 2002, staff had brought the stone upstairs for display.
Belanger also heard a separate ghost story from a local investigator: patrons were said to have seen a child walking the library’s hallways in the evening. The investigator did not identify the child.
