Articles Archive - Page 2 of 149 - Pittsburgh Quarterly

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 1200’s, but there are miles of fresh lava that stretch endlessly on either side of the highway in this …

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Arts Culture

Where Science Meets Play

by Aakanksha Agarwal

Oscar Wilde once remarked, “Illusion is the first of all pleasures.” Welcome to the Museum of Illusions, Pittsburgh’s newest playground for both the young and the young at heart. Step into Instagram-worthy exhibits — infinity mirrors, spatial puzzles, and a plethora of mind-twisting fun await. Situated a stone’s throw away from PNC Park, this is …

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Creative Capital

All’s Well that Ends…

by Greg Curtis

“You should be kissed often, and by someone who knows how.” Rhett Butler It seemed that everything had been taken care of at the Zurich Cantonal Bank and that we were home free. But I’d overlooked one crucial item. Previously in this series: Switcheroo!After Dr. Brenner and I had shaken hands with the bank officials and …

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People Profiles

An Awkward Introduction to Cyril Wecht

by Mark Schwartz

Cyril Wecht’s recent death took me back decades to summer of 1978 and Carnegie Mellon University’s tennis courts. Two white guys dressed in tennis whites had finished playing and sat on the grass. In my early twenties and in law school, I was one of them. The other guy, I’ll refer to as “Tom,” was …

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American Spirit

To Keep Your Balance, You Must Keep Moving

by Lori Jakiela

My daughter Phelan was born in 2004. She knows Winona Ryder from the series Stranger Things. She thinks Johnny Depp’s Wino tattoo is because he has a drinking problem; who knows, not judging. Stranger Things is set in the 1980s. The kids in the show ride bikes with banana seats and handlebar tassels, just like …

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Creative Capital

Switcheroo!

by Greg Curtis

The best laid schemes o’ mice an’ men / Gang aft a-gley. Robert Burns We were parked at a service plaza on Route 3, just inside the Zurich cantonal border, and Dr. Brenner had gotten an urgent message to call his office. Now he and I were standing in the parking lot a ways apart from …

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Books

Ed Simon and the Plight of Milton’s Satan

by Fred Shaw

The notion behind IG Publishing’s “Bookmarked” series is to allow contemporary authors to reflect on how a particular book influenced their journey to becoming writers. “Part autobiography, part literary criticism,” the series aims to guide readers through a deep dive of a single book. The latest installment, Heaven, Hell and Paradise Lost, features Pittsburgh writer …

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Creative Capital

It Takes a Village (To Move All That Gold)

by Greg Curtis

My client, Goldie, had spent many annoying decades conducting gold inventories in remote Swiss villages, and now I’d just been informed that it had been totally unnecessary. Previously in this series: Goldie, Part III“But … but …” I said. The Pictet partner explained that while the army’s original strategy (to pull back into the mountains) …

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Books

Remembering the Beehive

by Fred Shaw

A recent study by apartmentguide.com says Pittsburgh ranks sixth highest among 483 U.S. cities for coffee availability, based on population density and coffee establishments per square mile. It wasn’t always that way, before the iconic Beehive Coffeehouse opened in 1989 on East Carson Street. Readers and regulars alike can thank local journalist David Rullo for …

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Arrivals People

DeForrest, Singer, Diab, van Baarle, Dragga, Hembree, Rosenthal

by PQ Staff

Jasmin DeForrest has been named managing director of The Heinz Endowments’ Creativity Strategic Area. Previously, she was senior director for Arts and Culture at the Detroit-based Gilbert Family Foundation and has more than 20 years of experience in grantmaking, nonprofit leadership, sponsorship management, entrepreneurship and event production. The Detroit native was community sponsorships director for the …

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Creative Capital

Goldie, Part III

by Greg Curtis

No military plan survives the first contact with the enemy. von Moltke the Elder I’m describing how a lawyer conducts a gold inventory, just in case some of my readers might need help with their bullion in the future. Previously in this series: The Routine of Gold After we completed the inventory at the little bank …

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American Spirit Food & Wine

Quest for Cake

by Louise Gray

A birthday celebration calls for a birthday cake and gifts. As far as I’m concerned, forget about the gifts, but keep the cake. My love affair with birthday cakes began when I was four. Each morning on his way to work, my Uncle Eddie drove his two aunts and my mom to their jobs and …

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Nature

What Was that White Bird?

by Daryln Brewer Hoffstot

The first time I saw the white bird flying overhead, I thought I’d gone slightly mad because large white birds are not common in the Ligonier Valley. I was riding my bike on a rural road between two cow fields, a herd of black-angus eyeing me warily. I pedaled slowly, watching what I presumed was …

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Creative Capital

The Routine of Gold

by Greg Curtis

When Goldie asked me to conduct the gold inventory for her, I’d simply assumed that her gold was stored in the vast vault under the Credit Suisse headquarters building on the Bahnhofstrasse in downtown Zurich. After all, she’d been a good customer of the bank for decades. Previously in this series: GoldieI’d planned to walk …

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Obituaries People

McGinnis, Bucci, LaDuke, Rescher, Simmons, Beck, Posvar, Reichblum, Donley, Rocco, Snyder, Rierson

by PQ Staff

Gerald “Jerry” McGinnis, 89A celebrated biomedical engineer, McGinnis turned a fledgling medical device company founded in his kitchen in 1976 into Respironics, a global empire that was later bought by Royal Phillips for $1.5 billion. He was the inventor of the first mass-produced breathing machine — a device now used worldwide for sleep apnea and …

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Money

Financial Literacy: What’s it Worth?

by PQ Staff

Editor’s note: We asked a group of local financial leaders to weigh in on this question: How important is increasing financial literacy among our society and your potential customer base and what programs do you have to educate citizens in making responsible financial decisions, whether on mortgages, insurance products, loans, investments or savings? VINCENT …

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Creative Capital

Goldie

by Greg Curtis

“The Golden Rule: She who has the gold makes the rules.” The Wizard of Id (paraphrased to modify the gender) Quite some years ago I had a remarkable client I’ll call Goldie. Goldie was then in her late sixties and looked exactly like a lady in her late sixties: gray hair pulled back in a bun, …

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Birds

TVs in the Sky

by David Liebmann

When John James Audubon went about portraying the biggest American birds, he took advantage of the double elephant paper that made his enterprise unique. At 26 by 39 inches, the huge sheets lent themselves to nearly full-scale images of our largest avifauna. Take his “Turkey Buzzard,” for example, an old name for the turkey vulture. …

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Creative Capital

The Origin of the World (and the End of the Tours)

by Greg Curtis

Being the college guide sounds fairly straightforward, but in fact the job was full of pitfalls – landmines in every direction. The first pitfall arose out of the fact that I could never know who was going to be on my tour. It might be sensible people who thought the Orozco murals should be nuked, …

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Home & Lifestyle Homes

Livable Luxury

by Marylynn Uricchio

Interior designers Lindsey Longacre and Kate Tomalis became close friends while working at Restoration Hardware. They discovered they shared a similar aesthetic, and as their friendship grew, so did the requests for help from customers that went beyond the scope of the store. “Clients continued to ask us to work on projects beyond picking furniture,” …

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Arts

Painting the Audience: Quantum’s “Scenes from an Execution” is Artistic Theater

by Stuart Sheppard

Although we can’t prove that Freud said, “Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar,” we certainly can admit the wisdom in this adage, especially as it concerns the theater, where interpretation has turned into an industry for directors, dramaturgs, audiences, and especially, critics. So rather than write a quotidian, interpretive review, our critic decided to …

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People Profiles

“Go to the People”

by Jeff Sewald

Inspired by childhood memories of accompanying his physician father and nurse mother on medical calls, Dr. Jim Withers began providing medical care to Pittsburgh’s homeless in 1992. Initially dressing as a homeless person and accompanied by a savvy formerly homeless man, “Dr. Jim” started making regular nightly rounds in alleys and under the city’s bridges. …

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