This Gumbands podcast is mad possible by the Buhl Foundation, serving southwestern Pennsylvania since 1927, and by listeners like you.

Thank you.

Welcome to Gumbands.

I'm Rick see back and we think everybody in Pittsburgh knows what a Gumband is.

It's a rubber band, but we like to think tha these conversations we're having helped to hold Pittsburg together in some sort of crazy way.

We're really happy today to have as our guest, Mr.

Mark Houser.

And if you've ever done a tour of the rooftops of downtown Pittsburgh, Mark was probably your guide.

I always like to start.

Welcome, Mark.

Thank you, Rick and I. I know how I met Mark.

I was writing for Pittsburgh magazine, a column about famous visitors and my buddy here at work Minette Seatte, who many people know as the host of Filmmaker's Corner, Minette said.

Oh, my brother Mike said, You need to know that there's a story in The New Yorker about Emmanuel Macron.

It's a, you know, a littl profile of of Emmanuel Macron, the president of France, the new president, France, the youngest president ever of France.

And in that article in The New Yorker, they mentioned a visit of his to Pittsburgh and an incident at Mad Mex on Atwood Street.

That's right.

Sadly, that Mad Mex is closed.

I know.

I just drove by it the other day and shed a little tear.

Yeah, I'm a big fan of Mad Mex.

I think that was the first Mad Mex.

Yes.

Yes, you're right.

Yeah, And and actually, I went there with my brother after the birth of his two daughters.

They were born, you know, at Magee.

And afterwards, you know, he would say, you know, let's go get something to eat.

And we both times went to Mad Mex.

So lots of memories in that building.

Me too.

Not, not, not.

That's not the one we go with.

That's my family's.

That was my family's restaurant of choice.

All of my kids.

I have four kids.

We have four kids.

I did less of the work than Diane, my wife.

But, yeah, we.

They grew up on Mad Mex.

Happy hour wing specials.

Oh, cool.

Yeah.

No, it's good food.

I mean, and it grew into a small empire here.

Yes, You went to that next.

And I don't.

I can't remember.

I don't think you were mentioned in The New Yorker article but the incident was mentioned.

Well, they quoted me, so it was Mark Houser.

Oh, well, so you have.

Okay.

Okay.

It was one paragraph in The New Yorker.

I know, but still.

But it was it was really fun.

Yes.

Okay, so let's let's bounce back just a little bit.

I know from when I talk to yo then you were born in Germany.

That's right.

Why?

Well, I'm a I still I'm western Pennsylvania.

Pittsburgh, A proud Pittsburgh lifelong.

Except my parents, who both came from Newcastle just about an hour, an hour and a half north of here depending on how fast you drive.

My dad was in the Army so he was stationed in Germany for two years and that coincided with the time that I was born.

So I was born on an arm base near Frankfurt in Germany, and in all my life I was fascinated by the idea of Europe because I had these pictures in my baby book of me at the Eiffel Tower.

I'm in a baby carriag or me in Bavaria near the Alps.

And so I always wanted to go back and I was always interested in Germany.

And so I became involved.

Once I became it came back to Pittsburg after college and grad school, and I was a writer reporter for The Tribune-Review, and eventually got involved with a group based in Washington, D called the German Marshall Fund, which does professional transatlantic exchanges.

And so I went overseas for a month and learned about different places in Europe and got a fellowship.

Yeah, it's a fellowship.

Precisely.

And like so primarily you were a journalist.

I was.

Is it primarily political?

It was primarily people in media.

It was for people early or mid-career who done something recently that, you know, they qualified for this fellowship.

I'd written some stories about the justice system in Pittsburgh and jury duty, and so I got chosen.

It was really exciting.

I got to meet Greg Baer, the Grable Foundation.

I mean, then he was he was also he was on the same fellowship as me.

So we've been friends since then.

But anyway, after I did that, I loved the program so much that I wanted to help Pittsburgh be part of it for Europeans.

And so for 20 years now, about once a year a group of about a half a dozen, you know, mid-career early, let's say, in their late twenties, early thirties professionals from media from government, from business, from non-profits who have been picke from various European countries, come to the United States for a month and go to four or five different cities.

And Pittsburgh is one of those cities.

And you made that happen?

Yeah.

You're the one who said you guys should come to Pittsburgh.

I was.

Yes.

I think we deserve it.

People were going to Cleveland.

People were going to Detroit, wonderful cities.

And I thought we should be part of the mix, too.

We've got a great story to tell and fascinating all kinds of fascinating aspects of our city to, you know, take.

So.

So your parents were in Germany, stationed there when you were born.

How old were you when you moved back, do you know?

Less than one, I think before my first birthday, you were back in Newcastle?

Yes, Newcastle.

And then we moved to McCandless.

So I spent about five or six year there, like kindergarten through fourth grade.

And then they moved back becaus they had friends in Newcastle.

But my folks loved Pittsburgh, my mom especially, and so we would come here all the time to see friends or to every Christmas we'd come for, you know, to see the the windows in Kaufman's department store and get our F.A.

Barry's Snickerdoodle or whatever cookies.

We were big fans of the KDKA Morning show, and my mom was a massive fan of QED.

Oh, cool.

Which we're on a diversion, but let's stick with this story, if you don't mind.

I don't mind.

We'll get back t Emmanuel coming back to McCrum.

So anyway, so when I came back from Germany, I had a problem with my heart.

There was a hole in my heart, a birth defect.

And so I needed heart surgery.

My mom, as I said, she was a big fan of WQED.

She was a schoolteacher, and she was a massive fan of your former colleague, Fred Rogers.

So we were Big Mister Rogers neighborhood fans.

Me and my younger brothers and my mom had you know, posters of the great TV auction in the in the house, in our rec room and stuff.

And she was just a huge Fred Rogers fan.

So when I went to get my heart surgery, she got word to Fred Rogers that her son, the Mister Rogers fan, was in the hospital for a serious surgery and could he come and visit.

And so he came to my hospita room after I came out of surgery at Children' Hospital.

Children's Hospital.

And my mom always told I was kind of groggy.

And I remember hi being there and being excited.

But I also just been in a surgery.

So.

But anyway, my mom remembers this story perfectly and would always share this with everybod who came to our house or anyone who like Pittsburgh or whatever that Fred had come up to me and he saw the bandage and I was kind of weepy and sad because they're still sore and overwhelmed.

And he touched the bandage on my chest and said, when I was when I was little, I broke my leg and the doctor put a cast on it.

And I was worried that when they took the cast off, my leg wouldn't be there anymore.

But don't worry, you'll be there.

You'll still be okay.

And she just thought you know, this is transcendent.

Fred Rogers magic.

So anyway, that's my brush with WQED.

Oh, that's interesting.

I've always thought, you know, Fred Rogers, unusual fears, because he did a whole episode about you can't go down the drain.

And I don't thin I ever thought of that as a kid.

I like, can I, can I go down the drain?

No.

Was too big.

Yeah.

A remarkable sort of conception of of childhood.

And it's kind of specifi and it is a little bit of an odd I think, you know.

But that was his is his talent was he somehow stayed in touc with his young self certainly.

And you know was able to share some of that.

And, you know, undoubtedly there are other people who have those years.

I just never identified with that one.

But we're back to the German Marshall Fund and Emmanuel Macron.

And so he's not in the first batch of fellows to come from Europe.

No, that's right.

The first batch was 23 when you went when 2002, I was supposed to go in 2001 and fall in October of 2001.

That's when my group was supposed to go.

And then events transpired, and that year it was canceled and pushed back a year.

So I went in fall of 2002.

And so I traveled to Brussels, Belgium and Hamburg, Germany and Turin in Italy and Warsaw in Poland and then Berlin.

And some of those cities are not cities that are normally on your tourism itinerary.

And yet they were fascinating.

So that further made me believe Pittsburgh needed to be on this itinerary, too.

For Europeans.

I got to spend a wee in Turin, Torino, gorgeous city.

Did you see the shroud?

Yes, I wrote a story about it.

Oh, really?

See, I thin I went like three or four times.

It was never open.

It was there was alway some reason why it was closed.

I spent a week in Turin and I never saw the shroud, but I'm not sure that you actually see the shroud.

I think it's a replica or something.

Yeah, I saw the display o whatever it was, so I mean, it's very faint, really.

You can only make it out in the photo negatives.

Right.

But.

But I talked to a Sinde ologist, which is the term for.

So I think Sedona is the Italian for shroud.

And so I spoke to one of the Catholic scientists that explained this.

I was raised Catholic.

My mom had a book about the shroud.

I had read voraciously as a kid.

So I was you know it was the journalistic mindset and we had the lead in the tomb, I guess, right?

No, I mean, Mary Magdalene.

Isn't that her?

Well, that's different.

That's her veil that just gets his face.

He had these.

Oh, the shroud has got the shrouds, the whole burial shroud.

Oh, yes, my Catholic.

Well, mine's I'm just well versed throug sixth grade and gothic school.

Anyway.

Uh huh.

No, it's funny to think about Turin because in Turin there's a big building, and I know that we're going to talk about buildings.

Oh, yeah, There's a big building called La Molly the Mola Antonelli.

I just.

I knew this llama lake and I. Yeah, I remember asking.

I was there for a television conference and I remembe asking one of the secretaries, I said, La molly, what does that mean?

And she goes, It means the the big thing like you, you are the big O. So I've always identified with that building La Molly.

It's fantastic and nobody knows about it.

It's on some of the euro coins, but it's, it's basically the brick Eiffel Tower and it predates the Eiffel Tower.

It was you know, it was initially built to be a synagogue, but it's this, as you know, it's towering, it's somewhat colonnaded bizarre building that has no is the Museum of Italian Cinema.

And it so we went inside when we went there.

And I'll never forget that brilliant thing about I've never seen this anywhere else.

But we went up to the observation deck up hig and you can see the Alps nearby.

It's quite beautiful.

But the elevator so the atrium, the central part of this building is, oh, I want to say like eight storeys something.

It's this.

It's very tall and and th elevator goes up from the center and it's glass and it's fre floating, just hung by cables.

There's no shaft for the elevator.

There's you know, nothing to surround.

It's just hanging from cave.

It's a standard looking elevator.

You get in and you go up because you just hoisted like from a crane until you can get to the central shaft.

You know, it's sort of Eiffel Tower shaped or it looks like a spiked helmet or something.

The mole.

So, yeah, you hang from you suspended eight storeys or more.

I don't know, but it's huge and great.

I love vertigo.

That's one of my motivating, you know, Charges is just enjoying the knee, the weakness and that sort of churn in your gut when you look down over a vast distance, see how much you can take it before you have to close your eyes.

Wow.

And I think elevator technology has a lot to do with the kinds of buildings that you study, right?

Absolutely.

Okay.

But before we get to the buildings, we're going back to Emanuel, my girl.

Wow.

That was 2003 six, I think.

Oh, 2606 You go in 2002, you come back in 2003 and you say to the German Marshall Fund, you should be including Pittsburgh.

That's right.

It takes them a year or two to say okay, we'll come to Pittsburgh.

Oh yeah.

An are you always the organizer of.

I have always been so for 20 years now.

So you arrange an itinerary for a group of European visitors who come to town.

And I from what I remember, it includes things like visits the public theater, as well as meeting the mayor and that kind of stuff.

Right?

It sort of varies from year to year.

We almost always go to the courts and watch a morning of courtroom proceedings.

So we see about how juries are selected.

We see opening arguments if we're lucky enough to start a trial, because in Europe, that's not something that's common, that you have trial by jury, usually the trial by judges like we also have, but they don't do juries so much in Europe.

So they always find that interesting.

And it's quite dramatic the way that an attorne will present his case to a judge or rather to a jury of peers rather than to a professional judge.

Right.

So that, you know the language is more, you know, geared toward an audience whose educational level you can't really tell and who are not professionally involved every day with cases.

So it's more cinematic, it's more dramatic, and it's more fun to witnes personally than watching a case where you just be presenting to a judge.

So they always love that.

But we also go to like Carnegie Mellon or we go to robotics places.

You know, we always end on the Duquesne Incline because that is the grand finale of Pittsburgh.

Everyone needs to do the Duquesne Incline who visits, right?

I love tha you specify the Duquesne Incline because I am totally a devotee of the Duquesne Incline.

And but most people, I think, ride them on an incline.

But I say both.

No, no, I and it's included in one of my shows a story about the couple that helped save it.

And it's called the Duquesne Incline because it goes up to Duquesne Heights, which is the neighborhood at the top of the of Mount Washington.

There we think of it as Mt.

Washington.

But there are neighborhoods within Mt.

Washington.

And, you know, I remember one of them telling me and this is the little factoid that I love to tell people they have a good claim on those cars.

On the Duquesne Incline, being the oldest mass transit vehicles in constant use in the world.

I think you're right.

You know that because they've changed the ones on the morning lin several times, even in the last, you know, within memory.

But those old cars and I think they have a faint odor of kennywood.

That's a good way of putting it.

Yeah.

The wood inside them.

The wood trim.

Exactly.

Is okay.

Yeah.

It's the oil or something like that that they put on it anyway.

Oh, I love the Duquesne Incline.

So that's where you always end.

Emmanuel Macron Road, The Duquesne Incline.

You got to see the city from the Overlook.

Excellent.

So he was just one of six.

Do you think he stood out at all?

I mean, were you more aware of him?

There wer there were two aspects of him.

Well, the one will get to, but the other one is it was well, he was very stylishly dressed, but that's not unusual.

I remember you often see men with the scarf from that was not so much a look 20 years ago when I started doing this.

You see it a little more now.

But he was, you know, a foppish retired finance ministry official.

Okay.

And at the tim and that's one thing I remember is that he was just you know, he was confident and good looking, had a lot more hair then than he does now.

All right.

He wears hair longer.

But, you know, he was attentive and interesting.

We went and met Luke Ravenstahl the youngest Pittsburgh mayor.

So maybe this inspired him.

Oh, I, too, could be a young leader.

I think he was well on his way to thinking that he's probably in his late twentie or early thirties at the time.

Yeah, he's in his late twenties.

Not what, not yet 30 at that time I think I'm pretty sure of that.

But anyway, the other thing I remember is toward the end of the trip, all of us getting together and, you know, having a beer one evening and him sharing the story of how he married his high school drama teacher.

So you know that they were dating and all that interesting, fascinating love story.

Actually, I, I think I eventually, after having called you and asked you about his wrote it up for Pittsburgh magazine.

And I think in that article I mentioned the fact that you said that was at Fat Head's on the South Side.

That's right.

I love the idea of Emmanuel Macron at Fat Heads.

I mean, have on the wings.

Absolutely.

Well, so that was the other thing.

But but the story that made it into The New Yorker, those are all you know, fond memories for him.

And there's a picture from the Trib at the time of him, like leaning in and having a conversation with Mayor Ravenstahl when we went and met him at his office.

But the big story was I took them to Mad Mex.

And I think, you know, just in addition to all the meetings, we should have some fun.

We should learn about American football.

What is it exactly?

And I draw up on the back of a cocktail napkin how a first down works s you can make some sense of it.

We were watching Pitt play and and we got some nachos and the salsa.

I usually get that green bottle of habanero and spice up my salsa when I'm with the family for Wing Night.

This is my habit, right?

So I'm with these people and I'm not even thinking about i and I'm talking about football.

And I have a separate little salsa bowl, the one that I'm using.

And I put some of the green sauce in and I'm saying, Here's how you throw the ball Here's how you get a first down.

And he goes, What is that you're eating?

I won't do a French accent because it's ridiculous.

I mean, it's ridiculous when I do it anyway.

And he says, What is it?

I said, Oh, never mind.

Europeans are kind o they don't tolerate spicy food as much as we do.

That's not really part of their culinary culture.

I found they also hate root beer.

But anyway, they don't.

They don't take to the spicy food.

So I said, you know, maybe, no, this is super spicy.

You wouldn't like it.

And he took that as a challenge.

He said, Give it to me.

And so he has his nacho chi and he poured like a teaspoonful of habanero salsa on the chip and says, and I'm trying to stop him.

And he's like, Kyle, I'll show you.

I went to Africa once.

I know spicy food.

And and then his face just went beet red and he goes, I have made a big mistake.

And then he picks up a tumbler of water and just drains it, like on his water, filling on his scarf.

So that's the story.

That's in The New Yorker.

But, you know, I don't think I've ever I mean, even having encountered that story before, the idea that Europeans aren't that crazy about really spicy food.

I am I love spice on everything.

But it's such a great story.

And, you know, I love the way it brings world politics to over you know, a corner in Oakland.

Yeah, I love that one.

I've told that one to other Europeans coming anytime they wan some of the spicy sausage said well careful it knocked out the president of France.

I don't know if you're ready for it, but if you like spicy stuff, I would.

I'll just as a side note, recommend and we've done a podcast with Torello from the Steel City Salt Company.

I and they make a Trinidad scorpion salt, which I love.

I mean, and that's the thing I buy you every time I go in there.

Trinidad Scorpions salt it it's not, you know, I think now there's so many hotter peppers than habanero, but and it just takes a wee pinch and you can put it on and it just brightens everything up to me.

So that sounds really good.

Yeah, it is.

I love Trinidad Scorpion Salt from Steel City Salt Company in Millville.

Anyway, I'm going to look for it.

So even when you went as a fellow on the German Marshall Fund, you were working at the Trib, right?

I worked there about 15 years as a reporter.

Okay.

And that's where you met Mike Seatte, who is eventually the Yes.

Link to me through his sister?

Minette Yes, indeed.

And I appreciate, you know, their help with all of this and meeting you.

Uh huh.

So did you were you you mentioned, you know, that you did a lot of stuff about jury duty.

Was that sort of your Bailey Wick.

The paper I bounced all over the place.

You were just a general reporter.

Yeah, I started out you know, doing general early, new, fresh reporter stuff with Mike Seatte.

We both, for a time, had alternated weeks with a weekly humor column so he and I once went and got.

He took me for my first cocktail.

I mean, I had other drinks, but he was the one I should say, my first martini.

He suggested once this would be a fun column, you should write about a martini.

And I said, I never had a martini.

That's a weird old person that drinks.

I'm like 25 or whatever.

And so we both wen and got martinis at hula hands in Station Square.

So, I mean, that was just, you know, that Mik and I have been friends forever.

I talked to him about old skyscrapers, and he's not really interested.

And he talks to me about motorcycles and not really interested.

But we like to talk about, you know, new wave eighties music that we that's our common interest we share.

Okay.

So anyway, I did that and I did you know, I wrote about trends I wrote about technology a lot.

And then I, you know, demographic stuff, you know, sun trends, how the city is changing, immigration stuff you know, all different kinds.

And the justice system was one I came to a lot.

So that's how that jury duty thing came up.

But eventually, somehow your attention turns towards buildings.

Yes, that's right.

So, I mean, were you writing architectural stuff, too?

Occasionally or not really.

But after about 15 years at the Trib, I left that and went into public relations working at Robert Morris University and and I didn't write for publication for a while.

And then I missed it.

And so I started writing freelance for Pittsburgh magazine in the first story that I did was about the interesting old skyscrapers of Pittsburgh that were designed by Daniel Burnham.

Okay.

And that was, you know, as my first story.

He's from Chicago.

Yes.

So he's a famous architect from Chicago.

The two things he's done that that people might have heard of is he was the organizer of and the grand director of the Chicago 1893 World's Fair.

So he's the on who sort of assembled the plan for the World's Fair and put it together.

He's already an established one of the first skyscraper architects.

Then another thing that's the same world's fair with the Ferris wheel.

Right?

Exactly.

Okay.

So it's a terrific you know, it's a which has a nice Pittsburgh connections.

Indeed.

It does.

Right.

That was the tallest thing at the World's Fair in by a Pittsburgh bridge engineer.

So anyway, that's a big year in terms of architecture in terms of what would cities would look like in America because that's where Americans all poured into this to this event.

And while they were there, they would see Chicago off in the distance because it was, you know, down the lakefront from Chicago, but nearby And of course, they would visit.

And that's where the skyscrapers were coming up, you know, that had begun being built in the 1880s because now we had elevators an we had steel frame technology.

So anyway, that that had a big impact on what skyscrapers would look like.

And then Daniel Burnham als designed the Flatiron Building.

So I think that's the mos that's one of the most famous, certainly the most famous antique skyscraper, a term I like to use.

So he built more skyscrapers in Pittsburgh than in any other cit outside of his native Chicago.

Not in New York, but Pittsburgh.

I'm not I don't want to go too far that way, bu I think he's the Pennsylvanian.

Yes, that's one that's.

But I think that's Daniel Burnham Frick Building.

Oh, the Frick Building.

The Oliver Building.

The Frick Annex.

But the Oliver Building, that's one I thin every Pittsburgher should know.

It's the tallest skyscraper that Daniel Burnham ever designed.

So.

And you use the term antique.

I starte to learn about these buildings and I when I did a show called Downtown Pittsburgh.

And I know that one of the architects we were working with several in the show said, you know we were blessed that Pittsburgh, rather than ripped down its first generation skyscrapers, kept them.

And s we have a really good collection and that there basically I if I remember correctly, someone said to me they're like 10 to 14 stories tall and that's as hig as an elevator could go, right?

Well, yeah, exactly.

This first guy, usually I sort of constrain the term skyscrapers to ten stories or more, but exactly right.

It was not just elevators, but also how far you could pump water.

And that technology vastly accelerated.

So, I mean, it was ten, ten stories was a lot of stories in 1890.

But, you know, by 1920 stories, 40 stories, you know, b the time we got to the Woolworth Building in 1913, it's like 50 plus storeys.

And that's the tallest skyscraper in the world until the Chrysler Building comes along about what I gues more almost two decades later.

So, I mean, it the term skyscraper, I think is is funny that where it comes from, it's actually a baseball word.

It was the word that people use to describe it originally comes from sailing.

It's the top sail in a mast, the skyscraper.

Okay.

But then it got used for a lot of other things and it was popularly used for like a deep shot over the right or the left field fence in baseball was a skyscraper.

The ball going on?

Yeah.

When the ball when you hit it high and far, that's a skyscraper.

So journalists starte using that to describe these new super tall buildings that would transform every city in America withi a matter of a couple of decades.

Imagine every building i your city is five stories tall because that's as tall as anyone will walk up a flight of stairs.

And then suddenly there's this new innovation that allows you to have more flights.

And so now you can increase the value of your land.

So anyone who owns land wants as many stories as you can get because you can lease all of them and make a lot of money.

And so suddenly your city of church steeples and five storey buildings is a city of ten, 1 or 15, 18, 20 story buildings.

And that happened here in Pittsburgh in the course of about a decade.

We went from two buildings over ten stories to more than a dozen between 1919 ten.

Oh, that early.

And to me, many of them along Fourth Avenue where the banks are.

But also, you know, you can still see one of the oldest one is the park building with all those guys holding the Romneys.

Yeah, exactly.

That's the name for the place.

That's soldier.

I mean, that's soldiers, but at least bodybuilders rolling up the roof of that building.

So, I mean, they look old to us now because when people designed these new buildings I mean, they are old, of course, like antique skyscrapers.

But when people were designing this brand new technology of super tall buildings, taller than anyone has ever seen before, what are we suppose to put on the outside of these?

And so at the time, thanks largely in par to that World's Fair in Chicago, it became kind of accepted that what grand pieces of architecture should have on the outside i what was on the outside of old grand pieces of architecture like Roman and Greek temples.

Right?

So they used that in France.

There's the A called the Bazaar, right.

The School of Fine Arts.

And that was the first big architecture school.

Most of the prominent architects went there and so they absorbed these ideas that you should make these buildings look like classical o Renaissance style architecture.

So when we look at the now, they look like old temples.

But it's you need to sort of remind remind yourself that these in 1900 were brand new.

We're flashy, high tech.

And this is a time when you're also starting to see the first cars, the first airplanes.

You know, the world is changing.

Light bulbs.

We think we're going through a technological revolution.

And in many ways we are right.

But those folks did, too.

And we don't just think about, whoops, skirts and weird bicycles with one big tire and one little one like they were also seeing their entire world go through an upheaval like no one had seen before in such a short time.

Right?

No, Actually, when you mentioned the The World's Fair there in Chicago or the Columbian Exposition, it was right.

That was also where Westinghouse demonstrated tha alternating current could work.

And I mean, yeah, when you think of all those, you know, new ideas and new things, and because Westinghouse and Edison were fighting so much, Edison Watt didn't want to give his light bulbs for that event of Westinghouse, went into making light bulbs and they were used there in Chicago.

Yeah, that's right.

And, you know, all those factors combined.

And so you I'm going to bounce back to your you write this thing up about these buildings in Pittsburgh.

Yes.

And it just grows from there.

Yeah.

I just I loved the topic.

So I started doing some history.

I've done other history stuff in Pittsburgh, stuff.

I mean, I love the city and it's got a fascinating history.

But I shortly after a few years after doing that excuse me, initial story about the Burnham buildings, I, I started writing a column for Pittsburgh magazine that was called Multi Stories.

And the idea was each month I'd write about a building that, you know, an antique skyscraper from Pittsburgh whose story wasn't very well known.

And by going back into the archives of old newspapers from 100 years ago, you can find out a lot.

So, I mean, a lot of Pittsburghers know the story about the Frick Building and Henry Clay Frick and Andrew Carnegie, who was the first skyscraper in Pittsburgh, and it's where the Kaufman's warehouse is now.

It had no windows, right?

But that was first a skyscraper for Andrew Carnegie's Steel Company.

And so a lot of Pittsburghers know that after they had their falling out, Frick built his Frick Building by Daniel Burnham next door to block the sunlight out of the windows of the Carnegie Building.

But there were so many other buildings that also have fun stories like that, but we don't know these people's stories.

So I started writing stories like that.

The first one that inspired me was the Arrot Building.

I love the Arrot building.

Yes, isn't it?

Yeah, it's a it's such a fun building.

It's so strange.

Beautiful marble lobby with all kinds of mosaic and Yes.

And stripes.

Right, Right.

And somehow we hooked up with the guy who was the custodian there, and he took us all around and showed us all the things he loved about that building and took us up to the roof.

And with those crazy shouting faces on the cornice line.

Right.

So.

Well, it's a unique building.

I've always admired it.

And so I was looking about it on the Internet, looking at Wikipedia, what do I know about?

And all I could find about Eric is James.

Eric was an Irish immigrant in the insurance business, but when I started looking at old newspapers, I found out so much more.

And what I found out was that he is the bathtub king of the sea, something to do with plumbing.

I think he starts with it becomes American standard.

That's right.

He made his fortune on bathtubs.

So he was originally fire insurance company and he insured a foundry on the north side that did plumbing for, you know, sanitary, where they also like plumbing coated with enamel for drinking water and various fixtures for that.

And then some, too, like toilet and sinks and stuff like that.

And so this is the late 1800s.

He comes up with this idea that if you spray white enamel gloss on the inside of an iron tub, it will look really shiny and be durable.

And it will people will want it.

And he's right.

You know, this was massive.

This was a huge hit.

So there are bathtub factories on the north side in, you know, I think Beaver Falls had another one.

He start this bathtub production empire here in Pittsburgh and becomes super rich.

And the arid building was not only an insurance business in other offices but it was also the headquarters of Standard Sanitary which becomes American standard.

No, actually, I think I know why.

I know that.

I mean, anytime you see standard on a toilet or a urinal or something like that, it's connected back to that.

And the area building downtown, I don't think a lot of people think about that.

No, but but it's fun, right?

And but I look that the history center in the men's room, they had a little plaque that, you know, that explained that in the ground floor men's room at the Heinz History Center in this strip.

It's such a great enthusiast.

So my favorites, I hate superlative questions.

I'm not going to ask you what's your favorite building in Pittsburgh, but you must have a few.

Now, you've mentioned the area building.

What are a few of your favorites?

To answer your question, the Arrot building is has always been my secret favorite, and it's in my book.

So my book came out of the Multi Stories column.

I did a book about all the you know, all the skyscrapers, but it's not around the country.

Yes.

So I thought, okay, if Pittsburgh is a if Pittsburgh's got these great skyscraper stories, but no one else, a few in Pittsburgh may even appreciate them, then every city in America must have a few of these skyscrapers.

And indeed they do.

So that's here it is.

This is the are building is on the cover right next to the Flatiron Buildin in the Tribune Tower in Chicago is the art building.

And all these pictures come from the souvenir postcards, 120 years ago that people used to buy when they would postcard, the would best go to these buildings and say, you know, you must see.

In fact, there is a funny the one in the Heinz history Center's archives.

So they have an old postcard someone mailed to, I think, his daughter.

And he writes on the front cover this is going some which I it's funny, you see this old slang.

This was the way of saying, this is super cool, this is wonderful, this is amazing.

This is going some the air at building is going some.

So some of the other building that I love here in Pittsburgh, I love the balcony from the copper building up on the 29th floor.

I take my tours there, you see, you can see down into the strip district and see, you know, the the Cathedral of Learning, which is another one of my favorites.

Of course, that building is a classic, even though Frank Lloyd Wright hated it.

Well, you know, he did, but he hated everything.

He hated Pittsburgh.

Right.

And he's just jealous becaus after he got his commission for Fallingwater and to do Andrew or Edgar Kaufman's office, he didn' get any more of his commissions.

I mean, did you?

He would have destroyed the point with that crazy spaceship design he had.

Yeah.

So, I mean, but he's obviously a genius architect.

But what did he say about someone?

Ask him.

I was just telling this story yesterday to these a group of Australians that I was showing around the city from Sydney and they were doing a Frank Lloyd Wright tribute, you know pilgrimage from from Milwaukee to tell Taliesin, howeve you say the name of his place.

And I go, Yeah, but they were in Buffalo and then they came to Fallingwater and anyway I was showing them around Pittsburgh before they go back to Australia and, and I found this quote from a story you wrote in Pittsburgh magazine.

You were writing about Frank Lloyd Wright in Pittsburgh.

Oh, yeah, I think it was 2016 or whatever in Pittsburgh magazine.

Could be, Yeah.

But anyway, the quote was great.

One is they said, Do what can we do to improve Pittsburgh, Mr.

Wright?

And he said, Abandon it and start over.

And that's befor he didn't get his commissions.

All right.

So anyway, he didn't like it here.

Well, when I first cam to Pittsburgh, I'd worked with, I mean, I had a friend in South Carolina.

I worked for public television in South Carolina, and another producer there at our station, Tim Carrier, had done a story about, I think the three Frank Lloyd Wright houses in South Carolina, one in ruins with the other two.

And I think the guy who ran Domino's Pizza was trying to save them.

Oh, he was a Frank Lloyd Wright fan, the founder of Domino's Pizza.

That's my memory.

But when I announced that I was going to come to Pittsburgh to work at WQED, Tim said, As soon as you get there, let me know, because I you know, I desperately want to see Fallingwater.

And so he contacted the people and it's not quite, you know, it wasn't quite as commercialized as is now where there' an entrance and, you know, and a visitor center and all that kind of stuff.

But he contacted the and they said, We'd love to have you come take a look.

And there was like no one else there that day.

And he had brought one of our cameramen not to shoot it, but just because he was interested, too.

Herman, Herman and Tim came shortly after I came to Pittsburgh.

And what I remember is they it was great to go anywhere you want.

See anything you want.

And oh, well, then they at the end of the day, they were ready to go home and they said to Tim, Is there anything you haven't seen that you want to see?

And he goes I would love to see it at dusk.

And we were approaching and they said, Oh, okay, listen, here's the keys.

Stop when you leave.

Put them in the mailbo on your way out, you know, and and we did.

It's amazing.

I know we had the keys to Fallingwater and we stayed till it got dusky and took some pictures and all that and then put the keys in the mailbox at the end of the driveway and we'll pick them up tomorrow.

Wow.

I don't know if they do that anymore.

I can't imagine.

But my goodness, what a terrific opportunity that you had.

So but you did this multi stories across America that's just can you sort of say like, how many trips is that?

And you're like, boy, did yo visit multiple cities as you go?

So I did most of the reportin for multiple stories just before the pandemic came out, in fact.

So there's 36 different cities represented.

It's 55 buildings, 50 in the United States and then five outside.

The book was published in 2020.

So the last trip I did was to go up to Seattle and Vancouver, BC.

There's a building from Seattle, a marvelous my favorite antique skyscraper in the country, frankly just fun called the Smith Tower.

But Smith was a company that made shotguns in upstate New Yor and then not Smith and Wesson, but a different Smith Shotgun Company.

And they like Remington.

Another New York arm manufacturer used that machine tool technology that fine machining technology, and shifted to a brand new high tech industry in 1880 ish typewriters.

So the people that manufactured Mr.

Smith Corona is the Smith building.

The people that started it was a shotgun company that made the natural transition to shotguns anyway, so why so crazy?

And that I mean, the story o the men behind these buildings is always as fascinatin as any building story could be.

I agree entirely.

That's part of what motivated me to write the book is that we usually focus on architectural term.

I mean, we talk about old buildings, you talk about their architecture, certainly, and you talk about the architect.

And those are all worthy topics.

And I include some of that in the book, but almost never do we talk about who wanted this building and paid for it.

And that is really essential, not just for where the money came from but also for what those people, what the clients wante and their stories are usually, you know, interesting and inspiring.

These are tycoons and entrepreneurs, you know, rags to riches stories in many cases.

And, you know, they're relevant today.

So I give talks today.

I like to talk to groups about how this is, you know, inspiring to us today as we try to figure out wha we're going to do in technology.

And, you know, in the business realm, they face the same sort of struggles and they had to persevere these people, in order to build these fortunes in most cases.

And so the skyscrapers are kind of their legacies in in stone and steel, as one person writing about the book said.

But anyway, it was lots of trips, and the last one was to Seattle, just as COVID was breaking.

So I we went to Seattle as the first COVID cases.

My wife and I did.

We'd never been okay, and we had to make a decision whether we were willing to risk it.

And I'm really glad we did.

It was you know, it's a fantastic city and Vancouver is even more beautiful.

And so, yeah, and I've never been to Vancouver in Seattle and it's worth the trip and you haven't lost interest.

You're working on a new book.

That's right.

Or you're done.

Are you almost done?

Well, we were about to release we were released this year, a coffee table book based on the project that people can already see, and that is the High Rises project.

So just briefly, what that is, is there's this architecture school graduat from Drexel out in Philadelphia, and he's 25 years old.

His name's Chris Haifa and he's also a really creative artistic photographer.

And so he started a project he'd done one project already where he took photographs of the row homes row houses in West Philadelphia, where he lives on his way to school and then made them into a series of these unique sort of portraits of buildings.

And he cranks up, you know, the the Adobe Photoshop, you know, you makes these things very pop.

Yeah, they really pop.

That's the way to say it.

So he decides he wants to do the same thin with old art Deco skyscrapers.

And I wanted to write about art Deco skyscrapers and had been sort of trying to figure out how I would do a book about art Deco.

There's not art Deco in my book, because if I did, then half of them at least would have been because everyone loves Art Deco, right?

So I thought, this is book too.

Anyway, I get a call from this guy saying, Hey, I'm going to do a series of these.

I'm going to use a drone to make these unique images, and I've got some right here.

So it's done with a drone, too, as you can see here, some Pittsburgh ones.

He basically flies up the side of the building and takes a series of photographs and then stitches them together.

So they look a little bit like Wes Anderson.

Right?

Right.

Okay.

That's a gift you for your studio.

That is beautiful.

So it's a cathedral of learning.

Yes.

Coppers.

Yes.

This is the the buildin that has the notorious room at the top that there's all kinds lots of sexy stories about.

Oh, hogwash.

But yes, that's all hogwash.

That's another one of the fun myths.

I like the name of this building.

This is the Keenan originally a Keenan building.

Now it's called Midtown Towers.

Okay.

And this is the golf building.

The golf building?

Exactly.

So what he's doing is he's flying a drone up and every floor, Chris is takin a new picture of the building.

Then he stitches because if you just took a picture from a helicopter right here, it would have perspective.

Right?

Whereas here it looks like I said, kind of like a Wes Anderson movie set flat, very flat, like an elevation drawing.

And and then he stitches them all together and corrects it and then, you know, takes some picture of the sky from the drone above.

And then he well, so he called me and said, I want each of these buildings to have their story.

So can you research the story and write like you did for Hi for for multi stories.

So this is called high rises and you can see it online.

Now there's I think we've got more than 40 cities now.

We've got more than closing in on 150 buildings.

And just like with my book, thes are from not just the standard, you know, the New York, Chicago but we've been coast to coast.

So how do we find this online?

You go to high rises collection, dot.com, high with a g h h i h high rise collection dot com and for each we can sort them to see al the buildings from the 19 tens, see all the buildings from the south, see all the buildings, you know, that are art deco or gothic style.

And each on you've got like a short story, you got to the vital statistics, how many stories they are, how tall but also and the architects.

But you hear little stories behind them and I think it sounds great.

No, I will look forward to that.

And I didn't know that I could already do it online.

But we'll let everybody kno that through our Web site, too.

Absolutely.

It's fun.

You can browse through the whole thing.

And then there are prints like this available now.

And so this photographer just knew you from your book.

Indeed.

That's cool.

That's right.

He I guess he saw the book or he saw my website, housertalks.com.

All right.

And and he gave me a buzz and said, Hey, would you be interested in getting involved with this project?

And he came out here, we met and had brunch at the speckled egg, and I showed him around and we went up in the Oliver building and I gave him my spiel and lo and behold, for more than a year now, we just got back on our last trip.

But it's fun to discover the skyscrapers in cities that no one would know about, right?

So we last year we were u and when we were up in Chicago, we also went up to Saint Paul in Minneapolis.

But we stopped in Rochester Minnesota, where the Mayo Clinic is, which is a gorgeous art deco skyscraper with a tile roof.

The Mayo Clinic is a skyscraper.

Yeah, I didn't know that.

Okay.

And it's tremendous.

It's one of my favorites in the collection.

Buffalo has the city hall in Buffalo is on my phone.

It's my.

It's my screensaver.

So you can get these, like, phone screensavers, too.

We were just in Missouri and Nebraska, so we went to Saint Louis, Kansas City and Lincoln, Nebraska.

I think I saw on your Facebook page you gave a congratulations for this.

They state government building the state capitol is an art deco skyscraper in Lincoln, Nebraska.

It's like the only skyscraper in Lincoln, Nebraska.

But it's good, you know, And it's funn because the Lincoln Highway goes through Lincoln, Nebraska, but I don't remember that.

I you know, I don't know how much time we spent in Lincoln, Nebraska.

Yeah.

And we were doing the Lincoln Highway, but so but we've seen so many wonderful buildings, and it's just fun to uncover their stories and it's fun to share these stories with people because just like we're proud of some things in Pittsburgh and even more proud when we learn some of this Pittsburgh histor that isn't as widely recognized.

There's so much more to discover in these cities across the country, and it's just wonderful.

A beautiful era of design.

I totally agree with you and I and I love that you get to do this and that you're doing this.

And I know that we could talk all day before we before we wrap up, I want to talk about the fact that usually you have a bow tie on this.

So and I did a thing for the 48 hour film competition.

I don't know if you know that.

It's when you know I've heard of it.

Yeah.

And they get an assignment on a Friday and they have till Monday to to make a little movie.

I think it's maximum of like eight or 9 minutes long.

They don't know what the subject's going to be or wha the what they have to include.

They're like all kinds of rules.

It's a competition, but it's really fun.

And some guys that we're working here at QED, I'm going to guess ten years ago, Andy Kelman and Mike Rubino, who's part of the Arcade Comedy Theater downtown, they were working on one of these together and they asked me if I would do a voice, and I said, I'd love to do a voice.

And they said, Would you act?

I said, Sure.

You know if you want me to do something.

They called me on Saturday morning and said, You said you, you'd act and we need you to come dow with a suit on and we need you to get us on top of a building in the strip district.

And I said, okay, I think I can make some calls about that.

And I might.

I said to them, Do you want me to wear a necktie or a bow tie?

I mean I have no idea why I asked that.

And they said, Oh, bow tie.

And so I wore a bow tie that day.

And I, I just so many people commented on it.

I loved it.

I've never worn a necktie since.

I just I made that leap for this 48 hour film competition.

And Ricky the Rat and, you know, I've worn a bow tie.

And there was a time shortly thereafter when there were a lot of bow ties, you saw bow ties and all the men's stores and everything.

But that era seems to be over.

I think you're right.

It's hard to say.

It was just George Wil for the longest time, wasn't it?

Tucker Carlson, even Tucke Carlson, your bow ties for one.

You know what?

Fred Rogers he wore a necktie on the show.

But in life he always wore a bow tie.

Oh, really?

Yeah.

I didn't know, like, if you saw him anywhere but in the show.

Yeah, he had a bow tie, so.

Wow, There's good tradition in this building.

Certainly of bow ties.

Oh, that's fun.

And.

And.

Well, I mean, I didn't really wear a bow tie ever, but I didn't know how to tie one to do anything, what to do with how to how to do it.

But when I started doing my tours of the skyscrapers downtown, which I still do every year, people can find it on like once a year or sometimes a couple, two or three.

But the problem is we don't really have any public buildings that allow you to go on the roof.

So on my weekend tours, you know, I need to I have good relationships with the people like it, especially the coppers building but also others that we visit.

But it needs to be a weekend thing and I can't really ask them to have their staff there watching us bring people through.

But but I do it several times a year and so people can find out when by looking at my website or talks dot com or antique skyscrapers dot com gets you there too.

But I started wearing the bow ties for that and for when I give talk and give tours and it's just a look you know it's kind of fun it's and especially when you're don my favorite is when you're done and if it's a clip on you can't do this.

But if you if you learn how to tie it, then you can pop i And then your James Bond, right?

You got that.

I early on someone said to me, it's the exact same.

Not that you tie in your shoe, I suppose it is.

It's a bow.

It's just like a bow that you tie in your shoe.

I hadn't thought of it.

I mean, it's a little more complicated because you have to pull the ends and make it match and all of that.

Right.

Well.

Well, in addition to the spiffy bow tie, another spiffy piece of sartorial, what do you say, a accouterment or whatever.

Okay, It's these wonderful socks that you gave me.

I have one.

These are my along with the bow tie, almost always wear my skyscraper socks that you gave me.

This these.

I love goofy socks.

Yeah, they're fantastic.

So I have brought some gifts for you.

Oh, okay.

Okay.

Okay.

So.

Well, first, I would like you to have one of these Pittsburg High Rises prints.

Excellent.

That you can have for your office or home or whatever you like it.

And we can, you can enjoy that.

And then I have brought yo a copy, obviously, of my book.

All right.

I think I have one of these already, and I think I still have the.

You sent it to me.

I, I think I just printed You sent me a file because you wanted me to do a blurb.

Yes.

And it's right there on the top.

Right the back.

What a book.

It's amazing and fine.

So all of this is just a continuation of this blurb?

Indeed.

Indeed.

And then finally, I wanted to give you this is from Wiggle Whiskey, and I wanted to pass along a greeting from Wiggle to local Pittsburgh Steelers.

Well, no, but the fellow that helped me with the selection is Dere Minto, who's a stand up comic.

I was going to say I know him from the arcade, right?

Yes, indeed.

Now he has a good Rickey back story.

I have, as I thin I may have told you, I actually before I tell you Derek story and sticking with our theme of wildly diverting from what we were started to say, but I actually had a brief appearance on a Rick Sebak documentary.

And it was 30 years ago when I called you.

So I appeared on in my wife and I and our daughter appeared on a on the strip show.

And I can even sho you real quick as I pulled it up yesterday and took a still for him.

Well, yes, It's you never see my face so I could be lying, but I promise I'm not.

And what you see here is here we go.

I'll spin it sideways and this is woops, this is right after the great bananas.

This is my wife and me and our oldest.

Well, our first child.

There's a little shot for 3 seconds of us walking out the door of st stands.

Why?

Just after you talk about the great banana explosion that blew the spires off of that Polish church, it will inspire me.

You probably.

I mean, I don't know why you would know this about me, but I have great hoarder tendencies.

Oh, yeah, I have that footage.

I have the original.

Oh, we probably have much more of you walking out of there.

Well, it's been made the show, I'm sure.

Yeah, I remember the shoot.

Well we were just there for church, and it was pretty exciting.

And everyone was flipping out in my family and.

Then you can't see our face.

The only face you see is my daughter, which I think was good judgment on the part of your of your team.

But anyway, so that's that that's that's my Rick Sebak.

I love to meet peopl who are in the show, so.

Yeah.

Oh, well, yeah this is so much fun.

Another chance to And we've had cocktails on your porch during COVID.

I was going to say, Yeah, that.

Did you bring me that file?

I think that's you were asking.

You said, would you read this?

And you know.

Right.

Oh, yes.

That's when that's when we were talking.

We did.

You and I see.

I couldn't remember.

We Yeah, I probably I said I think I have a vague recollection, Mark.

I was there on my front porch during the pandemic.

Yeah, exactly.

So that we had, we had carrot cake, Oreos you had provide because we were talking about the new carrot cake, Oreos, an whether they were worth a darn.

So we had carrot cake, Oreos, and then I had a pandemic cocktail made with McLaughlin Distillery's Devil Juice.

That was the Hickory daiquiri.

Okay, So we did that.

And you had laid out quite a nice spread.

So this is for you and is from Derek Minto.

He gives his greetings, his Rick See back story is that he inspired by one of your documentaries.

He shared a lot of its information on a first date and impressed her because she was, he believes, press.

So you got him a good date?

Let's say so so cool and say Saffron Amaro Wow.

I like her put out by Weigl.

Excellent It is with I think saw Segal apples and saffron and it's pretty high proof to for Amaro but you can basically go straight with that or make a nifty cocktail.

I know I like tomatoes very much.

And, you know, I don't know if you know the whole story of Super punch.

No, I don't.

Tell me tomorrow from Italy that's imported only to Pittsburgh, that's a whole nother story anyway.

Well, Mark, thank you so thank you for being on gum fans for helping to hold all o Pittsburgh's buildings together.

And, you know, I wish you total luck and everything.

Well Thank you, Rick.

It's really been a great pleasure to spend some time with you again here.

And my pleasure.

Totally wonderful.

Thanks.

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Thank you.