Thank You, Cynthia

About 15 years ago, a pimply-faced teen-ager who wasn't half as clever as he thought he was started doing some research about McKeesport. Much of what he thought he "knew" turned out to be folklore at best.

After pestering his neighbors and family with one time-consuming question after another (What color was "The Famous"? When did Menzie Dairy go out of business? Who was the "Lysle" that they named the boulevard for?), it became obvious that he was going to have to go do some actual work.

Since there was no World Wide Web back in those primitive days, his first stop was the high school librarian, who sent him to the Carnegie Free Library, where he learned that most of the city's historical documents, along with copies of The Daily News on microfilm, weren't there. They were at a place called the McKeesport Heritage Center.

The what in the where? The Heritage Center. In Renzie Park. Next to the "Little Red Schoolhouse."

So one day, after school, he walked down the hill, in the rain, to the old schoolhouse. Next door was a new brick building he hadn't noticed before. The door was locked. He rang the bell.

. . .

The stern-looking woman who answered was shorter than the drenched kid standing outside, but she still seemed to tower above him.

"Yes?"

"I need to look up some information about some buildings in McKeesport."

She peered over her glasses. "What kind of information?" she said.

"Well, um ... everything, I guess. I don't know."

"Hmm," she said, sizing him up. She looked like an elementary school teacher, straight out of Central Casting, and suddenly he felt like he was about to be sent to the principal. His mom wasn't coming for another two hours. What if she refused to let him inside?

"Come in and get out of the rain, already," she said, finally, holding open the door. She gave him a quick tour of the building --- pictures were in these binders, the microfilm readers were over there, and maps and charts were back in this room.

He unknotted his tongue long enough to ask some questions. She patiently answered them that day, as she would patiently answer them for years --- even though, eventually, she trusted him enough to go look things up on his own.

. . .

That was Cynthia McLane Neish. She wasn't rude, and she wasn't unfriendly, and she wasn't mean, but she knew what she wanted, and once she had set her mind to something, it was going to happen. The phrase "tough cookie" was invented to describe people like her.

Cynthia set extremely high standards for herself, and she expected the same behavior out of everyone else --- and woe betide those who failed to live up to her expectations.

Once, about a year ago, she called and left a message on my answering machine. I fully intended to call her back the next day, but one thing led to another. She left another message. Call Cynthia tomorrow, I thought, but, well, sometimes the hamster falls out of the little wheel in my brain --- and I forgot.

Her third message was a perfect sound portrait of exasperation, and when I immediately drove over to pay a personal visit and make amends, she just peered at me and shook her head.

When the McKeesport Heritage Center was first formed (largely at Cynthia's instigation) as a museum, genealogy resource and repository for city documents, it was shoved over in a corner of the J. Clarence Kelly Library at Penn State McKeesport. By the time I discovered it a few years later, it had moved into its own building, but everything was still sort of disorganized, and it was difficult to see how it would amount to much.

Difficult, I guess, if you didn't know Cynthia McLane. (She hadn't yet married --- late in life --- longtime McKeesport advertising executive Frank Neish, a man every bit as jolly as Cynthia could be stern. Some how, they made a good match.)

With unswerving devotion and relentless drive, Cynthia brought order to the chaos. New collections were formed. Exhibits began to appear.

. . .

Pretty soon the original building had filled up, and plans for an addition had to be drawn up. In the meantime, the Heritage Center set about restoring the old "Little Red Schoolhouse." A brick shelter was erected to protect the 1832 log cabin from the elements. The addition went up a few years later.

It wouldn't be fair to credit Cynthia McLane Neish with all of the growth at the Heritage Center --- there were a lot of volunteer hours expended by many, many dedicated people --- but it's fair to say that no one dared abandon their posts until their tasks were completed. You wouldn't dare disappoint Cynthia.

Was she tough to deal with? Sometimes. I can think of a few people who held her in disdain. No one who sets high goals, and demands that others keep their promises, is beloved by everyone.

Her health hadn't been good of late, although until recently, she was still putting in regular hours at the Heritage Center. I have been spending a fair number of Saturdays this year at the Heritage Center doing research, and it was unusual not to see Cynthia at some point during the day.

And when she spotted me, she'd want to know what I was working on, and whether I was making any progress. Instantly, my posture became a little bit straighter and my diction became a little bit clearer. Cynthia had that effect on people: You shaped up when she was around, and you'd better be ready to answer her questions.

I won't be seeing her this Saturday, or any Saturdays, any more. Cynthia died last weekend in UPMC McKeesport hospital. She was 81 years old.

. . .

I'm not going to try to give a real, professional eulogy for Cynthia McLane Neish. Carol Waterloo Frazer did a fine job of that in Wednesday's Daily News, and city council members and Mayor Brewster eulogized her that night. You can also download (PDF) the resolution that city council passed last year, when Cynthia marked 20 years as director of the Heritage Center.

All I can write about is her impact on the life of one kid --- now, a slightly bigger kid.

It's tough for me to write this, because I had never really thought about Cynthia McLane Neish, or what she meant to me. I guess I assumed that she was just a force of nature that would always be there, though I know better.

Maybe I just didn't want to accept the fact that someone who commanded such respect from me --- and, I guess, intimidated me, too -- was just a mortal.

Yet she secured a piece of immortality for herself. No one would have much thought that the history of McKeesport and the surrounding communities was worth saving --- could even be saved --- if the Heritage Center hadn't become such a useful resource, and it's hard to say the Heritage Center would have become such a useful resource without Cynthia on the job for all of these years.

Her legacy will be felt for years to come, whenever families try to discover their roots, whenever students need to research local history for school projects, or whenever people try to make sense of the history of these valleys.

Just seeing her example made me a better person. And whenever I need some motivation, I'm going to pretend that Cynthia is behind me, watching me, waiting: "Well? Now what?"

God bless you, Cynthia, and thank you.

. . .

Funeral services and interment for Cynthia McLane Neish were private. In lieu of flowers, her family has suggested that people memorialize her by visiting a shut-in. With all due respect, I will go further: Please also consider a contribution in her name to McKeesport Heritage Center, 1832 Arboretum Drive, McKeesport, 15132, or to the Memorial Archives of the Western College for Women, her alma mater at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio.