Adventures of a third grader in Iowa
Although I was born in southwest Pennsylvania, my family moved around a little bit. At the age of eight, I found myself once again transplanted, this time all the way to Davenport, Iowa. To say that this was a change of scenery would be an understatement. Instead of the beautiful hills and trees I was used to, there was flat farmland covered with nothing but corn as far as the eye could see. Well, at least outside of the Quad Cities. That too was a change. Davenport was the biggest city I had ever lived in. (Yes, Iowa does have cities.)
I really felt out of place. Everyone talked different. Heck, everyone looked different. When I did manage to start up a conversation, they would ask me where I was from, and I would tell them Pennsylvania. I gave up on trying to tell them the town name, Greensburg after the first or second attempt. I don’t think my fellow grade schoolers were too sure where that was, but it sounded like someplace that had really big cities and lots of crime. I was looked on with a mixture of pity, contempt, suspicion, and sympathy for what must have been a harrowing escape.
However, fate was about to intervene. The year was 1972, and for some unknown reason, the owner of the NBC affiliate was a Pittsburgh Steeler fan. So every Sunday during the fall of third grade, while my friends were watching the Bears or Packers on CBS, my father and I would sit down in front of the television and see a little piece of home.
I never really watched football before. Boy did we pick the right time to start. The Steelers had never won a championship before in their nearly 50 year history, but this year they started playing well. They had this crazy quarterback named Terry Bradshaw that couldn’t win if he started a game, but always won if he came in off the bench. The running back was cool too, but I couldn’t understand why this Irish guy Frank O’Harris had an Italian Army. Of course, later I learned that his name was really Franco Harris, but I never did quite understand the Italian thing. Maybe it had something to do with his partner being French. That’s just more of the mysteries of the world to an eight year old. But my favorite had to be Mean Joe Green. I mean, he came up to the line and growled at people!
So that year I got indoctrinated into the religion of football. I learned that Miami was a cool team too because their coach taught our coach. This was the year that Miami went undefeated. And I learned that the Raiders were evil because they didn’t like Pittsburgh, and would always be punished for their sins. After all, this was the year of the Immaculate Reception. Wow, what a way to get introduced to playoff football. Maybe it was best that Pittsburgh didn’t win the Super Bowl that year. It would have set my expectations too high.
So, for the next six years, until we moved again, every fall I got to be proud of where I came from. After the first Super Bowl win, I gave up completely on saying I was from Greensburg. I would tell them I was from a town just outside of Pittsburgh instead. Gone were the looks of pity and suspicion, replaced with recognition, and perhaps a little envy. After all, how many kids get to say they come from the City of Champions?