Articles Archive - Page 119 of 155 - Pittsburgh Quarterly

When Kathy Humphrey was born, she was already an aunt, part of a family of 11 siblings and, now, 86 nieces and nephews. As a girl, she not only loved school, she played school outside of classroom hours with her hometown friends in Kansas City, Mo. And when she couldn’t find friends to join her, …

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History

The Little Block House That Could

by Emily Weaver

The first question a visitor usually asks is: “So… what was this place?” As curator of the 250-year-old Fort Pitt Block House, sometimes I feel that I have the most interesting job in the world. I get to take care of the only structure left of Fort Pitt and the oldest building in Pittsburgh. The …

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Sports

Opening Day, Minus One

by Mike McGarrity

Dunbar creek runs into the Youghiogheny River just north of South Connellsville in Fayette County. Vestiges of the interurban streetcar lines are all over. A massive stone arch that was once part of a bridge crossing the Dunbar Creek valley stands like an ancient Roman aqueduct by the coke oven complex near Wheeler. I grew …

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Science

Three Percent of You Isn’t You

by Kelly Casey

Susan Lambie was desperate. It was the summer of 2009 and her mother’s health was deteriorating rapidly. What began as a cold turned into pneumonia. Then her mom developed Clostridium difficile—a nasty bacterium that causes severe diarrhea. Each year, C. diff strikes more than a half million people, especially the elderly after taking antibiotics, as …

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Innovation

Kissing My Privacy Goodbye

by Tom Imerito

I first became aware that my online privacy wasn’t nearly as confidential as I thought while shopping online with my sister who lives in Florida. Separated by 1,000 miles, phones pressed to our ears, eyes glued to computer screens, my price for a particular web cam was a bargain at $3.37; hers was $4.66, over …

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Opinion

The Equilibrium Illusion

by Lara Bruhn

Balance, n., a condition in which different elements are equal or in the correct proportions. What an elusive state. Just the constant weighing and evaluating required to attempt balance is exhausting. My mind races: I should be working on improving the bakery’s website… no, I should be at my kids’ soccer game… wait, I really …

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Business

Passing the test

by Evan Pattak

Think you’d like to be CEO of a major corporation? Best get ready for this test: The employer informs you that over the next day and a half, you’re the leader of a hypothetical company. You prepare by reading reams of hypothetical reports generated by your hypothetical company. As you arrive at your computer, you’re assaulted …

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Money

Zero Interest Rate Zone

by PQ Staff

Each year in our summer issue, we ask a group of the region’s leading wealth managers to help our readers navigate financial waters by responding to a question. This year, the question is: In your opinion, what will be the ultimate impact of the Federal Reserve’s zero interest rate policy in the short term and …

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Business

Does This Change Everything?

by Seamus McGraw

It’s been nearly six months since the state Supreme Court rocked Pennsylvania by striking down key portions of Act 13, Gov. Corbett’s signature legislation on Marcellus Shale drilling. But even now, the full impact of the decision—and what it bodes for the future of the drilling industry in the state—remains unclear. In fact, say legal …

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Leadership

Chevron’s Nigel Hearne

by PQ Staff

For the past 100 years, the U.S. blossomed in part due to an oil boom with roots in the 19th century, the beginning of the modern oil period. That was when George Bissell, a school teacher, lawyer, entrepreneur and journalist—a true Renaissance man—conceived the idea that the “rock” oil that bubbled up very near to …

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Obituaries

Gaisford, Fisher, Feeney, Mccarran, Veeder, Weis Jr., Wymard

by PQ Staff

Dr. John Gaisford, 98 Jack Gaisford was a leading Pittsburgh surgeon, known for creating the West Penn Burn Center. After serving as a surgeon in the Pacific during World War II and treating patients around Hiroshima, Japan, Dr. Gaisford returned home, developing a specialty in treating burn patients. John R. McCartan, 79 Jack McCartan was …

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Nature

Exploring the Fort Necessity area

by Thomas Saunders

One of the most interesting historical sites in the Laurel Highlands is the Fort Necessity National Battlefield. And a new destination for hiking and exploring in the region is a property currently owned by the Western Pennsylvania Conservancy and about to be added to Forbes State Forest, adjacent to the national battlefield property. Forbes State …

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Regional News

Pittsburgh Emerges as a Low-Price Leader in Health Insurance

by Julia Fraser

Pittsburgh has emerged as one of the nation’s lowest-priced health insurance markets under the Affordable Care Act. Insurance marketplaces created by the Act offer a menu of private sector plans covering a range of benefits packages and premium prices. Some consumers are eligible for income-based tax credits that can reduce premiums and, in certain cases, …

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Regional News

Attendance Matters

by Julia Fraser

Juvenile court Judge Dwayne Woodruff sees the worst of the problem. “By the time kids get to me they’ve missed 50, 60, 80 days of school,” he says. It’s a common thread running through the Allegheny County cases over which he presides, regardless of whether the student is delinquent or in need of protective custody …

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Region

Pittsburgh Today & Tomorrow

by Douglas Heuck

Would you say this is the best shape Pittsburgh’s been in over the last 30 years?” I asked the question after a group of people, including the region’s leading economist, its top demographic expert, and the head of the Allegheny Conference on Community Development, had just viewed the most recent economic reports from Pittsburgh Today. …

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Opinion

Stocks & Pedestal, Spring 2014

by PQ Staff

For most of us, the phrase “one-party rule in Pittsburgh” conjures the Democratic Party. But for 70 years after the Civil War, the Republican Party had a lock on Pennsylvania and, largely, Pittsburgh. Only the Great Depression and the sweeping victories of the New Deal could break that lock. And since the mid-1930s, Pittsburgh has …

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Arrivals

Evans, Meixell, Munchak, Bracken, Peterson, Lam, Bibby

by PQ Staff

Catherine Evans is the chief curator at the Carnegie Museum of Art. She comes to Pittsburgh from Columbus, Ohio, where she served as curator of photography and also chief curator at the Columbus Museum of Art. Before moving to Columbus, Evans and her family lived in Sao Paulo, Brazil, for five years. A New York …

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Profiles

Elsie H. Hillman, Political and Civic Leader

by Jeff Sewald

Instrumental in the political campaigns of: Dwight Eisenhower, William Scranton, John Heinz, Gerald Ford, Richard Thornburgh, George H.W. Bush, Barbara Hafer, Tom Ridge and Arlen Specter Board member of many organizations through the decades, including: WQED Multimedia, the Hill House Association, the Urban League, Carlow University and the Hillman Family Foundations. Where does my story …

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Sports

Bring on March Madness

by Marino Parascenzo

The swell thing about working nights for an “ayem” (morning paper) is you can be having your first coffee and catch the early games, still in your jammies. And with that, you’re on your way to the greatest show on Earth: Opening Day of a three-week national fixation: the Big Dance; March Madness; the NCAA …

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Books

The working man novelist

by John Allison

Dave Newman is a hard-working and funny writer who embodies an everyman Pittsburgh spirit with all of his ample heart. His latest novels—the brand-new “Two Small Birds” and “Raymond Carver Will Not Raise Our Children” (2012)—show him succeeding at the goal which his autobiographical protagonist, Dan Charles, declares at one of the many turning points …

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Birds

The wood duck

by David Liebmann

Changing habitat has complex consequences for birds. Some species prefer deep, old growth forests. Others thrive around patchwork clearcuts. Some require grasslands to breed, while others reproduce in swampy bottomlands. Some of our notorious losses—the ivory-billed woodpecker and Carolina parakeet—needed relatively narrow bands of Southern wetland so much that when the trees there were felled, …

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Food & Wine

Let us think lettuces

by Sherrie Flick

The garden’s palette yawns tan and brown as winter ends and spring nears each year. All that’s left after the crusty snow melts (if I’ve remembered to diligently clean up the previous fall) are blank brown beds—the clean slates of gardening. I like the do-over aspect of each new garden season, but I long for …

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