"If I was ever ordered to storm a pillbox, going to shear, sudden, and utterly certain death, and told to pick my platoon, I would pick six White Sox fans. I would pick Sox fans because they have known death every day of their lives --- and it holds no terror for them anymore ...."
"... futility meeting hopelessness head on ...."
"The Sox represented not just Chicago, but the South Side. Do you know what it feels like to be a South Sider in a world of North Siders? ... A Sox fan's biggest aspiration in life is to someday get a better job in the mill. A Cubs' fan's biggest aspiration in life is to someday own the Chicago Cubs ...."
"Being a White Sox fan meant measuring victory in terms of defeat. A 6-5 defeat was a good day. A big rally was Wally Moses doubling down the right-field line. ... The White Sox were so bad when I was a kid that I can remember sitting at the kitchen table and seeing my Old Man reading the sports page. On the front I vividly remember seeing in big block letters ... SOX'S APPLING HITS 450 FT ... FOUL BALL!"
--- Jean Shepherd, 1921-1999
Guess who's filling in for the editor of Pittsburgh Radio & TV Online this week?
In other, somewhat related news: Guess which president was the first to be televised, and the first to be seen on television? The answer may surprise you.
That link, by the way, goes to the website of the Early Television Foundation, which operates a wonderful museum just outside of Columbus, Ohio. I visited in May and was stunned at how nice it was, and how comprehensive it was. It's operated entirely by volunteers and many of the old TV sets --- including mechanical versions that date to the 1920s --- are operational. They'll even turn them on for you to demonstrate them.
If you're a technology geek, like I am, then you haven't lived until you've watched color TV on a 1950 CBS studio monitor with a spinning mechanical filter to generate the picture. My only regret is that I couldn't spend more time there.
Columbus is about a three-and-a-half-hour drive from Our Fair City. There are worse ways to spend this weekend than heading out to Columbus for the day and spending a few hours prowling around the Early Television Museum. (And you're in luck, because this weekend, Ohio State is out of town, which should alleviate some traffic congestion.)
Closer to home, Mike Madison over at Pittsblog mentions that McKeesport's Blueroof Technologies had a nice presentation at a recent conference on aging. He asks if it's true that Blueroof's house is the first new one built in the Third Ward in 75 years.
Well, I think 75 years is a little bit of an exaggeration, but if it is, it's not much of one. More houses have definitely been torn down in the Third Ward than built, that's for sure. It may certainly be the first single-family home built in the Third Ward since the Depression. Kudos to Blueroof for bringing some life back to a once-vital city neighborhood.
Finally, my deepest sympathies to the family of Kevin Wander, an occasional contributor to Tube City Online. Kevin, whose family operated Wander Sales in the Mon-Yough area for many years, died recently at the age of 43 after an illness. I never met him, but I did correspond with him via email, where he offered me advice and encouragement.
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