Learning to Fly, Again: Pittsburgh Ballet’s “Peter Pan” Makes Children of Us All

Marcel Proust may have needed a sip of lime-flower tea imbued with madeleine crumbs to trigger the memory of his idyllic childhood, but I found myself just as deliciously transported back to my six-year-old psyche as I watched Pittsburgh Ballet Theater’s magical production of “Peter Pan” in the Benedum Center last week.  Had this performance …

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How Literacy Pittsburgh is Helping to Grow Population and a More Vibrant Economy

This story is part of “The New Americans” series, a project of Pittsburgh Tomorrow. When Mhra Moe arrived in Pittsburgh with her husband and baby daughter as refugees from Myanmar in 2014, she was fluent in Mon and Burmese, but the volunteer teacher knew little English. Despite the trauma of having to flee the only …

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Pittsburgh’s Future as a Climate Haven

If you walked the streets of Pittsburgh’s Strip District in 1924 at noon, you may have needed a lamp to cut through the thick air pollution of the city once described as “hell with the lid off.” With air twice as polluted as bad air days in modern Beijing, Pittsburgh represented the worst of the …

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Glendale Lake

Glendale Lake Summer neck deep on my birthdaydrowning has always been too easyno lifeguard on dutycold currents from the depthsstirred up by distant motorboatscan feel every inch of skinunderneath my clothesfor the next three days Autumn past-peak color on the hillsidesdogs rooting through leaveshoping to surprise a chipmunkthe promise of wintercould separate usfrom our sacred …

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The Art of Compromise

Q. You’ve been a leader in the Pittsburgh community for decades, serving as president of the Mt. Lebanon School Board, managing partner of Pittsburgh’s oldest and most prestigious law firm — Reed Smith, president of the Allegheny County Bar Association and the Academy of Trial Lawyers, board member of several nonprofits and through your private …

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A Tiny Airborne Hunter

You might remember an owl on a Pennsylvania license plate from the 1990s. It was one of those plates for which you pay a little extra to support conservation efforts, featuring an owl with bright yellow eyes, an intense little bird with a bit of a scowl that said, “Who are you looking at?” This …

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College Town Pittsburgh Part 6

Editor’s note: We thank the top leaders of this region’s universities for penning a response to the following question: Given continuing enrollment declines and our civic need to attract and keep young people, is it desirable to significantly build on fledgling programs to get students off campus and engage them in this region’s amenities, thus building …

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Vanishing Point

Vanishing Point Wind kicks sand, a mist of saltwater layers my skin.I am on Hatteras island, the Atlantic on one side, Pamlico sound on the other. My feet unsteady as waves roll in, shift ground beneath me.I walk and walk, stop to gather a few intact shells, ocher and cream, maroon and gray,what were once …

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A Pittsburgher’s Plan to Get America Back on Track

Editor’s note: Over the past 15 years, when Pittsburghers including Dan Onorato and John Fetterman have run for statewide or national office, Pittsburgh Quarterly has given them the opportunity to share their views. In this issue, U.S. Senate candidate and Pittsburgher David McCormick writes about why he’s running. I’ve always been proud to call Pittsburgh …

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The Fall 2024 issue:

Lessons from Last Place

Sailing is a big part of the culture in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, where I’ve spent 63 straight summers. And some might say that from an early age, I earned the dubious distinction of being a kind of “Jonah” of sailboat races. I’ve never seen myself as that ill-fated shipmate of yore, but the case could …

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The Wonders of Iceland

When you check into the luxurious Silica Hotel at Iceland’s famous Blue Lagoon, the receptionist mentions the possibility that the nearby volcano might erupt. The resort is built on lava fields that date back to the 1200s, but there are miles of fresh lava that stretch endlessly on either side of the highway in this …

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College Town Pittsburgh

Editor’s note: We thank the top leaders of this region’s universities for penning a response to the following question: Given continuing enrollment declines and our civic need to attract and keep young people, is it desirable to significantly build on fledgling programs to get students off campus and engage them in this region’s amenities, thus …

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Tryon-Weber Woods

There’s a great place to go for an autumn road trip where you can take a deep-forest hike and feel the awe of old forest trees. About 90 miles north of Pittsburgh in western Crawford County, the 100-acre Tryon-Weber Woods area originally was protected by the Western Pennsylvania Conservancy in 1976 and enlarged in 2017. …

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Sailing at the Point

It’s a brisk early-June Saturday morning on the North Shore just downriver from the Point. A light breeze is moving in from the west on the Allegheny River. Almost a dozen high school girls and boys from several Pittsburgh and suburban schools gather at an under-used concrete riverfront amphitheater, jabbering away while looping their arms …

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Conway, Buford, Oshry, Morby, Moriarity, O’Reilly, Nutting, Ochester, Eberle, Courtney

Tom Conway, 71 International president of United Steelworkers since 2019, Conway was committed to making things in America and remained unwilling to accept that globalization was better. He tried to make changes in manufacturing that would lead to a cleaner environment and worker health and safety. A legendary negotiator who believed in the union ideal of “stronger …

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Speaking of Drinks…

Tiki two As I mentioned, I came of legal drinking age at a time when you could only get tiki drinks at Chinese restaurants. The pioneering Don The Beachcomber was no more, and as far as I knew all the Trader Vic’s had closed, except for a few locations abroad. Previously in this series: The …

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Spring Blooming Plants Blooming in Fall

It’s the holiday season and my rural Pennsylvania town is bursting with the signs of Christmas: wreaths hung on doors, trees strung with colorful lights, a creche erected in the town square — and spring-flowering plants in bloom.  My forsythia is blooming a bright yellow. White lilac flowers are just dying back. Pink magnolia buds …

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Charitable Giving: Why Does it Matter?

Editor’s note: In this season of giving, we asked some of the region’s nonprofit leaders to answer a simple question: Why is charitable giving so important in our society?  Part II Laura Kelly. Brothers BrotherCharitable giving builds a foundation for a better future by promoting understanding, kindness, and collective efforts towards positive change. When members …

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The Tiki Phenomenon

I had the great misfortune to reach legal drinking age just as the tiki drink phenomenon was turning into a parody of itself. Formerly terrific drinks such as the Zombie, the Scorpion and the Rum Runner were now available only in Chinese restaurants and they all tasted exactly alike, being made by then out of …

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