{"id":6478,"date":"2016-02-03T00:21:43","date_gmt":"2016-02-03T05:21:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/newsinteractive.post-gazette.com\/thedigs\/?p=6478"},"modified":"2016-02-04T10:27:15","modified_gmt":"2016-02-04T15:27:15","slug":"theres-nothing-like-it-in-the-world","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/newsinteractive.post-gazette.com\/thedigs\/2016\/02\/03\/theres-nothing-like-it-in-the-world\/","title":{"rendered":"“There’s nothing like it in the world”"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"August <\/a>
August 1952: From an observation deck, visitors watch planes swoop in and out. (Stewart Love\/The Pittsburgh Press) <\/div> <\/div> <\/div>
\"August <\/a>
August 1952: One family makes travel arrangements. (Stewart Love\/The Pittsburgh Press) <\/div> <\/div>
\"August <\/a>
August 1952: Compass in the airport’s floor. (Stewart Love\/The Pittsburgh Press) <\/div> <\/div> <\/div> <\/div>
\"August <\/a>
August 1952: At the penny arcade, one young man takes target practice. (Stewart Love\/The Pittsburgh Press) <\/div> <\/div>
\"August <\/a>
August 1952: One girl takes flight in the penny arcade. (Stewart Love\/The Pittsburgh Press) <\/div> <\/div> <\/div>
\"August <\/a>
August 1952: This young traveler passed time in a toy store. (Stewart Love\/The Pittsburgh Press) <\/div> <\/div> <\/div> <\/div>
\"August <\/a>
August 1952: The photo booth was a popular spot. (Stewart Love\/The Pittsburgh Press) <\/div> <\/div> <\/div>
\"August <\/a>
August 1952: One family watches planes from the observation deck. (Stewart Love\/The Pittsburgh Press) <\/div> <\/div> <\/div> <\/div>
\"August <\/a>
August 1952: One stylish traveler waited for his flight. (Stewart Love\/The Pittsburgh Press) <\/div> <\/div> <\/div>
\"The <\/a>
The airport exterior as it looked in 1965. (Howard Moyer\/The Pittsburgh Press) <\/div> <\/div> <\/div>
\"Aerial <\/a>
Aerial view of the airport in 1968. (The Pittsburgh Press) <\/div> <\/div> <\/div>
\"The <\/a>
The airport looked forlorn and abandoned in 1997. (Lake Fong\/Post-Gazette) <\/div> <\/div> <\/div> <\/div> <\/div>
\nThe first passenger plane to land at Greater Pittsburgh Airport was a sleek TWA Constellation that skidded to a halt shortly before noon on May 31, 1952. Passengers included a bevy of Hollywood stars from the musical \u201cI Dream of Jeanie,\u201d a bio-pic of Stephen Foster. The movie\u2019s \u201cglobal\u201d premiere was scheduled at the Fulton Theater in a few days, and the actors were coming to town for a series of promotional events.<\/p>\n

Nobody remembers the musical and the stars are mostly forgotten, although the performer who had top billing, a guy named Ray Middleton, later turned up in TV shows like \u201cM.A.S.H.\u201d and \u201cCharlie\u2019s Angels.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ah, but the old airport looms large in our memories. In its final days, the facility\u2019s labyrinthine series of corridors and gates seemed cramped and overcrowded. But when it opened in 1952, the airport was considered a gem.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s nothing like it in the world,\u201d the airport\u2019s superintendent boasted at a dedication ceremony attended by an estimated 50,000 people on the same day the movie stars came to town.<\/p>\n

After World War II, Pittsburgh yearned for a new identity, one that involved more than and steel mills and dirty air. Key was the new airport, larger than Washington National and LaGuardia combined.<\/p>\n

The aiport covered 1,600 acres, four times the size of the old Allegheny County Airport at West Mifflin and 40 times larger than the county\u2019s first airport, Rodgers Field.<\/p>\n

\u201cNo airport can match the seven-story terminal of shiny black granite, buff marble and green glass,\u201d wrote The Pittsburgh Press. Amenities included a night club, cocktail lounges, a theater, a recreation center, a penny arcade as well as shops and restaurants.<\/p>\n

\u201cWith smoke control, roads, skyscrapers, Point Park and now the new airport, Pittsburgh has achievements no city can boast of today,\u201d Mayor David L. Lawrence said.<\/p>\n

But the price tag of $33 million caused some alarm. Critics were up in arms. Pittsburgh didn\u2019t need such an extravagant facility. What if air travel proved to be a passing fad?<\/p>\n

\u201cMost of us feel aviation is here to stay,\u201d said County Commissioner John Kane. He seemed a bit uncertain. Needlessly so. In the airport\u2019s first year, 1.7 million passengers passed through the facility. Its successor, Pittsburgh International Airport, recorded nearly 8 million passengers in 2014.<\/p>\n

A few months after its opening, a reporter and photographer visited the Greater Pittsburgh Airport and discovered it had become a tourist destination. On weekends it would attract 25,000 visitors, who played games in the arcade, had their pictures taken in a photo booth and paid 10 cents to wander onto the observation deck to watch planes swoop in and out.<\/p>\n

The airport had become a greater magnet for visitors than either Mount Washington or the city\u2019s industries, wrote reporter William Faust.<\/p>\n

Of course, Primanti\u2019s had yet to become a thing and the Steelers were more than two decades away from drawing any sort of national attention. And \u201cI Dream of Jeanie\u201d? The movie doesn\u2019t exist on DVD. Maybe it should. A few years ago the New Yorker called it \u201cthe greatest musical that\u2019s never shown.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Pittsburghers couldn’t get enough of the new Greater Pittsburgh Airport in 1952.<\/p>\n

Look at the pictures“There’s nothing like it in the world”<\/span><\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":6497,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true},"categories":[945],"tags":[961,1046,1049],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/newsinteractive.post-gazette.com\/thedigs\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/Web.1952DigsAirport020.jpg?fit=1500%2C976&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":465,"url":"https:\/\/newsinteractive.post-gazette.com\/thedigs\/2014\/07\/14\/pittsburghs-pawn-shops\/","url_meta":{"origin":6478,"position":0},"title":"Pittsburgh\u2019s pawn shops","date":"July 14, 2014","format":"gallery","excerpt":"During the first half of the 20th century, many Pittsburgh neighborhoods included this type of business.","rel":"","context":"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/newsinteractive.post-gazette.com\/thedigs\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/07\/tumblr_n8kfnpbY191rr5swxo4_1280.jpg?fit=1045%2C936&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":6011,"url":"https:\/\/newsinteractive.post-gazette.com\/thedigs\/2015\/10\/21\/who-wouldnt-want-to-take-a-chopper-from-pittsburgh-downtown-to-airport\/","url_meta":{"origin":6478,"position":1},"title":"Who wouldn’t want to take a chopper from downtown Pittsburgh to the airport?","date":"October 21, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"Both companies called Pittsburgh Airways were doomed to fail, for different reasons.","rel":"","context":"","img":{"alt_text":"Celebration of the opening of the heliport on the Mon at the foot of Wood Street. 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