Dantry, Dunn, Wertz, Gentile, Jannetta, Lee, Campbell

Jay Dantry, 87 Dantry was a leading light of Pittsburgh’s literary scene through his bookstore, Jay’s Bookstall, which he opened in 1959 and ran until it closed in 2008. The eclectic store on Fifth Avenue in Oakland attracted giants from the literary world for readings and signings including Margaret Atwood, E.L Doctorow, Stephen King, John …

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Thinking Green

Allegheny County got rid of desk-side wastebaskets in the County Office Building and Health Department administrative offices last year and, as a result, sent 64 percent less trash to landfills. In its Downtown office tower, Highmark swapped fluorescent lighting for LED, and energy consumed fell by 20 percent on every floor where the lighting was …

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Why Are We So Afraid of Democracy?

Recently I debated Ben Bernanke about Fed policy since the Financial Crisis.(1) But even before the event I already knew how it would go. We’d all be very polite, very thoughtful, very respectful. Otherwise, we might be mistaken for The Donald. Some people would agree with me and some would agree with Ben. But even …

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James Dean

Half of James Dean’s body is under the hood of a ’63 Chevelle that’s missing all of its doors, a portion of his 50 years hanging over navy blue work pants as he twists awkwardly, trying to get the right angle. He’s in the middle of grinding a piece of metal, orange-tipped sparks cascading overhead …

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Negative Interest Rates, Decrees the Queen of Hearts!

Buckle your seat belts. This is going to get weird and metaphysical. My purpose is to turn the prism a little bit and try to make sense of something that I believe makes no sense. This would be a good time to get the children out of the room. Currently, (Bloomberg 3-18-2016), negative interest rates …

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Involuntary Mental Health Commitment

Teenagers and African Americans face the greatest risk of being involuntarily committed to mental health facilities in Allegheny County, a recent study reports. Some 37,750 people were involuntarily committed for mental issues from 2002 through 2013, according to the Allegheny County Department of Human Services (DHS) study. An involuntary commitment occurs when someone is found …

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Cartoons

Expat Paul Scripko Sets the Stage

A few years ago at Southwestern University in Texas I attended a lecture given by Michael Chabon, author of those two love letters to Pittsburgh, “The Mysteries of Pittsburgh” and “Wonder Boys”. At the start of the evening he asked “Who in the audience is from Pittsburgh?” A number of us raised our hands and …

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Home Movies

i. That severe unspoken savor she’d bring with her To the table, family gatherings after grace, Your plate filled, as always, With whatever had passed through her hands— The aunt who’d married wearing weeds, A black-clad Bride of Christ. Mantle, habit, scapular, guimpe . . . No wonder we called them penguins. In school they …

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Southwestern PA Sustainability Goals & Indicators

Sustainable Pittsburgh last presented this regional sustainability goals and indicators report in 2004. In tracking the region’s progress, we see that much has changed, while too many things remain the same. Not changing, however, is the reason we produce the report. The old saying, “You can’t manage what you can’t measure,” applies. Sustainable Pittsburgh is …

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Voyaging to College

The road to college is much like an expedition. It can appear overwhelming, exciting, and at times too far away to be tangible. However, much like planning a trip out of town or across the globe there is preparation involved, and it is always best to start that planning early. First, you must figure out …

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Pittsburgh Today and Tomorrow 2016

The 2016 Pittsburgh Today and Tomorrow report, produced by Pittsburgh Today, analyzes recent data to assess the Pittsburgh region’s standing compared with 14 other regions in key economic and quality of life measures. Also included are numerous in-depth reports focusing on the most important issues facing Greater Pittsburgh. To view a PDF version of Pittsburgh …

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South Side Visions

I only met my husband’s grandfather a few times; he died at age 92, shortly after my husband and I were married in 1988.   However, I think of Lee Dittley often, when I look at his charming paintings of the South Side of Pittsburgh. With only a ninth-grade education, he went from working in …

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An Art Full House

“We’re art addicts so we’re always buying stuff, ” says the owner of a wood-clad modern home in Fox Chapel, laughing. She and her husband are just back from a major art fair and the question, as usual, is where to put the new piece. From the outside, no one would suspect that the discreet …

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Moderate Growth in Store for Metro Pittsburgh in 2016

Metropolitan Pittsburgh is a picture of stability entering 2016. Job growth is outpacing the Pennsylvania state average, and the unemployment rate for the seven-county region is steady near 5 percent. 2015 brought a resurgence in labor force growth, providing local employers a wider pool of talent from which to fill their ever-expanding payroll needs. Pittsburgh …

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Keeping international graduates

Alexandra Oliver had been a writer, editor, researcher, art critic, lecturer, curator, community organizer and entrepreneur. She earned her Ph.D. in Pittsburgh. She had a job offer in Pittsburgh and wanted to stay in the city where, she said, she “found a niche.” But Oliver is Canadian, and for international graduates like her, getting legal …

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Forever In Bloom

Gardens are fleeting, as anyone with a green thumb will attest. Within two weeks of neglect, weeds invade; within two years, shrubs perish and pathways disappear; within two decades, the garden is but a memory. Fast forward two centuries, when everyone who even remembers the garden is gone…   The Garden Club of America, founded …

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Setting a New Standard

The professor sits at her console and looks to the monitor at her right. There, she sees the smiling, eager faces of her students, 16 strong, for this evening’s lecture. She greets them and is greeted in return. On the monitor to the professor’s left is a SMART Board, an interactive whiteboard that she uses …

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A Pittsburgh Masterpiece

When Rachel Rosenberg arrived at the University of Pittsburgh from California as a freshman, she was immediately drawn to the cultural classrooms lining the Cathedral of Learning’s first and third floors: their alluring aesthetics, stunning architecture and meticulous attention to detail. “There’s nothing like this anywhere else,” she said. “They really set the University of …

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The Internet of Things

We carry our smartphones everywhere, and they connect us to everything. We feel comfortable talking to them and having them talk back. We call them phones, but they’re pocket computers, as powerful as the supercomputers of a decade ago. We use them as calculators, cameras, memory aids, executive assistants, voice recorders, word processors, road maps, …

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Esther L. Barazzone, Educator & Administrator

I grew up in Bluefield, W.Va., a town of about 16,000, which had no “wrong side” of the tracks—because it was all tracks, for trains moving coal out of southern West Virginia. I lived there with my mother, stepfather and three brothers. Three out of four of my grandparents were immigrants—from Italy, Belgium and Ireland—and, …

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A New Initiative

John Kane was the quintessential Pittsburgh working man: tough, hard-working, unpretentious, and yet extraordinarily creative. He emigrated from Scotland in 1879, worked for Frick’s coke works, Carnegie’s steel mill and the Pennsylvania Railroad where he became a painter of boxcars for the railroad. Later, emerging as a true artist, he created some of the most …

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