The other day, I remembered teaching the phrase “Phant, phant, el-e-phant” as a rhythm-teaching phrase to my beginning music students. 1 — 2 — 3 – and 4. Phant = quarter note. Phant = quarter note. El-e = two eighth notes. Phant = quarter note. And it got me thinking about those ...
There was a time when defeating a disease was good news. "Wipe out polio." "Stop smallpox." Neither of those diseases were part of any cultural agenda. We knew that kids were getting sick and dying, and if science could prevent it, that seemed like a good idea. Vaccines have saved millions of ...
In 1970, I was recruited to teach at a junior high school in Johnstown. Although the 1970s would mark the beginning of the American steel industry's decline, Johnstown was still a happening place. There were jobs, families, and lots of kids in the city schools. My bands and orchestras ...
Today, I bought a new tablet, and even though that may not seem too significant to the rest of you, it was to me. No, it wasn't a computer tablet. It was just a little tablet made of white, unlined paper with a gray cardboard back. When I was a good little kid, my dad would stop at Murphy's ...
I recently pulled my Sentinel yearbook off the shelf and lost an afternoon reminiscing. There were about 120 of us in the Dunbar Township High School Class of 1965. We came from the coal patches and railroad villages of Dunbar, Monarch, Leisenring 1 and 2, Dickerson Run, Liberty, Vanderbilt ...
I had a good friend from what many people call "flyover country" who moved to Pennsylvania from Kansas. He once told me, "I learned to drive when I was 12. It wasn't a big deal. If you went off the road in Kansas, you hit corn. But if you go off the road in Pennsylvania, you die." Years later, ...
