'Hell with the lid taken off': The pictures of bygone Pittsburgh and its residents choking under clouds of thick smog

The pea-souper problem was once so bad that clouds of smoke and pollution would block out the midday sun



Photographs from the 1950s show just how badly the U.S. city suffered before laws on coal burning were introduced




The thick pea-soupers that hung over British cities until the 1950s live on in the memory of those who experienced the life threatening smogs.

But a new collection of photographs featuring Pittsburgh in the 1940s and 1950s show people living in the American industrial city suffered just as badly.

Pollution was once so bad in Pittsburgh that it could block out the midday sun. The scale of the problem is revealed in pictures from the Smoke Control Lantern Slide Collection at the archives of the University of Pittsburgh.

Danger: Crowds of people in Pittsburgh go about their business with a thick smog visibly filling the air and clouding the tops of surrounding buildings

Daylight: The smog in 1950s Pittsburgh was so thick at times that it could block out the midday sun, but for decades people were unaware of the dangers the thick clouds of coal smoke and industrial pollution posed to people's health in the U.S. city

Danger: Clouds of choking pollution once shrouded the skyscrapers of Pittsburgh before authorities took action by banning the burning of coal in the American city

The problem in Pittsburgh had been a long standing one with Victorian-era British novelist and Londoner Anthony Trollope writing that Pittsburgh was 'without exception is the blackest place which I ever saw'.

Despite his grimy review, the lack of alternative fuels in the 19th century made introducing smoke controls difficult. Also lots of people thought that high smoke output was a sign of high productivity and that coal smoke was good for the lungs and helped crops grow.

The photographic collection was put together to highlight the history of the city's smoke control laws which were first passed in 1941, but then delayed by the Second World War leaving residents choking in the fumes for more than a decade longer.

Looming: As cars and pedestrians go about their daily business the thick clouds of smog cut down visibility, leaving the view between the city's tall buildings hidden even during the day