The woman at the liquor store rang up my purchases and commented on my T-shirt: “I’m a Steeler fan, too.” Though it is early in the (potential for a) professional football season, I’ve grown nostalgic for the sound and fury of smashing men, and the nattering nabobs in the broadcast booths. (Thanks, Bill Safire.) I dug out the black and gold to coordinate with the rest of the black attire I’d adopted for the day, and on this stop at the store, was again pleased to find another Steeler fan. I told the woman that I was born in Pittsburgh, and that another clerk at another liquor store was also a fan, one to whom I had given a front license plate reading “Steelers #1 Fan.”
In 1970, my new bride and I took off from Pittsburgh Pennsylvania in our 1963 Volkswagen Bug, and after 6 weeks of camping across the country, arrived in Los Angeles California. One of the many Southern California pleasures we encountered was the novel experience of having drivers honk at us and wave us down: “Are you from Pittsburgh? I saw the Pennsylvania plates on your car. We are Steeler fans!” We found a “Pittsburghers Club” in Los Angeles, and the club members were all fans of the football team. Steeler fans are everywhere.
I’ve had two stints in the Hoosier state, with the first being 1978 to 1993; my second tour of duty began in 2012. Though I left the state and city of my birth in 1970, I still draft behind me the flag of the State of Pennsylvania, and the “Terrible Towel” of the Pittsburgh Steelers. Home is always home, no matter where you roam. (As my hip-hop-aware daughters would say about my rhyming, “You got bars.”) The captain of a team of pool players in Indianapolis, after attending an Indianapolis Colts away game, surprised me with the gift of a “Terrible Towel” that had been left on every seat in Heinz Stadium as a tribute to broadcaster Myron Cope, who coined the term. (Ironically, the term was coined in 1975 to get fans excited about a playoff game against the “Baltimore” Colts.)
In 2013, I moved to Irvington, and in a search for a place to play pool, I touched bases at Si Greene’s, Shi-Kay’s, the 10th Street Pub (on the recommendation of my landlord) and the Sawmill Saloon on Sherman, near 16th Street. I walked into The Sawmill one Sunday in October 2014, carrying the case that holds my pool cues and wearing Steeler gear. A man sitting at the bar noted my accoutrements and said: “A pool player and a Steeler fan. I’m gonna beat you on the pool table and my team is gonna beat yours.” I quietly disagreed, and the Steelers beat the Colts that day, 51-34; I beat that man by an equally large margin. (I deny that there were funds wagered, and exchanged.)
The liquor store clerk later told me that her father is also a die-hard fan. When she told him that she remembered a game that Pittsburgh played against Kansas City, he blurted out the score: “42-37.” We fans of the ‘Burgh remember those things. One of the readers of this publication noted my mentions of my hometown and e-mailed me, saying that he was a Western Pennsylvania native. Ken Collier-Magar introduced me to the Sunday meetings of Steeler fans at the 10th Street Pub, where the games were broadcast on one of the big screen TVs. I hope “Dat Rona” doesn’t cancel out the tradition.
Steeler fans are everywhere. Thanks, Indy.
cjon3acd@att.net