WQED Weekly
Pete Flaherty Interview
Clip | 5m 39sVideo has Closed Captions
This segment features an interview with Pittsburgh Mayor Pete Flaherty.
This segment of WQED Weekly features an interview with Pittsburgh Mayor Pete Flaherty. Pete describes growing up in the Northside during the Great Depression and working in his father’s grocery store. This segment also includes interviews with former neighbors who knew him as a child.
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WQED Weekly is a local public television program presented by WQED
WQED Weekly
Pete Flaherty Interview
Clip | 5m 39sVideo has Closed Captions
This segment of WQED Weekly features an interview with Pittsburgh Mayor Pete Flaherty. Pete describes growing up in the Northside during the Great Depression and working in his father’s grocery store. This segment also includes interviews with former neighbors who knew him as a child.
Problems playing video? | Closed Captioning Feedback
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I say that the winner of this election will be the next United States senator.
Yes.
That was the high point to date of Pete Flaherty's political career.
He just clinched the Democratic nomination for Senate.
And in this crowded Hilton ballroom for this one moment, it look for all the world like Pete Flaherty was on his way up.
I'm sure that Mark Twain had something to say about politicians and politics, but I can't remember whether it was that they were born to it.
Like great violinists or whether they just turned out that way.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, the rooms are still the same.
Pete Flaherty was born Frances Flaherty on Pittsburgh's North Side in 1926, and most of his childhood he lived here in this house on Alpine Street, now occupied by the Halsey family.
And, as he tells it, politics was the last thing on his mind.
You see you earlier that you had a dream when you were growing up here.
What was that dream?
Well, I never dreamed that I would be the mayor of the city of Pittsburgh.
Fran, that's, Pete.
Was the second oldest of a family of eight children.
Because of his seniority, he rated this largest bedroom facing Alpine Street.
On warm nights, though, he slept out here on this roof.
Where, on a clear night, if you couldn't see forever, you at least might be able to pick out the city office buildings on the far side of the river.
But Fran, as opposed to Pete, wasn't much of a dreamer.
During the Depression, there just wasn't much to dream about.
Since everybody was in this in the depression.
And I can remember we were sort of all felt that we were in the same boat.
So you really didn't see the, you didn't see, anything else but poverty in a way.
But we didn't realize we were poor.
On the other hand, the neighbor kids played our, parents got along and, it was just a, a great place to grow up.
I played right out here on the street, stickball and basketball.
And, I remember one day we broke this window right here.
The basketball hit it, and, that stopped things for a while.
Wow, you have a good memory.
Fran was one of a couple of hundred seniors at Allegheny High School in the class of 1941.
Evidently, he wasn't one of the class leaders.
His name only appears twice in the yearbook.
And in the class prophecy, among all the future doctors, lawyers and soldiers, Europe was already at war.
It was predicted that he would become a successful businessman.
Oh.
Hello, ma'am.
Are you all right?
How are you?
Hi, Mrs, how are you?
Fran had his first dose of business in his father's grocery store.
A mom and pop affair just a half block from his house.
Now it's the rec room for the Washingtons.
They were old friends of the Flahertys.
Neighbors from the days when the family was living on Alpine Street.
And long time customers.
I remember the sweets most of all.
I remember the candy case was over here.
That's right.
And the candy counter and the ice cream case, was over on this side just along here.
And there was.
Business as usual during the depression.
Was unusually hard on the people of the north side.
Bread was a nickel a loaf and milk just $0.07.
But Flaherty's father sometimes had a hard time collecting his bills.
Every now and then he would, ask me to get down and see if I could collect the delinquent account.
And I really hated to do that.
But, that was a difficult job for me, because I knew the people and I knew how tough it was, to, live and get by it.
Maybe these are the humble roots that they say breed the most successful politicians.
Flaherty, Pete, not Fran, doesn't think too much of that theory.
To him, it was just home.
You tell Jack I said hello.
He said he stayed in the army didnt he?
Flaherty's old time neighbors remember him well.
I remember it.
It would be difficult not to.
The reluctant bill collector turned into big city mayor.
Flaherty's memories, on the other hand, are a little more hazy.
But judging from one afternoon on a cold winter day, they're every bit as nostalgic.
It was, just a great place to grow up.
Little stores, nearby, youngsters all over the place and not too much traffic.
And, that's how I remember the neighborhood.
A real neighborhood.
Mrs.
Chance, do you remember me?
I certainly do, but I was young.
One character.
Yeah, I lived in here for a little doing.
Well, they wanted to come over and see where I grew up and meet some of the people that I knew and.
Well, now you remember me when I was a youngster here and my family.
That's right.
Yeah.
Isn't that wonderful?
It's good to see you again, Mrs.
Shell.
Oh, just as well as I see you.
I think my daughter could see you.
Well, you tell her I said hello.
Okay.
Okay.
And see you again.
You remember us.
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