[PRCo] Testing post and hello there!

[Fred Schneider]

Your comment, "Went downtown by myself all the time after about the age of 10 or so - unimaginable today I guess" shows a lot of understanding.   We all did things like you did back then.   I moved out of Pittsburgh at age 9 to a small town in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania and began hanging out in the Reading station and watching steam engines.   When we went back to Pittsburgh to see the grandparents, I would begin to break loose.   By age 12, I was beginning to float all around Pittsburgh and by 13 there was no way you were going to restrain me.   At 13 I was exploring Pittsburgh on Sunday Passes.

Now, unimaginable today?   There is a favored restaurant at Eat and Park in Washington, PA (she is now on leave) who told me a few years ago that South Hills Village Mall instituted a ruling that no children under age 18 would be permitted in the mall without adult supervision.  If mall security picks up a kid, they call the parents.  If the parents don't care to pick up their kid, they call the police to come and get the offender.   A week after I was told that, I read an account in papers in this end of the state that a mall in York, Pennsylvania made a similar rule.   Last month I read of another mall doing it … only adult supervision in that mall is considered 21 or over.   

You are right Robert.   What we did would not be permitted today.   

That means you are legally old enough to produce a child of your own but not old enough to go into the mall and buy a birthday gift for the mother of the child you created!   

And where are you today? 



On May 28, 2013, at 8:04 PM, Robert Spangler wrote:

> Stumbled across this site as I'm laying around with the flu and waxing
> nostalgic about the Burgh (like so many, I left for economic opportunities
> elsewhere about 30 years ago).
> 
> I didn't realize my days on trolleys in Pgh meant so much to me - I think I
> knew a fair amount but I've learned so much more here.  I have a couple
> questions I'll ask in subsequent posts, but this is just to introduce
> myself.
> 
> For someone born relatively late (1957), I was privileged to have had a
> pretty good immersion in the PCC days.  I grew up in Bon Air on Institute
> St, with the Bon Air stop literally behind my house, so I knew the 35-36-37
> like the back of my hand.  Went downtown by myself all the time after about
> the age of 10 or so - unimaginable today I guess.
> 
> My dad worked in a drug store on Brownsville Rd. where the old car barn
> used to be, and my grandparents lived about 3 doors away from the 42/38 on
> Potomac Ave in Dormont, so I used to take that to see them all the time,
> transferring at the Junction of course.
> 
> I went to Overbrook for what we used to call Junior High, so I took the
> Shannon lines there right from behind my house (took about 5 min as opposed
> to a 20-25 minute bus ride, and it stopped right at Saw Mill Run behind the
> school), and was even privileged to ride the 53-Carrick for the first few
> months that I attended Carrick High School in the Fall of 1971.  I can tell
> you from first hand experience that the buses could NOT handle nearly the
> crush of students when class let out.
> 
> I even remember when the 53 used to go through the Southside (what is it
> now - the "Flats"?) and I vividly remember being taken to Forbes Field on a
> trolley when I was about 7 or 8.  Sadly, I think I just missed being able
> to ride on the 77/54, although I may have done so when very young.  I DO
> remember being on a car that caught fire - #1654,  Will never forget my Mom
> panicking. Still, my parents were LIVID when PAT started to take the
> streetcars away.
> 
> I do have tons of memories and loved those old PCCs.  Thanks to all of you
> for contributing to this site and keeping some of the old days alive (and
> getting me through a couple days of illness)
> 
> 
> 
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