Editor's Picks category, Page 398
Pumpkin spice lovers, rejoice – tasty blend returns early this year
Is mid-August too early for pumpkin spice flavors to make their annual appearance? Not according to Dunkin’ and Starbucks. Fall products from Dunkin’ will be on the menu beginning Wednesday, their earliest-ever rollout. The Starbucks pumpkin spice latte will return Aug. 25, according to Business Insider. Are people craving cooler...
Western Pa. women played pivotal roles in passage of 19th Amendment a century agoVideo
Tennessee tipped the scales to codify women’s suffrage in the U.S. Constitution 100 years ago Tuesday, becoming the 26th state to ratify the 19th Amendment on Aug. 18, 1920. Long before that, however, the battle to give women the right to vote played out in communities large and small. Women...
Facing incurable, speech-robbing disorder, Westmoreland Chamber CEO Chad Amond forges ahead
The first signs of trouble were unmistakably odd. It wasn’t like Chad Amond to forget the name of someone he knew as they greeted. Not once but twice. And it certainly wasn’t like him to ask his wife, Amy, when she brought home a new type of his favorite ginger...
Week in review: Schools told to remain flexible; Pitt students move in; Post-Gazette employees authorize strikeVideo
Here were the biggest stories of the past week: Keep flexible Schools should remain consistent but flexible in how they educate students when school resumes at several districts later this month. State health officials said a spike in covid-19 cases may require districts to change how they teach students. The...
Pittsburgh Foundation ramps up for fund drive to benefit nonprofits as pandemic exacerbates needs
Dan Carney is growing more anxious by the day. Carney is executive director of the Union Mission, an agency that oversees a Latrobe homeless shelter and provides housing assistance in Westmoreland County. His phone keeps ringing these days with inquiries from residents hit by the coronavirus pandemic and the economic...
New Kensington junior firefighter advances in ranks with plans to go proVideo
Mark Jackson had just finished talking about his plans to become a professional firefighter on Friday when an alert on his phone went off, telling him there was a fire just down the street from his station, New Kensington Fire Department Company 2. A heartbeat later, the deafening siren went...
Marge Simpson uses her voice to call out Trump adviserVideo
Marge Simpson has advice for a lawyer with the Trump campaign: Do not name call. In a clip posted Friday by Fox’s animated series “The Simpsons,” matriarch Marge chided the attorney over a tweet comparing her voice to that of the Democratic vice presidential contender, Sen. Kamala Harris. Kamala sounds...
Shrine to ‘Our Lady of the Parkway’ in Oakland may receive historic designation
The Shrine of the Blessed Mother, located on a South Oakland hilltop overlooking the Parkway East and Monongahela River, may soon receive historic designation, after a unanimous recommendation this week by Pittsburgh’s Planning Commission. The Shrine, created by a collection of community members in the mid-20th century, was blessed in...
‘Apocalypse ’45’ brings last days of World War II into your home
Only those who fought in World War II really know what it was like. Over the decades since the war ended with the dropping of atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August, 1945, movie dramatizations and documentaries using heavily edited, rapid cut newsreel footage have skewed America’s perception of...
Salvation Army’s Back-to-School Bash Drive-Through to provide essentials for students
The Salvation Army is hosting a Back-to-School Bash Drive-Through on Saturday to provide back-to-school essentials for local students. Advance registration is required. Students will receive backpacks, gently used clothes and shoes, and snacks. A limited number of onsite haircuts will also be available for students. The event is scheduled from...
Construction project unearths Civil War era cannonballs in Pittsburgh
A construction crew in Pittsburgh recently unearthed a piece of history. The Franjo Construction crew was turning soil for a new condominium development on 39th Street, between the Allegheny River and Butler Street in Lawrenceville, on July 2 when they found a piece of buried history, Pittsburgh Public Safety officials...
AMC to offer 15-cent tickets on first day of reopening
NEW YORK — AMC Theatres, the nation’s largest movie theater chain, will reopen in the U.S. on Aug. 20 with retro ticket prices of 15 cents per movie. AMC Entertainment, which owns the chain, said Thursday that it expects to open the doors to more than 100 cinemas — or...
Answering The Call: Meet the expert helping UPMC employees work remotelyVideo
During the covid-19 pandemic, many people are working remotely, including tens of thousands of UPMC employees. The person largely responsible for making this happen is UPMC systems engineer Crystal Morgan, an online security expert and former songwriter from Los Angeles. In this edition of Answering the Call, Morgan discusses working...
Pine Township man recognized as ‘Big of the Year’ for Pennsylvania by Big Brothers Big Sisters
Brady Smith concedes that his description of family life while growing up in southern New Jersey may seem overly idyllic to some people. But the nurturing he received from his parents not only helped shape him as an adult, it served as a foundation for Smith’s efforts to help others....
Poll worker needs ranked critical in Washington, Westmoreland, Fayette counties
Westmoreland County, as well as Fayette and Washington counties, face an uphill battle when it comes to recruiting poll workers for the presidential election this fall, researchers found. A study produced by Boston-based bipartisan nonprofit The Voter Protection Corps and Carnegie Mellon University found the counties were among 15 across...
Trib partners with investigative nonprofit Spotlight PA
Trib Total Media on Thursday became a partner in Spotlight PA, the nonprofit investigative newsroom based in Harrisburg that covers state government. Spotlight PA was launched in September 2019 through The Philadelphia Inquirer and the Lenfest Institute for Journalism, which operates the Inquirer. Trib Total Media joins PennLive/Harrisburg Patriot-News as...
Location of time capsule buried in a North Huntingdon school courtyard remains a mysteryVideo
The location of a time capsule buried 31 years ago in a former Norwin elementary school courtyard remains as much a mystery today as the contents sealed inside it, despite a couple of hours of digging into the solid earth and using a metal detector to try to find it....
Unity family appeals backyard chicken violation, want birds classified as petsVideo
Kristin Kuhns and her husband, Jeff, say the chickens they keep in their Unity backyard provide their family with companionship as well as eggs, and they want township officials to ease up on regulation of the birds. After a neighbor in the Lawson Heights neighborhood complained about the Kuhnses’ 20...
Take a drive through the Pittsburgh Zoo’s ‘Carnival’ on FridayVideo
The Pittsburgh Zoo & PPG Aquarium’s annual summer gala has gone mobile. Because of the coronavirus pandemic, a traditional event at the zoo in Highland Park wasn’t able to be held. So organizers went on the move and created “Carnival: Drive Thru at the Zoo.” The sold-out soiree is from...
Point Park University implements new safety measures for fall reopeningVideo
Point Park University’s plans for reopening include thorough signage, capacity limits in rooms and elevators and a lot of Plexiglas. As students prepare to return to campus this fall, university leaders have implemented a variety of new measures to promote social distancing, mask-wearing and other safety protocols to prevent the...
Fayette County singer in running for country music awardsVideo
A country singer from Fayette County is hoping to up her industry profile through awards from two music industry organizations. Katrina Lynn Whetsel of White, who performs as Katrina Lynn, is nominated for honors from the Atlanta-based International Singer Songwriters Association and Fair Play Country Music, an online magazine and...
Western Pa. leaders working to exceed census response rates from 2010
Fewer people have responded to the 2020 census across Western Pennsylvania than in 2010, new data shows. According to the Pennsylvania State Data Center, several area counties, including Allegheny and Westmoreland, are about 5 percentage points behind self-response rates recorded in 2010. That means fewer people so far have responded...
Pittsburgh Symphony looks to January return to Heinz Hall
The Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra is planning its return to Heinz Hall in January, but in the meantime will offer a new digital music series free to the public this fall. The digital programming will introduce a “reinvented” 2020-21 season, the symphony’s 125th, taking the place of in-person concerts that have...
Pittsburgh’s North Shore restaurants endure summer without sports fans
Rico Lunardi opened the third location of Slice on Broadway, his local pizza chain in 2016 at PNC Park. He guesses he missed only five or six Pirates game nights since he opened the spot with a street entrance on Federal Street. “I will never be a professional athlete, but...
As Post-Gazette employee representatives consider a strike, analysts say strategy can be dicey
A strike is “in the arsenal” for newspapers to use in labor negotiations, said Rick Edmonds, a media business analyst for the Poynter Institute. But it’s “sort of the atomic bomb,” he said. Edmonds, referring to a potential strike at the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, said these work stoppages once were commonplace...
