Health/Science - Environment - Pittsburgh Quarterly Magazine

Pittsburgh Quarterly Contributors

Sean D. Hamill

Sean is a staff writer for The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. After three years working for a daily newspaper in rural Missouri, and 12 working for papers in Chicago, he moved home with his family 2 ¹⁄₂ years ago. He continues to write for newspapers, including the Chicago Tribune and New York Times. He and his wife, Dr. Joey Kallem, a local emergency veterinarian, have two sons.

The institution that saw the parade and progression of theories about treating the mentally ill has now become obsolete and sits mainly idle pending its imminent closure.

Health

2009 Winter

Moving Beyond Mayview

When the state Department of Welfare announced last year that it would close Mayview State Hospital by Dec. 31, 2008, officials explained what would happen to the remaining 200 patients and said the closure would allow patients to receive community-based care.

Health

2009 Fall

The End of Smallpox

There are a lot of reasons why people believe Dr. D.A. Henderson was the best person to lead the successful effort to eradicate smallpox from the planet in the 1960s and 1970s. Usually they revolve around his intellect (unquestionably world class), his training (schooled in “shoe leather epidemiology” by his mentor) or his…

Environment

2012 Summer

Was Rachel Carson Right?

Patricia DeMarco, Director of the Rachel Carson Institute at Chatham University, has heard the question before. Has history — and science — proven that Springdale, Pa., native Rachel Carson was right in her book, “Silent Spring”? Not just about the most celebrated of her attacks — the impact on the environment of the widely used herbicide DDT — but the other…

DeAnna Kwiecinski's robotics course is taught in a new "model classroom" at The Campus School of Carlow University. The reimagined space helps to encourage learning through teamwork and is furnished with unique seating and dry-erase-topped desks.

Schools

2015 Spring

Region

Classroom of the Future

It is 12:23 p.m. on a school day, about seven minutes before DeAnna Kwiecinski’s robotics class starts at The Campus School of Carlow University in Pittsburgh. But dashing in the door, red-faced and breathing hard, are third-graders Lorenzo Auteri and Tyler Sharek. “We ran because we wanted to get here first,” Tyler said,…

Joseph Graham, 17, greets in the hallways of Allderdice High School. Graham chose to attend Allderdice because of its academic reputation.

Schools

2014 Fall

Working to keep The Promise

It is 5:30 a.m. on a Thursday in early June — one of the last days of the 2013 – 14 school year — and Joseph Graham is tired, but awake. It’s about an hour before most of his Allderdice High School classmates in Squirrel Hill have awoken, and Joseph is getting ready to start an hour-long, two-Port-Authority-bus trip…

Schools

2008 Spring

Inside the Promise

As is his style, Jeffrey Romoff wanted to get to the point. “So, how much is it going to cost?” the charismatic and sometimes acerbic president and CEO of UPMC, the region’s largest employer and dominant health care provider, asked in a Bronx accent still evident after 35 years in Pittsburgh.

Business

2013 Winter

A Christmas Miracle

John Dionise knows Santa would be jealous. Rather than flying a sleigh all over the place this Christmas season, trying by sight to find each and every home where a gift is to be delivered, the drivers who work for Dionise out of a Sewickley station for FedEx Ground — the growing, Moon Township-based division…

Money

2012 Winter

Blockbuster!

There were no hidden tape recorders, car chases or safe houses involved, but you can almost hear the theme music from “Mission Impossible” when Gary Saulson, PNC’s director of corporate real estate, describes the steps he took to veil PNC’s purchase of almost a block of downtown Pittsburgh.

Business

2011 Fall

Middle East Connection

For 18 years, the Columbia, Md.-based engineering and construction firm Allen & Shariff grew quickly in the mid-Atlantic area, opening its Pittsburgh office in 2000, and looking to expand internationally.

Sean D. Hamill

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