Articles Archive - Page 18 of 151 - Pittsburgh Quarterly

Patrice Matamoros, Junior Achievement of Western PA JA BizTown is officially the “tiniest town” in western PA! Junior Achievement of Western PA (JA) has developed a simulated city with over 19 storefronts, City Hall, and a town center. This school year, over 8,800 students from 4th-6th grade will utilize JA BizTown to learn how a …

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People Profiles

What Do I Know? Dr. Robert M. Friedlander

by Jeff Sewald

“My mother’s father was born in 1905 in Pinsk, in the old Soviet Union. He was Jewish and had witnessed pogroms against his people, during which half of his family lost their lives. In fact, his father and some of his brothers were killed right in front of him. So, when he was 15, my …

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Creative Capital Money

Too Close for Comfort

by Greg Curtis

“This was not only the most dangerous moment of the Cold War, it was the most dangerous moment in human history.” — Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr. Last week we watched as the captain and political officer of a Soviet B-59 submarine agreed to launch a nuclear-tipped torpedo at the US Navy ships that had located it. …

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Nonprofits Nonprofits

Spotlight on Nonprofits

by PQ Staff

Rachel Petrucelli, UPMC Children’s Hospital Foundation Working in the nonprofit sector — specifically at UPMC Children’s Hospital Foundation — has enabled me to draw on my own lived experience to ease the burdens many children and families face here in our community. As the mom of a daughter with complex medical and behavioral health needs, I …

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Arts Culture

The Immaculate Reception Collection

by PQ Staff

To mark the 50 anniversary of the “Immaculate Reception,” Pittsburgh-based artist Dino Guarino has created a series of paintings that capture the entire play. The famous Franco Harris catch provided the spark that ignited the Pittsburgh Steelers dynasty, and Guarino’s series of seven paintings grew from a series of conversations he had with the …

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Food & Wine Home & Lifestyle

Hyeholde

by Barbara McKenna

Being almost 88 and having spent three-quarters of my life at Hyeholde, writing the story of the restaurant my parents created is a piece of cake for me, and a delicious piece at that. In 1931, my parents bought six acres of farmland and, with income from working three months each year at a lovely …

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Creative Capital Money

The Blackest Day

by Greg Curtis

“It isn’t the first step that concerns me, but both sides escalating to the fourth or fifth step and we don’t go to the sixth because there is no one around to do so.” JFK to EXCOMM Previously in this series: DEFCON 3, Pt II On October 25, 1962, the world was very close to …

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American Spirit People

The Brush Pile

by David Macpherson

About 100 yards from my house, near the edge of an open field, lies a large brush pile. It’s unsightly, at least from the human perspective — a lump of tangled, decomposing chaos marring the open views of the field. Each time I pass, I think: I’ve got to do something about that. We all …

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Books Culture

Airmen Behind Enemy Lines

by Charles Stanley Jr.

As illustrated by the stories of eight Pittsburgh-area natives, downed airmen who bailed out over Yugoslavia during World War II experienced vastly different fates, from daring rescues to drowning and execution. Lost Airmen: The Epic Rescue of WWII Bomber Crews Stranded Behind Enemy Lines tells their stories and many others. Pilot Charles “Scotty” Stewart ordered …

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Sports Sports & Outdoors

Is Pittsburgh Still a Baseball Town?

by Richard “Pete” Peterson

There has been a great deal written about the demise of baseball as America’s game. After the excitement of last season’s NFL playoff games and the drama of the Super Bowl, sports commentators, lamenting painfully slow and dull baseball games dominated by batters swinging with uppercuts and striking out at a record pace, decided to …

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Culture

On a Pedestal, Fall 2022

by PQ Staff

Sculpture All AroundHats off to two local sculpture efforts. The first, by longtime design innovator Dan Droz is “The Gathering,”(above) the largest sculpture to be installed in a public setting in Pittsburgh in over 20 years. It is sited at the entrance to The Heritage Trail, at 15th Street and Waterfront Place in the Strip …

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Creative Capital Money

DEFCON 3

by Greg Curtis

We are examining the nuclear threats propounded by Vladimir Putin during the Ukraine conflict through the lens of the nuclear threats propounded by his predecessor, Nikita Khrushchev, during the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962. Previously in this series: Ukraine through the Lens of Cuba, Pt I Last week we looked at the events that led …

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Culture History

The Studied Neglect of the Hill District

by Mark Schwartz

The dreariest part of a recent trip to Pittsburgh was not the memorial service I attended, but revisiting the Hill District. I’ve always felt a connection to the place, first referred to as “Jew’s Hill” during my grandparents time. Then with the great migration of blacks coming north after the Civil War, the named changed …

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American Spirit People

Retiring Ritter Farm

by John Beale

Under a gray November sky, in a rain-soaked cornfield where four generations of the Ritter family had farmed, Carol Ritter embraced her husband, Ralph, as strangers bid on equipment the couple had accrued over nearly 60 years of farming. “Woooeee, look at that,” said auctioneer John R. Huey II of Slippery Rock, gesturing toward a …

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Creative Capital Money

Ukraine through the Lens of Cuba

by Greg Curtis

“I’m looking forward to being an old man. I have to, you can’t look back on it.” — Jerry Seinfeld One of the good things about being an Old Coot – maybe the only good thing about being an Old Coot – is that you can vividly remember events other people only know about if they’ve studied …

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Culture History

A Princess on the Bluff

by Samuel Hazo

On February 26, 1978, Princess Grace of Monaco presented a poetry program entitled “Birds, Beasts and Flowers” in the Carnegie Music Hall under the auspices of the International Poetry Forum. This was her first professional appearance in the United States since her marriage in 1954. This would also be her first visit to Pittsburgh. Though …

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Books Culture

The Power and Danger of Storytelling

by Fred Shaw

Sway. for Jonathan Gottschall, author of the riveting nonfiction, The Story Paradox: How Our Love of Storytelling Builds Societies and Tears Them Down, this lone syllable jotted on a bar napkin while watching interactions in a tavern becomes the answer to a question: What are they actually doing? His thesis: human communication stands “to influence …

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Nature Sports & Outdoors

Riding the GAP Trail

by John Beale

Rob and Nikki Fleming came with friends from Tarpon Springs, Florida. Tom and Carolyn Cassell made the trip from Tucson. And Jeremy Cline travelled from Connecticut. Each year, bicyclists come to Pittsburgh from across the country and beyond to ride the 150-mile Great Allegheny Passage (GAP). Last year, that number reached 1.4 million, according to …

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Creative Capital Money

Beating Long COVID

by Greg Curtis

Vitamins. Okay, I know you are disappointed, you were expecting more. Maybe the rediscovery of a century-old drug everyone had forgotten about but that had magical properties when it came to over-active immune systems. Maybe a new concoction made up of equal parts lithium and kryptonite. Previously in this series: Poor, poor Pitiful Me, Beating …

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Culture

Canton – a Great Fall Getaway

by Barbara Eichenlaub

For most Pittsburghers, canton, Ohio is synonymous with the Pro Football Hall of Fame. And why not? Thirty-two of the 362 enshrined members are Steeler-related. But the birthplace of the National Football League (originally the American Professional Football Association in 1920), has more to offer than football. Founded in 1963 with two rooms, the Hall …

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Regional News

Regional Unemployment At “Extremely Low” Rate

by Julia Fraser

The unemployment rate in southwestern Pennsylvania fell to one of the lowest rates in the past 50 years, according to the latest Pennsylvania Department of Labor data. In September, 4.2 percent of workers in the seven-county Pittsburgh Metropolitan Statistical Area were looking for work. That rate tied for the lowest unemployment rate in the region …

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Creative Capital Money

Poor, Poor Pitiful Me

by Greg Curtis

On December 28, 2021, despite being double vaxxed and boosted, I tested positive for COVID. So much for the vaccine’s 96 percent success rate. Over the following week my symptoms got worse and worse – basically, the flu-from-hell – and eventually I called my doctor. Previously in this series: Beating Long COVID, Part I He …

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