The Real Carnegie Hall

 So there are at least five "Carnegie Music Halls" in the United States.  The most famous one is in New York, of course.  But there are lesser ones in many of the larger towns where Andrew Carnegie (to soothe his aching conscience) constructed libraries.  In fact, his music halls are usually attached to his libraries.  That's the case in Pittsburgh, Homestead, Braddock, and in this place: Carnegie, PA.  This is the Carnegie Free Library and Carnegie Music Hall in Carnegie, PA...one of the many old industrial satellite cities of Pittsburgh.

If you go around to the side of the big library building, the Carnegie Music Hall has a separate entrance, pictured here.  I got into the library easily enough but couldn't get into the music hall.  However, I do know that it is still an active venue for the performing arts.  Online photos make the interior appear fairly humble, but it is cool that an old manufacturing borough like Carnegie got such an artistic and architectural gem.

 The library's collection is laughable: only two short aisles of non-fiction books, most of which are celebrity and political biographies.  The remainder of the collection is largely pop-fiction from the 1990s: Danielle Steele, Sue Grafton, John Grisham... And yet, the town of Carnegie is cool.  The once-fashionable part of town, including the library and music hall, is built on a hill overlooking the rest of the city.  The lawns around the library are parklike and command a good view when the leaves are off.  This is also a neighborhood of quiet, tree-lined streets and grand old houses.

 Click on this photo to see the two onion-domed churches in the distance, one gold and one blue.  Carnegie is one of those gritty old Western Pennsylvania boroughs that I used to dream about when I was exiled out west.  It's hilly with a nice little river running through it--Chartiers Creek.  It has lots of bridges and wooded hillsides too steep to build on.  It's got ornate old buildings and stately mansions in varying states of decay.  You can imagine being young here, with lots of places to hide, and smoke cigarettes, and meet up with friends.  I know their music is considerably older than I am, but places like this remind me of the sad ballads of Simon and Garfunkel.  "The Sound of Silence."  "The Boxer."  "I Am a Rock."  All of those songs seem to echo the sadness and antiquated beauty of places like this.

Also, like all of Pittsburgh's satellite cities, it's got train tracks.  The long, mournful cry of the trains would provide part of the soundtrack to your life in a place like Carnegie, not to mention the low rumbling of the trains' passing.  It would rattle windows and bring traffic to a halt.  I tried to hike today, but the woods just wasn't doing anything for me.  I'm not sure what's happening...