Thoughts of Pittsburgh

I haven’t lived in Pittsburgh since the late seventies; and I’ve never gone back more than three or four times a year, yet it still feels like home. The neighborhoods, the markets, the roads and bridges may change but not the people. It’s an easy town; the food is not very distinctive unless a Polish, Italian, Irish mix has been raised to the level of cuisine while I wasn’t looking. What the food lacks in subtlety is made up for in quantity. These days my stomach aches just at the thought of the belt loosing portions served in the typical diner. If it’s coffee it’s Maxwell house, if it’s strong it’s burnt, and if it’s right you can see the bottom of the cup.

They use to call it a shot and a beer town, but that’s only true in spirit. Like most places, nobody drinks the way their parents did, or they did years ago. It’s a mill town brimming with world class universities, and now without the mills. The coke plant down the river is the only remnant of the glory days of US Steel. The mill have been torn down, malls, townhouses and sports complexes have slowly taken their place.

These days Pittsburgh is a business center, a medical power house; it’s clean, it’s safe, and it’s old, but it sure has character. The mayor is still in his twenties. There is the Southside on the flat next to the Monongahela and below Mount Washington. When I was growing up Carson Street was bustling with Five & Dimes, Polish deli’s, and seedy mill bars; it was the home to US Steel. Nobody went there, unless you worked in the mills, and most of the mill workers lived there. It was a typical western Pennsylvania river town in the heart of the city.

Pittsburgh’s history is rife with the hero’s and demons of the industrial age Carnegie, Mellon, Frick. They all left an indelible stamp on the city for good and bad. They exploited the labor, polluted the rivers and air, and left art treasures and the first public library system in the country.

Today Pittsburgh is still cloudy, but it’s clean. Allegheny County passed the first air pollution ordinances in the country. The Allegheny and Monongahela still form the mighty Ohio, and the cityscape as you emerge from the Fort Pitt Tunnel is one of the best in the world; even on a cloudy day

Top Photograph: Bridge span over the Allegheny River

Middle Photograph: The Strip District

Bottom Photograph: Downtown