1955: Jonas Salk and the polio vaccine

On the afternoon of April 16, 1955, there was noticeable buzz at the Greater Pittsburgh Airport. Why?  Pittsburgh’s newest international star, Dr. Jonas Salk, was coming home. A crowd of 500 proud locals, many of them children, anxiously waited for the doctor’s plane to land.

“No public reception is planned, but County and City police will be assigned to the Airport to handle the people who may wish to cheer his victory,” said a Pittsburgh Press article that day.

Salk arrived in Pittsburgh on the heels of his most notable accomplishment: the successful application of a vaccine to cure polio. After seven years of experimentation and testing, largely conducted at the University of Pittsburgh, the scientist’s team reported the vaccine a success.

Salk-related headlines sprang up all over the country; he quickly became known as the miraculous man who cured a disease that had affected more than half a million Americans in the preceding 40 years.  

Salk, though, was not well-liked by his peers.

While some scientists were purely petty, others argued Salk had “not played fair” by using unconventional means of creating a vaccine.

A few in his field thought it was “unthinkable” that Salk should receive all the credit for the polio vaccination. Scientists who came before Salk set the foundation for the work he did, but despite their research and experimentation, they were not as widely recognized.

Through the success and criticism, Salk knew he still had work to do. Unsatisfied with a vaccine that was only 80 to 90 percent effective, the New York native set his sights on perfecting the shot by returning to his Pittsburgh lab for further research.

Meanwhile, starting in late April 1955, thousands of Pittsburgh children were vaccinated in local schools. The first mass inoculation in Allegheny County occurred the Monday after Salk’s return, and city school children did not receive shots until 10 days later.

Pittsburghers warmly welcomed home their “adopted local boy” after the initial invention, and the happiness and gratefulness spread across the country. People hung up “THANK YOU SALK” posters in store windows, held celebrations, and commemorated the day the invention broke through.

Ten years after the vaccine’s initial success, the United States no longer claimed polio as a major health concern. And the public loved Salk for it.

—Emily Kaplan and Golzar Meamar

1999: Hip dinosaur Dippy 

The Oakland statue of Dippy, the most famous dinosaur of Pittsburgh, seems to have been standing outside the Carnegie Museum of Natural History on Forbes Avenue forever. He is old, right? It only makes sense: Dippy is a dino. 

The looks and names can be deceiving though. Dippy’s fiberglass statue is only 15 years old. One of the most recognizable symbols of Pittsburgh was erected in 1999 to celebrate the centennial of discovering the bare bones of the real Dippy, Andrew Carnegie’s obsession — that treasure still stands indoors in the museum’s Dinosaur Hall. 

The indoors Dippy, whose real name is Diplodocus carnegii (in honor of… well, you know who), first appeared before Pittsburgh’s public in 1907. At that time, the 84-feet-long Diplodocus was a creature of superlatives: the tallest dinosaur ever found, the best preserved, the most desired by various collectors, the first dinosaur to ever be housed in the museum and many other THEs.  Even the tale of finding Dippy and bringing the bones to Pittsburgh was hailed "a soap opera about bones."

But enough drama about the Dippy who lives indoors. Tough life. Dippy who stands outside must be thinking his indoors counterpart has it easy. Snow, sleet, rain, thunder, bone-chilling cold and even the vandals — Dippy has seen it all in an unpredictable world of Pittsburgh’s outdoors, and for that perseverance he earned the city’s respect and recognition.

Dippy, for sure, is a representative of Pittsburgh’s pop culture. He even made it to Yinztagram, a Pittsburgh photo app, as an integral feature of the Steel City along with Primanti Bros. sandwich, Rick Sebak and a construction detour sign.

The fiberglass Dippy is hip, too. During his short life he has sported more scarves and hats than an average Pittsburgher. Obviously, he does not choose his sports loyalties. Dippy’s passions have Pittsburgh ties. He was spotted wearing the Steelers Terrible Towel, the Panthers’ scarf, the green-and-white scarf with shamrock on it before St. Patrick’s Day and even a bicycle helmet (maybe as a precursor to the advent of the cycling culture in the Steel City?).

— Mila Sanina

1947-48: “The Freedom Train’s journey through Pennsylvania”

One year after World War II concluded, U.S. Attorney General Tom Clark believed Americans had become complacent about their rights and responsibilities as citizens and the value of their many freedoms.

On May 22, 1947, with the endorsement of U.S. President Harry S. Truman, Clark gathered 200 people at the White House. Conference participants represented business, finance, labor, industry and government. 

Americans, the group decided, should see a free traveling exhibition of the nation’s historic documents. The American Heritage Foundation, a New York-based organization, was established to organize an exhibition aboard the Freedom Train. 

Fifty-two railroads shared the task of taking the Freedom Train on its 33,000-mile journey. Staff members of the National Archives assembled about a quarter of the 126 documents on display. 

Americans lined up in droves to see Thomas Jefferson’s rough draft of the Declaration of Independence, the Bill of Rights, the Emancipation Proclamation and Abraham Lincoln’s Gettysburg address. Caesar Rodney’s letter, written on July 4, 1776, described the voting on the Declaration of Independence. George Washington’s letter outlined the winter hardships his troops suffered.

The Freedom Train’s journey began in Philadelphia on September 17, 1947, the 160th anniversary of the signing of the U.S. Constitution. Guarding the displays were 27 U.S. Marines, many of whom had seen combat during World War II. 

The Freedom Train arrived for a three-day stay in Pittsburgh, at Pennsylvania Station, in September 1948. In Downtown Pittsburgh, a line formed an hour before the exhibition opened. Men removed their caps when they boarded the train. 

The Freedom Train’s tour ended on Jan. 22, 1949. By that time, more than 3.5 million people in 48 states had seen America’s founding documents.

—Marylynne Pitz

1960: Boyhood memories at Forbes Field

When I called Lee Reischbaum, a local Pittsburgh psychologist pictured left in the above photo, he responded: “You won’t believe this! I’m on the phone with Michael Hyde right now!”

Not that this was abnormal. The two are good friends. The fascinating part?

Michael Hyde is the boy on the right in the photo above, captured on April 24, 1960, by a Pittsburgh Press photographer.

Early in that magical 1960 season, 11-year old Reischbaum and 9-year old Michael Hyde enjoyed hot dogs on the third base side at Forbes Field. It was a warm spring day and a familiar scene. The neighbors, whose parents moved from Friendship to Stanton Heights together when they were infants, often attended games with each other.

Reminiscing about the 1950s and ‘60s Pirates takes the two men — now 65 and 63 — back in time. Both can name just about every player on the 1960 World Series Champion Pirates.

“One person I really enjoyed watching was Smoky Burgess, the catcher,” Reischbaum said. “He was a short, pudgy guy. But you could count on him. He was like a Josh Harrison. You put him up to bat, he would hit the ball.

“Left field was Bob Skinner, this long, tall guy who loped. He looked like a giraffe. And when he ran it was like watching a giraffe run across the plains of Africa.”

Hyde’s memory is just as sharp.

 “I remember Billy Virdon climbing up the batting screen in centerfield to catch balls,” Hyde said.

Of course, Roberto Clemente played right. The two boys used to pay a dollar or two to sit in the right-field grandstand.

“They were horrible seats. But they were behind Clemente,” Reischbaum said.

Talking about the Forbes Field Pirates reminds them of a different era.

“It was a gigantic part of life, and if we weren’t at the game at the time, we would be sitting up on the porch watching the glow from the steel mills, listening to it on the radio, eating pizza,” Hyde said. “They were amazing, amazing times.”

Today, Reischbaum has a partial season ticket package to PNC Park. But the men agree that Forbes was in a league by itself.

“I have to say nothing could be better than Forbes field. That was just a classic field,” Hyde said.

Although the two don’t go to Pirates games together anymore — Hyde lives North Carolina and is a professor at Wake Forest University — they stay in touch. Reischbaum has hardly left Pittsburgh, earning four degrees from the University of Pittsburgh. Still, the two cannot remember a time when they did not know each other.

“Michael and I are an example of the long friendships people in Pittsburgh have,” Reischbaum said.

After spending his whole life here, Reischbaum is understandably fond of Pittsburgh’s small-town feel. He and Hyde grew up on the same street as Steve Greenberg, the former Pirates vice president who spearheaded the construction of PNC Park.

And Reischbaum’s Little League coach was Bob Smizik, the former Post-Gazette sportswriter.

“That’s part of what Pittsburgh is, too. My wife sometimes shakes her head and says, ‘How do you know all these people? How do you stay in touch with all these people?’ It’s part of the city’s culture.” 

—Hayes Gardner

April 25, 1979: PSO rocks the jailhouse

From time to time, we find photos in the Post-Gazette’s photo archive worthy of standing alone — and without much story. This image of Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra in the Allegheny County Jail qualifies.

Pittsburgh Press photographer Michael Chikiris captured the scene and writer Eleanor Chute provided colorful details about how the inmates received it.

"The violin sounds pretty. I hope they come back here," inmate Harvey A. Broadus told her that day.

It’s unclear whether they ever did, but the photograph contains a scene for the ages. The full story, from April 26, can be seen above.

—Ethan Magoc

June 8, 1935: The faltering love life of a golf champ

Moments after he’d shocked the golf world by emerging from obscurity to win the National Open at Oakmont, Sam Parks Jr. was cornered by a reporter from The Pittsburgh Press.

Parks had taken the tournament lead with a miraculous 60-foot chip shot witnessed by a gallery estimated at 10,000. Then he held off a curly-headed blond Californian named Jimmy Thompson in a gruelling homestretch to win with a score of 299.

But who cares about spectacular victories? Love — that’s what reporter Evelyn Burke wanted to discuss.

Parks was young and handsome, and now he was a star. The fact that he was a hometown kid made him even more appealing.

Do you have a girlfriend? Burke asked. Is marriage in your future?

“For heaven’s sake, don’t make me out a ladies man,” Parks pleaded, a note of panic in his voice. “I’ve been too busy all my life to bother with girls.”

The reporter took a moment to jot down that Parks was wearing a brown sweater and gray slacks. Reporters crowded around. Flash bulbs popped. Burke noted that Parks had a “natural deep tan” and his face was “a sort of new Dubonnet shade, a sort of red brown mixed with purple.”

Burke then persisted in her line of questioning. You can’t blame her. In the mid-1930s, the Depression continued to hang around the country’s neck. Reading about a local guy who defeated golf’s biggest stars made Pittsburghers feel proud.

The public is interested in you, Burke said. What type of girl do you like?

“I like ’em all,” replied Parks, obviously trying to be helpful and accommodating. “Blondes, brunettes and redheads, but honestly I haven’t any preference.”

Parks wasn’t accustomed to the spotlight. He was just a kid who’d grown up in Bellevue and happened to fall in love with golf. After school, he’d run to catch a streetcar to the Highland Country Club so he could practice. It paid off. Parks was unknown nationally, but local golfers knew him as a solid player and a dangerous competitor. At Pitt, he’d served as captain of the golf team.

And what about lady golfers? Burked asked.

Parks said he’d never played golf with a woman. “Not that I have any objections to them. It’s just that I don’t know many girls who do play golf. I’ve always been pretty busy, anyway.”

The National Open victory earned Parks $1,000. He’d play a few more years professionally, but would never again win another major tournament. Eventually he would marry, then divorce and marry again. He’d take a job with U.S. Steel, then retire to Florida, where he’d die at the age of 87 in 1997.

But in a cramped hallway in 1935 he was still a young 25 and he showed his white teeth and shook his head at Burke’s questions.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “There’s not much to tell about me — only golf. I like to dance, too. But I don’t get to many parties because golf seems to take up so much of my time. And honestly, I’m not in love.”

Parks grinned and “his dark eyes squinted in a friendly fashion,” Burke wrote. “His black hair, parted in the middle and slicked back, made him look very boyish.”

—Steve Mellon

Top photo: Two weeks after winning the National Open at Oakmont, Sam Parks Jr. played an exhibition game at Cambridge Springs, PA., where he was joined by former English champion Joyce Wethered. (Pittsburgh Press photo)

1964: Hill House

In the 19th and 20th centuries, immigrants who arrived in America often spent time at settlement houses where they learned how to speak English, sought work and adjusted to their newly adopted country.

Pittsburgh’s Hill District was once home to three settlement houses — the Irene Kaufmann Settlement, the Anna B. Heldman Center and Hill City. In 1964, those three agencies merged to form Hill House Association.

The new community center was a place where Hill District residents could obtain help finding housing, receive dental and medical care, advice on family planning, legal assistance, tutoring for high school dropouts and job training.

Public officials and civic leaders such as Elsie Hillman and the late Wendell G. Freeland knew there was a pressing need for a place like Hill House Association.

That’s because 50 years ago, the needs of Pittsburgh’s black residents were acute.

The destruction of the Lower Hill District neighborhood, which occurred between 1955 and 1960, displaced 8,000 people and 400 businesses. City officials had used eminent domain to clear the neighborhood so it could build the Civic Auditorium for the Civic Light Opera. (The dome-shaped building, later called the Civic Arena and Mellon Arena, was demolished in 2012, after the Pittsburgh Penguins had moved to Consol Arena.)

In 1972, a new Hill House building opened at 1835 Centre Avenue and served as the home of 18 social service agencies. The new building, which cost $2.5 million, also became a gathering place for the black community and local leaders of the civil rights movement.

Among Hill House’s early leaders were Harry Bray, J. Wendell Ramey and Russell Shelton. James Henry became director in 1978 and his tenure lasted for 25 years. He was succeeded by Evan Frazier.

The current president and chief executive officer is Cheryl Hall-Russell, who happily announced the opening of a full-service grocery store in the Hill District in October 2013. For thirty years, the community had lacked that basic amenity. Today, Hill House is focusing on helping seniors, workforce development and students who have dropped out of school.

—Marylynne Pitz

1967:"First penguins arrive in Pittsburgh"

In 1967, a group of penguins found a new home in Pittsburgh. Their new home was not Civic Arena, and in fact, they were not even hockey players.

These real penguins in Pittsburgh joined hundreds of other aquatic species in the opening of Pittsburgh’s new aquarium, Aquazoo.

They joined the exotic animals who had called the zoo home since 1898, when the Pittsburgh Zoo first opened its gates. Then, it was known as the Highland Park Zoological Garden.  

In the 1960s, the Highland Park Zoo experienced major changes when the Pittsburgh Zoological Society planned and fundraised the two newest attractions, AquaZoo and Underground Zoo.

In 1966, while constructing the dwellings for Pittsburgh’s newest aquatic residents, an “aquafari” led by top zoological experts was underway to capture nearly five tons of the exotic fish from the Amazon River in Columbia. These “aquafarians,” as they termed themselves, returned to Pittsburgh with eleven 11,000 pounds of fish, porpoises, alligators, toads, and frogs. Animals such as penguins, sharks, and dolphins were also shipped to Pittsburgh.

Meanwhile, AquaZoo staff worked hard to ensure that these species were placed where they would thrive. Zoo artist Ben Blackson stated, “What we’re trying to give the public are ‘living illustrations.’ We’re living in the 20^th century and it’s time we took the animals out of the cages and put them in surroundings similar to their natural environment.”

This meant particular attention to tanks’ water temperatures levels, adding simulated sponge and coral reef, and balancing chemical levels in saltwater water trucked in from a New York harbor.

Finally, in October 1967, the AquaZoo opened its doors to nearly eight thousand attendees, including Mayor Joseph Barr who noted, “It will be a benefit and a boon to the Tri-State area as well as to Pittsburgh; [it is a] great addition to the City and its people.”

The aquarium certainly left attendees in awe.

Roger Conklin, one of America’s most famed expert on sea-life, was also on hand for the grand opening. While visiting the aquarium he couldn’t stop saying, “beautiful! - beautiful!”

Decades later, the AquaZoo is still thriving, especially after undergoing a $17.4 million renovation in 2000 that doubled its size. The AquaZoo became the PPG Aquarium that year, too.

Today, the theme at the aquarium is “Diversity of Water,” where you can still explore the underwater world of sharks, turtles and - of course - penguins.

— Emily Kaplan

June 26, 1947: The night of a killing.

An hour or so before becoming one of Pittsburgh’s most notorious killers, Charles Peyton locked the door of his Steubenville Pike roadhouse, then sat in the tavern’s kitchen and had a beer with his cook, a man named McKenna.

Peyton left the room briefly. When he returned, he carried a loaded and cocked .45 automatic pistol, which he placed on a table. Peyton began singing a song called “When You Were Sweet Sixteen.”

McKenna thought the gun was dangerous and said so. Peyton replied that he’d only use it to defend his “castle.”

By now it was after 3 a.m. McKenna said goodnight and headed upstairs to his apartment.

A short time later, an automobile pulled into the roadhouse parking lot. Peyton would later say he heard men and women talking outside. Suddenly there was pounding on the roadhouse door. “We want a drink,” called a voice.

Peyton hollered that his tavern was closed, then he snapped off the lights.

“We’re coming in anyway,” someone answered

In the darkened tavern, Peyton sat on a barstool behind the counter and aimed his .45 automatic downward. He pulled the trigger — a warning shot, he claimed, to scare away the intruders.

A body crumpled to the floor.

“As I fired my wife walked right in front of me,” Peyton said. “I didn’t see her before I pulled the trigger.”

The bullet, fired at point-blank range, tore into Mary Peyton’s left breast, punctured a lung, ripped downward through her organs, emerged from her right hip and ricocheted off the floor.

Mary, 22 weeks pregnant, fell face down. Blood pooled on the grimy floor. When detectives arrived, they found Charles Peyton “semi-hysterical.” Mary, moaning and weak, was rushed to Mercy Hospital.

There, she rallied long enough to answer a few questions. Did your husband shoot you by accident or on purpose? a detective asked.  “On purpose,” came the reply.

Within 10 hours, Mary died. Peyton was arrested.

“I tell you I didn’t see her,” he protested. “It was pitch dark in there.”

Mary’s body was laid out in the living room of her parent’s Carnegie home. Police allowed Peyton to pay his respects. The haggard 51-year-old was led manacled up the front porch, where he was met with stony glares from his in-laws and his 11-year-old son, who’d later testify that his father was a merciless wife- and a son-beater.

His lips twitching, Peyton stood for a moment before his wife’s casket. Then he dropped to his knees and sobbed, “Oh, my God. Oh, my God.”

He rose and stumbled forward to kiss his dead wife on the cheek, but before he could complete the smooch detectives grabbed him and whisked him out of the house.

The trial was 17 days of drama that captivated the city. Peyton said he didn’t hear his wife enter the bar moments before the shooting, but detectives discovered that the door through which she passed squeaked loudly.

Witnesses said Peyton regularly gave his wife black eyes and bruises. No, others said. Peyton was a loving husband who bought furs for his wife.

Then came son Pat, who testified that his father beat him severely and had, on another occasion, fired a gun at Mary. Pat referred to his father not as pop or dad, but “that man.”

A jury found Peyton guilty of second-degree murder. The sentence, 10-20 years, was pronounced on Good Friday. Distraught, Peyton slumped into the arms of deputies.

At Western Penitentiary, he was a model prisoner. During a riot in 1953, he stood aside, far from the fray, where his image was captured by a newspaper photographer.

He served the minimum 10 years. Dressed neatly in a prison-made suit, Peyton left the prison in July 1957. He was 61 years old. “Tanned and full-faced” one newspaper reported.

Son Pat, now 21, was there to greet him. A newspaper photographer snapped a picture of Pat smiling with his dad.

Peyton then slipped into an automobile and headed straight for Miami, Fla., where he was promised a job as a janitor in an apartment complex.

— Steve Mellon

Top picture: After viewing his wife’s body, Charles Peyton sobs in a police vehicle. (Pittsburgh Press photo)

1965: Cleaning Herron Hill Reservoir

Most Pittsburghers would say Mount Washington offers the best view of their city.

Maybe so, but as Post-Gazette columnist Brian O’Neill wrote this week, Observatory Hill’s Brashear Reservoir is actually Pittsburgh’s highest elevation point at 1,370 feet. He found the elevation ranking doesn’t necessarily provide the best view of the skyline and surrounding area.

Reader Mike Cornell responded to his column: “Brian, you had the right idea but the wrong reservoir. Try the reservoir in Robert E. Williams (Herron Hill) Park.”

At The Digs, we made good on his suggestion and visited the park as the sun was setting.

It’s centered in the Upper Hill and offers equally impressive views to the north, south, east and west — an advantage over Mount Washington or the West End, where one’s eye is drawn toward the Golden Triangle.

The reservoir itself was built in the 1880s and now holds 14 million gallons, serving neighborhoods that include Bloomfield, Garfield, the Hill District, Point Breeze, Squirrel Hill and upper Oakland. In 2004, City Paper’s Chris Potter labeled the 19th-century construction “a desperately needed improvement for a rapidly expanding city.”

From 1920 through 1964, the city did not clean the reservoir’s bottom. Leaks developed and minor earth slides resulted, leading to a $150,000 repair job ($1.2 million in 2014).

The photos above — taken in the spring of 1965 — reveal the reservoir as it’s not often seen.

That is especially so today, when a fence and tarp-like covering extends across the two-acre space.

—Ethan Magoc

Oct.12, 1971: The great ‘Mr. B.’

Tall, handsome and blessed with a velvety baritone voice that seduced jazz lovers everywhere, Billy Eckstine left his mark on music as a band leader, mentor, entertainer and singer.

A Pittsburgh native born on July 8, 1914, he grew up on Bryant Street in Highland Park, attended Peabody High School and went to Howard University. His mother, Charlotte, was a seamstress and his father, William, was a chauffeur. The family owned a piano and young Billy gravitated to music, eventually learning to play trumpet, trombone and guitar. He also loved playing football but suffered a broken collarbone while in high school.

Eckstine was 11 when he first sang at a church bazaar. Later, he won an amateur competition by singing “Stardust” at the Howard Theatre in Washington, D.C. For a time, he worked as a singing waiter at the Fort Pitt Hotel in Downtown Pittsburgh.

In 1939, he sought his musical fortune in Chicago. The next year, he joined Earl “Fatha” Hines’s band, sharing vocals with Sarah Vaughan and working with alto sax player Charlie Parker and Dizzie Gillespie. The two young vocalists began perfecting their singing styles. During that time, Eckstine made a successful recording of the jazz standard “Skylark.”  His first big hit was “Jelly, Jelly,” which he sang while touring with the band. A few years later, he had other hits with “Prisoner of Love” and “Cottage for Sale.”

His success allowed him to form his own band in 1944 and mentor emerging talent. The Billy Eckstine Orchestra featured jazz trumpeters Dizzy Gillespie, Miles Davis and Kenny Dorham, saxophone players Charlie Parker, Dexter Gordon and Sonny Stitt and drummer Art Blakey, another Pittsburgh native. It was the first major big band to be influenced by the emerging musical style called bebop.

The band broke up in 1947.  Eckstine signed with MGM records and began singing ballads. Hits included “Blue Moon,” “Caravan,” “I Apologize,” “My Foolish Heart” and “Everything I Have is Yours.” By 1949, he was the top male vocalist in “Metronome” magazine and the most popular singer in “Down Beat” magazine.

Like Dinah Shore and Frank Sinatra, Eckstine arrived in the big time by appearing at New York’s famous Paramount Theatre. In 1950, Eckstine grossed half a million dollars from record sales, stage appearances and nightclub stints. He drew record-breaking crowds in New York and Los Angeles. By that time, he had closets full of suits, owned three cars and took regular lessons from a golf pro.

Always stylishly dressed, he wore narrow ties, loose-fitting suits and a signature curved shirt collar favored by hipsters and gangsters. He toured with pianist George Shearing and loved to play golf, shooting in the low eighties. He made numerous television appearances and was the first black singer to grace the cover of Life magazine.

In 1960, during the World Series between the Pittsburgh Pirates and the New York Yankees, he sang the national anthem. In 1986, he was honored at Heinz Heinz during a local jazz festival. By that time, he had 11 gold records to his credit. That same year, he made his last recording, titled “Billy Eckstine Sings With Benny Carter.”

The father of five boys and two girls, Mr. Eckstine sometimes performed with his daughter, Gina, the youngest of his seven children. He died in Pittsburgh in March 1993.

—Marylynne Pitz

Top picture: Pirates manager Danny Murtaugh and Bill Eckstine in 1971. (Ross Catanza/The Pittsburgh Press)

1958: "Shippingport Atomic Power Station"

Shippingport Atomic Power Station was the first full-scale atomic electric power plant in the world. 

The Beaver County plant built on the Ohio River, just 25 miles from Pittsburgh, at the time of its opening inspired promises and bold predictions that “nuclear power would raise the public’s welfare, revamp industrial techniques, and increase America’s standard of living.” 

Its decommission was less glorious — due to environmental concerns publicized by Pitt Professor Ernest Sternglass — but it was successful. Nowadays the site hosts a different power plant, the Beaver Valley Nuclear Generating Station, which has two Westinghouse pressurized water reactors. 

On the day of Shippingport Atomic Power Station’s dedication, May 26, 1958, President Eisenhower, who five years before gave his famous Atoms for Peace address at the United Nations, delivered a speech via electronic hook up to people who gathered at the Shippingport site. The ecstatic crowd of government officials, dignitaries and business elite  shared the sense of accomplishment, congratulating each other on completing the landmark plant just in 32 months. Final costs for the entire plant ran up to $75 million. 

Philip Fleger, chairman of the Board of Duquesne Light and the man of vision, who won the bid with his Shippingport offer, was among the enthusiasts: ”It is all together fitting that this station should be located close to the birthplace of the petroleum industry and on top of one of the world’s greatest coal fields,” he said. “For the history of industry and man’s progress is closely bound to the history of fuel…”

It was in Shippingport where experts established practices and rules on how to operate a nuclear power plant. A mistake could be costly and the main rule at Shippingport read: “No carelessness can be tolerated anywhere, for the entire chain of events can prove disastrous.” In the 1960s experts from Shippingport traveled to Japan when the Japanese started talking about using nuclear power as an energy alternative. 

However, the Shippingport experiment was not meant to live. After 25 years of operation, the plant was decommissioned. 

Dr. Sternglass, Pitt professor of radiology, accused Shippingport executives of covering up harmful radiation levels he discovered in data gathered by Nuclear Utilities Services Corporation, which went unreported to government officials. Sternglass alleged that levels of cancer, infant mortality, heart disease had increased due to higher levels of Strontium-90 in the soil and milk produced on local dairy farms.  Dr. Sternglass’ accusations galvanized protests in Shippingport. The community and environmentalists called for the moratorium on nuclear power plants in Pennsylvania and the U.S. Due to insufficient evidence the case was dismissed and the investigation closed. But in spite of the result, Dr. Sternglass’ account of the scandal make a riveting read. At present Dr. Sternglass serves as Emeritus Professor at the Department of Radiology at the University of Pittsburgh.

Shippingport was the first but obviously not the last nuclear power plant. As of March 2014, 435 nuclear power plants are in operation worldwide, 104 of the them are located in the U.S.

— Mila Sanina

1940s: "Bedford Dwellings"

Bedford Dwellings opened in the Hill District in 1940. At one point that year, a man was interviewing to live in a unit there.

An interview was then required of prospective residents. During the questioning, he changed his mind.

“I just remembered about that graveyard and I decided I’m not going to live with any ghosts,” he told an employee of the complex — allegedly built atop a cemetery.

From its inception through the present, the possible presence of ghosts, as well as a need to fill an abandoned mine in the late 1930s, have been far from being the only problems at the Hill District housing project.

The project would have been torn down in 2003 if not for a shift in federal funding, and today the units could use more care. Piles of litter are the first thing you see at its front on Bedford Avenue. Deep potholes mar Chauncey Drive, which loops through the complex’s eastern half. The 2423 and 2425 Bedford Avenue building numbers are missing or damaged. In short, it’s no longer the shining answer to the city’s lower-income housing needs.

More than 70 years ago, the complex was especially sought after. It was part of the Pittsburgh Housing Authority’s response to the federal government’s push to eliminate slums.

On opening day — July 15, 1940 — 32 families “paraded” into their new residence. On that day, The Pittsburgh Press wrote: “Thus begins a great experiment in public housing visualized by the Federal Government as a step in solving the problem of providing better living quarters for a ‘third of the nation which is ill-housed.’”

Despite issues such as dirty water that appeared from time to time, Bedford Dwellings was still the preferred public housing project 50 years after its construction.

Others, including Allequippa Terrace, had so deteriorated that, “for all the demand for public housing, the city just can’t give (them) away to its needy,” Dennis B. Roddy of The Pittsburgh Press wrote on Sept. 13, 1984.

Still, in the late 1970s, The Pittsburgh Press reported, mothers grew concerned about their children’s safety to the point of patrolling streets and buildings with brooms, swatting those driving up to sell dope to residents.

The next 40 years featured several attempts to replace or renovate many of the units, but much of the original Bedford Dwellings project remains.

—Golzar Meamar

1955: Groundbreaking ceremony for Mellon Square

Mellon Square has anchored Pittsburgh’s business district since 1955 and hid behind its aesthetic shield one of the largest parking lots in the center of the city. Props to Pittsburgh banker Richard Mellon King for conceiving an oasis in the heart of Pittsburgh’s Downtown.

But more than 50 years of exploitation, corrosion, and lack of maintenance made it clear: the oasis itself needed resuscitation to bring back its previous magnificence. In 2009, such a plan was developed, and in 2011, a $10 million restoration began. 

Today Mellon Square re-opens restored and remodeled to once again offer a safe place for Downtown workers and residents to take a break in the middle of traffic crawling on Smithfield Street, Oliver and Sixth Avenues. 

Walk over to Mellon Square, take a stroll on the exquisite pavement, look up and you’ll feel dwarfed by giant symbols of Pittsburgh’s capitalist power and glory of the past: the Regional Enterprise Tower, Oliver Building, Omni William Penn Hotel, and 525 William Penn Place. Well, maybe not “glory of the past” — no one would argue that these buildings still look quite as magnificent.

The vision behind Mellon Square was driven by pragmatism: in the 1940s, Downtown Pittsburgh needed a garage to accommodate the needs of the growing business district and to lure Alcoa away from an idea to move its headquarters to New York. Thus, it couldn’t be just a parking garage; Richard King Mellon wanted that space to capture the spirit of Pittsburgh’s Renaissance. Architects from Mitchell & Ritchey designed the parking space capped by the public square, Simonds & Simonds landscaped it. 

When Mellon Square opened, it was deemed “the creation of an oasis of beauty and serenity above the din of the city streets.” When the square was completed, Mellon gave the square to the city.

A dedication marker on ground level says: “Mellon Square is dedicated to the memory of two brothers, Andrew W. Mellon and Richard B. Mellon, their leadership, civic spirit and philanthropy advanced immeasurably the welfare of this community.”

Mellon Square is looking up to become Pittsburgh’s Rockefeller Center, though smaller in scale and more manageable in vision — not quite as Ayn Randian, much more hospitable and less intimidating. Just like Pittsburgh itself.

— Mila Sanina

1940s: Labor leader Asa Phililp Randolph

One of the American labor movement’s greatest leaders was Asa Phililp Randolph, who knew what it meant to work hard and persevere.

As a boy, he was a grocery store clerk and newspaper vendor to supplement the income of his father, a minister in the African Methodist Church. When he got older, Randolph laid track for the railroad. 

After leaving Crescent City, Fla., for New York City, he worked as an elevator operator and waiter while attending City College of New York. He lost his job while trying to organize a union for waiters on a local railroad. But that setback did not stop him. 

By age 28, he was publishing a magazine called the Messenger, which was billed as the “only radical Negro magazine in America.”  

In 1925, he began organizing a union called the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters, a group of railroad employees who worked up to 400 hours a month for a wage of $67.50. Twelve years would pass before he won the union’s first contract, which cut porters’ work hours in half and more than tripled their salaries. 

In 1941, Randolph organized a march on Washington to protest discrimination in defense plants. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt yielded to the pressure and signed an executive order banning that type of discrimination.

In 1948, Randolph and other black civil rights leaders fought discrimination in the U.S. military, prompting President Harry S. Truman to order desegregation of the U.S. military.

Randolph also organized the famous 1963 March on Washington, which drew 250,000 people who heard Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. speak eloquently of his dreams for America.  The march brought pressure to bear on the U.S. Congress. That same year, Lucille Green Randolph, whom Randolph had married in 1955, died the day before his 74th birthday. On the nights when he was home, he read her a chapter from the Bible.

The success of the March on Washington was realized a year later when  the Civil Rights of 1964 became federal law.

In September 1967, Randolph was honored in Pittsburgh at a Labor Day Mass where Bishop John Wright presented him with an award for his courageous leadership.

—Marylynne Pitz