Articles Archive - Page 107 of 155 - Pittsburgh Quarterly

We’re all trying to figure out the implications of the somewhat surprising news that UK voters decided by a comfortable majority to leave the European Union. No matter what side you identified with in this grand referendum, it’s always invigorating when democracy’s voices speak. With a record high voter turn out – over 70% of …

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Creative Capital

Getting Rich in a Poor Market, Part II

by Greg Curtis

If we are, in fact, facing a prolonged period of subpar returns in both stocks and bonds, as seems likely, there are almost limitless ways this future could play out. We might, for example, simply experience long years of generally positive – but low – returns, interspersed with down years. At the end of the …

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Events

Pittsburgh Quarterly Turns 10

by PQ Staff

In early June, Pittsburgh Quarterly celebrated its 10th Anniversary with a cocktail reception for nearly 200 contributors, advertisers and friends at the Cultural Trust Cabaret Downtown. Speakers included: Pittsburgh Mayor William Peduto, who said the magazine’s in-depth journalism and particulary its measurement of Pittsburgh’s strengths and weaknesses helps keep the city moving forward; Richard Simmons, …

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Books

Going Back in Time to Ambridge

by Fred Shaw

Growing up in the early ‘80’s as a native-son of a local borough named after a steel-magnate, it’s easy to recall how mill closings affected my hometown. Layoffs were followed by hushed talk of unemployment checks, and later on, businesses shuttered leading to diaspora when folks looked to start fresh elsewhere. In a swath of …

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Business

The City Should Welcome Shell to Downtown Pittsburgh

by Paul Scripko

In the current issue of Pittsburgh Quarterly, Publisher Doug Heuck notes the collaborative work of Pittsburgh civic leaders in helping Pittsburgh’s economic rebirth. The recent announcement that Shell is now committed to building an ethane “cracker” plant in Beaver County is an opportunity to increase that collaboration. The natural gas in the region has a …

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PQ Poem

I Knew I Wasn’t Poor

by Jan Beatty

I knew I wasn’t poor, because I had a choice: buy tampons or birth control pills. I shoplifted. When I opened the oven door, splitting the closet-sized kitchen in half, my only plan was heat. The ice smooth on the inside of the windows, the no money to pay the bill. I knew I wasn’t …

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Creative Capital

Getting Rich In a Poor Market

by Greg Curtis

Virtually every thoughtful observer of the stock and bond markets has concluded that investment returns in the future are likely to be well below recent returns and even well below long-term norms. This situation is reminiscent of the late 1990s. In 1999, following an almost uninterrupted 17-year bull market, investors on average expected future stock …

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Nonprofits

“It’s Bitcoin for Volunteers”

by Margaret J. Krauss

Dan Little has wanted to build the infrastructure of the future for a long time. So while he enrolled at Carnegie Mellon University to study architecture, he switched to civil engineering. “The recession happened and Obama got elected and there were all these promises about infrastructure. I thought, ‘It sounds like civil engineering is going …

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American Spirit

Offering a Way Out

by Kate Benz, photography by John Altdorfer

There are about two dozen men—black, white, young, old—gathered in a well-lit commercial space that occupies 704 Main Street, Sharpsburg. In the front window is a white cross with an orange life preserver draped over it that reads Jesus Saves Lives. Anchored against the interior wall, in front of floor-to-ceiling mirrors hangs a wooden cross—about …

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Creative Capital

Why Are We So Afraid of Democracy? Part III

by Greg Curtis

I’m arguing that there are three main reasons why our faith in democracy has taken a hit in recent years. The first reason is the deadlock in Congress that has everybody so frustrated. But as I pointed out, this isn’t a US phenomenon, it’s a global phenomenon. And it’s persisted not because Congresspersons are idiots …

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Business

Problem in Pittsburgh?

by Paul Scripko

Pittsburgh’s unemployment rate, reported for the latest available month, April 2016, bumped up for the third month in a row to 5.8%. On the surface this is a disturbing figure given that most cities in our cohort group are experiencing falling unemployment rates. The unemployment rate in Charlotte is now down for the third consecutive …

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Opinion

Mark

by David Macpherson

About 10 years ago, a six-inch bust appeared suddenly on top of a retaining wall in my back yard in Highland Park. How it got there was a mystery. Left by someone moving from the area? An abandoned kid’s toy? Or…something magical? The bust was creamy white and from a distance seemed likely a noble …

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Business

Should We Go Fishing for PayPal?

by Paul Scripko

Recently PayPal announced the cancellation of a planned operations center in North Carolina resulting from the passage of North Carolina HB2 (the “bathroom” bill). The reasons a company chooses a particular location to establish a facility are complex, but I believe Pittsburgh offers practically everything that was to be found near Charlotte. I would like …

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Health

Room Service in Wonderland

by Jennifer Papale Rignani

The view from up here is majestic. The smudged, working class neighborhood of my youth has grown up to be a gentrified village whose renovated rooftops peer out of a sanitary blanket of January snow. I can almost hear the bustle of the hipsters and their Uber apps, heading out to work in the city. …

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Creative Capital

Why Are We So Afraid of Democracy? Part II

by Greg Curtis

Profound disagreements among the voting public have led, as noted in my last post, to profound disagreements in Congress. This has, naturally enough, led in its turn to a substantial decline in collegiality, willingness to compromise, and even civility in that not-so-august body. It’s hardly an exaggeration to say that Congress has accomplished hardly anything …

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Opinion

Giant Eagle Misadventures

by Elizabeth Wiethorn

I appear to be a fully functioning, generally normal human being. I have friends, a family, a job, and some interesting hobbies. No felonies, no spectacular talents, no debilitating weaknesses, either. Just your basic person. But as the old song goes, “Everybody plays the fool, sometimes…” My time was not long ago, at the Market …

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Opinion

Thank You for 10 Great Years

by Douglas Heuck

It was a cold January day 10 years ago when I got the call that the truck with our first issue of the magazine was stuck on a small South Side street. When I found the driver, his truck was snared in an impossible turn, stopping traffic. On the sidewalk at my feet was a …

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Arrivals

Rogers, Hundorfean, da Silva, Finegold, Clouser, Dermody, Bartlett

by PQ Staff

Susan Rogers is vice chancellor for communications at the University of Pittsburgh. She comes to Pittsburgh from Dallas, where she was vice president for university advancement at The University of Texas at Dallas. Previously, she was associate vice chancellor for university relations in the office of advancement at the University of Arkansas and director of …

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Birds

Season of the Killdeer

by David Liebmann

One early summer day, I was walking the paved loops of Hartwood Acres in the North Hills. Off in the distance, a band was doing a sound check on the stage and bass notes were booming through the trees. As I headed west toward Middle Road, I passed some extended patches of gravel. It was …

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Opinion

Cleaner Air for Pittsburgh and More

by PQ Staff

When a Detroit company announced earlier this year that it would close its Shenango Coke Works on Neville Island, the news accounts led with the loss of 173 jobs. While we don’t cheer job losses in Pittsburgh, there is another, more important side to this story. Shenango was the smaller of the two coke works …

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Books

A Window Into the Marcellus

by John Allison

“Heat and Light,” the latest novel from western Pennsylvania native Jennifer Haigh, has tandem virtues. It possesses not only the urgent feel of a story “ripped from the headlines,” as they say, but also the grace and insight of American literary fiction for the ages. The Marcellus Shale boom in Pennsylvania has been examined at …

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History

Exploring the Maridon

by Barbara Eichenlaub

Most people do not associate Asian art with Butler, Pa. However, the only museum dedicated to ancient and contemporary Chinese and Japanese art and culture in western Pennsylvania is tucked away on a residential street in this city of around 14,000 — epitomizing the concept of “hidden gem.” The Maridon Museum is home to the …

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