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Myron Memories with Elizabeth Cope & Dan Joseph · Pittsburgh Sports Memories

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_01: Hi everybody, welcome to the Pittsburgh Sports Memories Podcast.
• 0:04
  SPEAKER_01: My name is Tim Hannon, and I am joined, as always, by my co-host Steve Wirt.
• 0:11
  SPEAKER_01: In this episode, uh, we had the opportunity to interview the daughter of Myron Cope, Elizabeth Cope, and Dan Joseph.
• 0:19
  SPEAKER_01: Uh those two have collaborated on a new book.
• 0:22
  SPEAKER_01: It's out now.
• 0:23
  SPEAKER_01: It's called Behind the Yoi.
• 0:25
  SPEAKER_01: And uh we we got a chance to ask them about Myron.
• 0:29
  SPEAKER_01: Of course, Myron Cope, an iconic Pittsburgh figure.
• 0:32
  SPEAKER_01: Many of us uh grew up listening to Myron.
• 0:36
  SPEAKER_01: And uh and we got a chance to just ask them about uh, you know, Elizabeth especially about what it was like growing up as the daughter of Myron.
• 0:44
  SPEAKER_01: And uh boy, did they give us some really insightful stories.
• 0:47
  SPEAKER_01: So uh this podcast is just a taste, I think, of what you'll find in the book.
• 0:52
  SPEAKER_01: Uh we'll have links in our show notes for the book and for the YouTube channel, which also has a lot of good stuff.
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_01: Uh but for now, enjoy this interview with the authors of Behind the Yoy.
• 1:19
  SPEAKER_01: So this week we've got Dan Joseph and Elizabeth Cope with us.
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_01: They have written a book called Behind the Yoi: The Life of Myron Cope, Legendary Pittsburgh Steelers Broadcaster.
• 1:32
  SPEAKER_01: You can pick up that book at uh uh Pittsburgh area Barnes and Nobles.
• 1:37
  SPEAKER_01: You can also get it on Amazon, you can also read it on your Kindle, that's where I usually like to read books.
• 1:43
  SPEAKER_01: Uh so welcome, Dan and Elizabeth.
• 1:46
  SPEAKER_04: Thanks for having us.
• 1:47
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, thanks.
• 1:49
  SPEAKER_01: So so Dan, you've um you've written some books on baseball history.
• 1:54
  SPEAKER_01: What what led you to wanting to write about Myron?
• 1:57
  SPEAKER_01: And then how did the two of you connect to do this book?
• 2:02
  SPEAKER_00: I I'm a Steelers fan from birth, almost my birthright.
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_00: I grew up in Pittsburgh.
• 2:09
  SPEAKER_00: And uh Myron was a guy, you know, he was ubiquitous, he was inescapable growing up in Pittsburgh and fascinating.
• 2:19
  SPEAKER_00: Um and I always had had some questions in the back of my mind what made him tick, and uh, and I found out he had been a sports writer before becoming a broadcaster, and so it was just uh an area of curiosity.
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_00: And then my wife, um, she knew a friend of Elizabeth, and this friend said Elizabeth had all of Myron's old uh tapes and papers, um scrapbooks and things, and communicated that Elizabeth wanted to do something with all this.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_00: And so we just kind of got each other's phone numbers and began talking, and in time, yeah, we decided we're gonna do a biography.
• 3:03
  SPEAKER_01: So so uh, you know, you you mentioned Dan Myron kind of being inescapable.
• 3:10
  SPEAKER_01: Elizabeth, I imagine that that there must have been positives and negatives growing up for you with that sort of being the the uh the way that he was for most of us who grew up in Pittsburgh.
• 3:25
  SPEAKER_05: For sure.
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_05: Oh yeah, definitely.
• 3:29
  SPEAKER_05: He um there was definitely lots of uh ups and downs, that's for sure.
• 3:36
  SPEAKER_05: We were stared at everywhere we went, and people interrupted us at dinner and things like that.
• 3:42
  SPEAKER_05: And of course there was positives, but as a child, like a lot of those positives, um, you know, you wouldn't necessarily like realize the full extent of it as a child, like because you don't know any different, and also it's not like oh, you know, we're recognized or we get special treatment.
• 4:02
  SPEAKER_05: You don't realize that when you're five.
• 4:05
  SPEAKER_05: I mean, you don't know that's happening, and you don't really benefit from it actually, because you're just a kid.
• 4:11
  SPEAKER_05: So, but I only just like knew of him as my father.
• 4:15
  SPEAKER_05: I didn't really understand any of that other stuff.
• 4:18
  SPEAKER_05: I didn't even know what he did for a living as a kid.
• 4:20
  SPEAKER_05: I mean, I just I mean, he was just my dad.
• 4:23
  SPEAKER_05: So I mean, I had the ups and downs everyone has with anybody's dad, as far as him being Myron Cope.
• 4:30
  SPEAKER_05: I guess I was aware of that, that that was like uh something different than what my friends had, but I didn't focus on it that much or pay attention.
• 4:40
  SPEAKER_03: Uh Elizabeth, it's uh Steve Ward.
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_03: I'm the co-h co-host with Tim.
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_03: Now, was Myron the same person that he was at home as he was on the air with his public persona, or was that two different kind of people?
• 4:54
  SPEAKER_03: Like he had a public persona and then it's just dad, Myron, at home.
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_05: Um, he was the same.
• 5:00
  SPEAKER_05: I mean, he never put on a false persona, but he definitely toned it down at home.
• 5:07
  SPEAKER_05: Or we might have murdered him.
• 5:09
  SPEAKER_05: You know, I mean, he didn't act like on the air like he did at home, but I mean it definitely was who he was.
• 5:16
  SPEAKER_05: I mean, he always he did he didn't say really yo, but he tended to say oi, like oi ve, and like oi, you know, and like all the yiddish expressions, yeah, all the yiddish expressions, and he also could get excitable, you know.
• 5:31
  SPEAKER_05: He had that kind of personality.
• 5:33
  SPEAKER_05: He was type A personality for sure.
• 5:35
  SPEAKER_05: He had a lot of energy.
• 5:37
  SPEAKER_05: Um, in fact, whenever he was in the home, um you were aware of it, whether he was speaking or not.
• 5:44
  SPEAKER_05: Like when I was up in my bedroom, I knew if he was home because I knew the sound of his foot, like his footprints or whatever, you know, when someone's walking back and forth in the house, like I knew he was home.
• 5:55
  SPEAKER_05: And there was always um, I don't want to say high tension, but um, there was definitely a feel in the house when he was there.
• 6:03
  SPEAKER_05: Maybe some people would like to call it in a positive sense, electric, but um like his presence was known always when he was home.
• 6:14
  SPEAKER_00: You know, that is related to something that we talk about in the book.
• 6:19
  SPEAKER_00: Now, the Myron persona that everybody came to know on radio and TV, like like Elizabeth said, it was related.
• 6:28
  SPEAKER_00: It it grew out of his own natural personality, but it was something that kind of was built.
• 6:34
  SPEAKER_00: Uh uh aspects of that persona were built over time.
• 6:39
  SPEAKER_06: He evolved.
• 6:40
  SPEAKER_00: He evolved, yeah.
• 6:41
  SPEAKER_00: Like if you listen to Myron, I listened to lots and lots of Myron Cope over the last two and a half years doing this book.
• 6:48
  SPEAKER_00: If you listen to Myron from, say, like the late 60s, he hasn't quite revved up yet.
• 6:54
  SPEAKER_00: You know, he's he's he's working on it.
• 6:56
  SPEAKER_00: He's kind of it's like a comedian who hasn't quite found his lane just yet.
• 7:01
  SPEAKER_00: And then by the mid-70s, he was uh on Steeler games, especially, he was getting more excitable, more you know, unleashing the yoys and things like that.
• 7:12
  SPEAKER_00: And then you get up to about the time of Super Bowl XIII.
• 7:16
  SPEAKER_00: That's the whole Myron.
• 7:17
  SPEAKER_00: That is the Myron that everybody knows and remembers, with uh you know, just going off on these metaphors about you know ballet dancers and food.
• 7:28
  SPEAKER_03: Najinski, if I remember correctly.
• 7:31
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 7:32
  SPEAKER_03: I also I I so this is different.
• 7:34
  SPEAKER_03: Like so the 60s Myron is different than I now I'm a little younger, so I remember Myron more from the 90s, and I remember him wearing hammer pants.
• 7:44
  SPEAKER_03: Oh my god.
• 7:46
  SPEAKER_03: Like dancing the I think it was Can't Touch This, wasn't it?
• 7:49
  SPEAKER_03: And it's something.
• 7:50
  SPEAKER_05: I hated those videos.
• 7:53
  SPEAKER_05: He thought they were hysterical, but yes.
• 7:58
  SPEAKER_00: He he always sang, like he always did comment uh on his morning commentaries on WTAE, he would sometimes sing.
• 8:08
  SPEAKER_00: And yes, that was always part of the persona, but then the videos that that was more of a 90s thing, and uh apparently, yeah, he loved doing that.
• 8:16
  SPEAKER_00: And people people loved it.
• 8:19
  SPEAKER_01: Uh climaxing with the uh Macarena video, the famous so so Dan, you you touched a little bit about you know early Myron and and Myron did write an autobiography, and I'm gonna say that was like 2002.
• 8:36
  SPEAKER_01: Uh but but there was much more to Myron's story that wasn't in that book, wasn't there?
• 8:43
  SPEAKER_00: I got to go through with uh Elizabeth's uh permission, I got to go through all these boxes with his he saved not maybe not everything, not in a rat pack kind of sense, but he saved lots and lots of files, of you know, correspondence and contracts and and and things that I hadn't expected, like the the early history of the terrible towel in terms of uh the original contracts and royalty payments and sales charts and things like that.
• 9:13
  SPEAKER_00: You know, it was interesting to see how when they began selling it in 78, you know, it took off.
• 9:23
  SPEAKER_00: And in but for about a year and a half, the sales were just spectacular.
• 9:26
  SPEAKER_00: And Myron was getting these big royalty checks, much of which he donated almost immediately to charity.
• 9:32
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, and then when the Steelers stopped winning Super Bowls, all of a sudden the sales plunged.
• 9:38
  SPEAKER_00: And he actually got a letter from Gimbal's department store.
• 9:41
  SPEAKER_00: They were like the the outlet, and they said, a very terse letter, when when sale when your royalty reaches the amount of$10 per month, we will send you a check.
• 9:54
  SPEAKER_00: That's how much the sales had dropped off by 1981.
• 9:59
  SPEAKER_00: And it kind of laid dormant for more than a decade, and then all of a sudden, in the Bill Cower era, it took off again.
• 10:07
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, that was something that hadn't been in his autobiography.
• 10:12
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and then just a lot of details about like how he changed his name at a surprisingly young age from Copeland to Coke.
• 10:21
  SPEAKER_00: Um you could see a lot about how his writing career evolved.
• 10:27
  SPEAKER_00: He was with the Post Gazette for eight years and then he branched off into magazines.
• 10:32
  SPEAKER_00: And let you get letters from editors about encouraging him to move up and move out.
• 10:38
  SPEAKER_00: You're gonna you can do this, you can be a success.
• 10:41
  SPEAKER_00: Um a lot of stuff about his contracts.
• 10:44
  SPEAKER_00: You could really go into uh great detail about his life and career.
• 10:49
  SPEAKER_01: That that's that's interesting about the towel.
• 10:51
  SPEAKER_01: I I um started going to steal our games with my dad in the 80s when they were you know not so good.
• 10:58
  SPEAKER_01: And and I hadn't thought about it, Dan, until you said it.
• 11:02
  SPEAKER_01: But you're right, people were not waving terrible towels at the River Stadium in the 80s, it just wasn't a thing.
• 11:08
  SPEAKER_01: And then I I want to say it was like that that first playoff game against the Bills where Coward was the coach, and I I sort of remember Myron getting on the radio and let's bring back the towel.
• 11:19
  SPEAKER_01: And it's really been a staple ever since.
• 11:21
  SPEAKER_01: But but you're right, it kind of went away for a while, and people want to remember that.
• 11:24
  SPEAKER_00: He uh he actually faced a little bit of resistance trying to bring it back because uh I I found this one newspaper columnist said, Hey, it's time to move on for the 70s.
• 11:34
  SPEAKER_00: The towels the the towel is this from the decade of tube socks and eight-track tapes, and uh you know, let's try something else.
• 11:44
  SPEAKER_00: But but Myron would not hear of it, and he persisted in especially the 94 seasons when it really came back.
• 11:52
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, and I I certainly get the I get that mentality because I I think again, you know, Steve mentioned he and I are a little younger.
• 12:01
  SPEAKER_01: We were born during the 70s and the time when the Steelers are winning Super Bowls, and then we grew up in this era where you know we we were too young to experience all that, and and I remember Three River Stadium, they were still playing the Steelers polka and that kind of stuff.
• 12:17
  SPEAKER_01: And and you know, this new generation was like, hey, we went we won our own championship and all that kind of stuff.
• 12:23
  SPEAKER_01: Uh but I don't know that anyone ever felt that way about the Tal, right?
• 12:27
  SPEAKER_01: The Tau was just so iconic that and it didn't it it came right back with when the Steelers kind of came back.
• 12:36
  SPEAKER_00: I mean he Myron did sort of engineer that.
• 12:38
  SPEAKER_00: He he found a new distributor and promoter for the town, and of course he was promoting it himself.
• 12:45
  SPEAKER_00: And you know, it was it it hadn't really disappeared from anyone's memory, and no one had bad feelings about it.
• 12:51
  SPEAKER_00: It just it was just waiting for the right moment.
• 12:54
  SPEAKER_00: And and when uh Coward, when the team got good again, you know, the people just picked up the towel.
• 13:02
  SPEAKER_03: This can be uh Dan or Elizabeth here.
• 13:05
  SPEAKER_03: Um, how was Myron viewed by I would say his peers in the media?
• 13:09
  SPEAKER_03: And you can if you want to separate it in the nationally and locally, I know you kind of touched on like there were some people saying that he should have moved on to bigger and better things, but I don't like what were him and Howard Cosell, like they were kind of around the same time.
• 13:23
  SPEAKER_03: Was what was their relationship like?
• 13:25
  SPEAKER_03: Or even I know later him and Madden, I don't know Mark Madden got along, but you know, some of those relationships if you guys could get on get into.
• 13:33
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, he was extremely close with Howard Cosell.
• 13:36
  SPEAKER_05: They were very good friends.
• 13:38
  SPEAKER_05: Um, they liked each other ever since my dad wrote the article about him for Sports Illustrated that won an award.
• 13:45
  SPEAKER_05: Um, they were really close and they had a kind of a sparring relationship.
• 13:49
  SPEAKER_05: They were a lot of fun together.
• 13:51
  SPEAKER_05: And um, I think he got along with most of his peers.
• 13:56
  SPEAKER_05: I mean, he always talked about the business was very competitive for sure.
• 14:01
  SPEAKER_05: And he dealt with some of that as well.
• 14:04
  SPEAKER_05: And um Mark Madden, I do not think they got along.
• 14:09
  SPEAKER_05: Um at the end, especially, no.
• 14:13
  SPEAKER_05: Um, Mark Madden apparently just did not like my father.
• 14:17
  SPEAKER_05: I don't know if he was, I don't want to say jealous.
• 14:20
  SPEAKER_05: I mean, I I don't, I mean, my dad didn't talk to me about like drama at the station or anything like that, but um, they didn't get along.
• 14:29
  SPEAKER_05: But as far as everyone else, I feel like that he was well respected and liked.
• 14:34
  SPEAKER_05: I think uh Mark Madden might be one of the only people I know that um that my father did not get along with.
• 14:41
  SPEAKER_05: And I don't think they didn't get along in person, it was more like comments that were made like out of each other's presence.
• 14:51
  SPEAKER_05: Like Mark would say things about my father, and my dad would hear about it.
• 14:55
  SPEAKER_05: When they were face to face, I think they acted like they got along.
• 14:59
  SPEAKER_05: I mean, that's my impression.
• 15:01
  SPEAKER_05: But he he was very close with Howard Cosell, and he had many opportunities to um go to a bigger market.
• 15:09
  SPEAKER_05: They called him um from New York, um, LA, and um he thought about it, is my understanding.
• 15:18
  SPEAKER_05: He thought about it, and then I guess he wanted to stay in Pittsburgh, or I I remember something went awry with like a tape he was sending forward, but he feels like they would have had him just mainly because his ratings were top in Pittsburgh, and I guess that's really the most important thing that they would be looking for in a bigger market, what your ratings are, and he always had the number one spot in Pittsburgh during his whole career.
• 15:44
  SPEAKER_03: Yo in New York just wouldn't have been the same.
• 15:46
  SPEAKER_03: I don't I don't know.
• 15:47
  SPEAKER_03: That would have been yeah, definitely weird.
• 15:49
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, maybe.
• 15:52
  SPEAKER_00: Can I just add a couple uh comments to that?
• 15:55
  SPEAKER_00: Uh yeah, he got along pretty much, I think, with everybody in in the Pittsburgh market, uh, especially that Bill Hill Bill Hillbroke was like one of his closest friends.
• 16:06
  SPEAKER_00: He did have kind of a rivalry with the late Stan Savron, and that's um one of the things we talk about in the book.
• 16:13
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but otherwise, and he he he and Sam Nover apparently had some sort of uh they rubbed each other the wrong way, I think.
• 16:22
  SPEAKER_00: But but generally he got along well with everyone.
• 16:24
  SPEAKER_00: Now, in terms of going to other markets, uh some of the people I talked to thought Myron's style was so Pittsburgh-based that he wouldn't necessarily translate that well to other markets, you know, like Los Angeles.
• 16:41
  SPEAKER_00: I it's hard to see him doing his shtick in LA or in other cities, although maybe New York would have worked.
• 16:48
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not sure.
• 16:49
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but yeah, he he wanted to stay in Pittsburgh.
• 16:52
  SPEAKER_00: The only, the only uh serious, the only other offer he seriously considered was when Katie KDKA tried to hire him away a couple of times from WTAE, and he wound up getting a much bigger contract at WTAE both times that it happened.
• 17:13
  SPEAKER_00: But he was very loyal to the station.
• 17:15
  SPEAKER_00: Uh he had a lot of friends there.
• 17:17
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and they treated him well when uh there were either he had health problems or there were other things he had to deal with, and they gave him time off.
• 17:26
  SPEAKER_00: So he I think he was happy where he was, both in the city and in the station where he worked.
• 17:33
  SPEAKER_05: He was very adaptable though.
• 17:35
  SPEAKER_05: Like he always said that he thinks he could have translated to other co other states, uh, parts of the country.
• 17:42
  SPEAKER_05: Um, I think he definitely believed he would have been successful, but who knows?
• 17:47
  SPEAKER_05: You know, I mean he was happy and he wasn't all about like having the biggest stage or or anything like that.
• 17:54
  SPEAKER_05: He was he he was happy and content.
• 17:57
  SPEAKER_05: He wasn't overly ambitious in that regard.
• 18:00
  SPEAKER_01: So, folks, once again, the book is called Behind the Yoi.
• 18:04
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, you can find that at Barnes and Noble or Amazon.
• 18:07
  SPEAKER_01: We will post links to that in our show notes.
• 18:09
  SPEAKER_01: You guys mentioned Howard Cosell before.
• 18:12
  SPEAKER_01: Obviously, that was one of the more famous articles that Myron wrote in Sports Illustrated was the profile.
• 18:18
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, you guys also mentioned the YouTube channel where you've been uh uploading some of this great archival material you'll have you have.
• 18:26
  SPEAKER_01: And uh he told a story years later, I guess, that uh Howard was kind of angry about the article at first, but then but then came around.
• 18:36
  SPEAKER_01: Um do you guys have do you guys have any more insight on that?
• 18:41
  SPEAKER_05: He was uh he was angry about that article because my dad had to write.
• 18:45
  SPEAKER_05: I mean, he was a writer, he wrote objectively, he couldn't just like sugarcoat things or only say this person like their good side, or he wanted to tell the truth.
• 18:56
  SPEAKER_05: So he um he did, he told the truth of what he knew of Howard, and Howard didn't like that, and um but it it ended up being something that got a lot of attention, and Howard did like that, and so so then he was okay with that, and they were friends again because people would you know see Howard on you know the streets of New York and they'd say, Oh, you know, we saw you in sports, we read about you in Sports Illustrated, how wonderful, and so then he changed his tune and and he was okay.
• 19:29
  SPEAKER_05: But when he first read the article, he he was upset apparently.
• 19:33
  SPEAKER_05: That's how the story goes.
• 19:35
  SPEAKER_05: My dad said that he didn't call him, you know, and it was noticeable because he would call my dad up on the phone almost every single day while he was writing the article.
• 19:45
  SPEAKER_05: And then when it came out on the newsstands, the phone was silent for a couple days.
• 19:51
  SPEAKER_01: Interesting.
• 19:52
  SPEAKER_01: Interesting.
• 19:53
  SPEAKER_01: What what what do you guys in this book, what what is it that you would want people to know about Myron the writer?
• 19:59
  SPEAKER_01: Because he really had a whole distinguished career before he started doing Steeler games and before he did the radio show.
• 20:09
  SPEAKER_01: And you can actually still go back and read a lot of his stuff.
• 20:12
  SPEAKER_01: Sports Illustrated has a great vault on their website where you can go back and read some of his old articles.
• 20:18
  SPEAKER_01: And they're really, really well written and some really interesting insight.
• 20:22
  SPEAKER_01: You know, he's not just writing like game recaps, right?
• 20:24
  SPEAKER_01: He's doing human interest stories and things like that.
• 20:26
  SPEAKER_01: So, what is it that you guys would want people to know about Myron, the writer?
• 20:31
  SPEAKER_05: Well, for me, one thing, like when he transferred over to broadcasting, he still was sort of like the writer as far as like there is nobody, I don't think, in broadcasting history, I can safely say, even today, that prepared for a game more than him.
• 20:47
  SPEAKER_05: As far as he didn't just go on the air and wing it.
• 20:50
  SPEAKER_05: I mean, he did wing it, but like as far as like preparation, he researched every player on the Steelers roster, every player on the opposing team, tried to find colorful stories about them, background about them, nicknames from their childhood, so that whenever the opportunity presented itself in a broadcast, he could throw that out there.
• 21:13
  SPEAKER_05: That's why he was so successful because of he really worked hard.
• 21:19
  SPEAKER_00: When he was doing the magazine career, he would travel all over the place.
• 21:24
  SPEAKER_00: And because he didn't want to just, you know, phone somebody up and do an interview.
• 21:28
  SPEAKER_00: He wanted to get all the sights and the smells and the sounds that he can really make that person or that game or that setting really come alive.
• 21:36
  SPEAKER_00: And I mean, there's a whole chapter on it in the book.
• 21:40
  SPEAKER_00: Um he uh he wanted to be known on some level.
• 21:46
  SPEAKER_00: I think he to the end, he thought of himself primarily as a writer.
• 21:50
  SPEAKER_00: And he wanted at when he retired um at his retirement press conference, he's he said he wanted to be remembered mainly as a writer.
• 21:59
  SPEAKER_00: It was very Deep within his personality, even after 30 years of broadcasting.
• 22:08
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, he was always when he was growing up, he was one of those people that always knew what he wanted to do for a living.
• 22:14
  SPEAKER_05: Like when he went to college, you know, a lot of people don't know what to major in.
• 22:19
  SPEAKER_05: He always knew, he said he wanted to be a newspaper man.
• 22:23
  SPEAKER_05: He wanted to write in a newspaper.
• 22:24
  SPEAKER_05: That was his like dream.
• 22:29
  SPEAKER_01: So you guys uh you guys touched on this in the book when you said you know, Myron wasn't afraid to to do things like touch on a a player's race or religion.
• 22:40
  SPEAKER_01: Uh obviously things are are different today than they were in Myron's heyday in terms of what you can and cannot say publicly without getting splashed all over social media.
• 22:50
  SPEAKER_01: Do you think how do you think he'd be received today?
• 22:54
  SPEAKER_01: Do you think this environment would have changed his approach at all?
• 22:57
  SPEAKER_01: Or do you think he just he just would have had to have been true to himself no matter what and just dealt with whatever came with it?
• 23:04
  SPEAKER_00: He he would have run into a lot more flack.
• 23:07
  SPEAKER_00: Uh just if people would hammer him as they hammer almost everybody on social media, uh, and someone as outspoken as he was, if he if he took the exact same approach today, he wouldn't have the relatively smooth sailing that he had throughout his career.
• 23:25
  SPEAKER_00: The station protected him to some extent.
• 23:29
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, and I'm not sure a station would be able to protect him now without facing a lot of protests online or or from some various pressure group.
• 23:41
  SPEAKER_00: I think he'd have to adjust partially.
• 23:45
  SPEAKER_05: I agree.
• 23:47
  SPEAKER_05: I agree.
• 23:48
  SPEAKER_05: I think um if he had grown up in this era, I think he would he would know that what he could and could not get away with.
• 23:58
  SPEAKER_05: I I would like to think that he would he would have to adjust how outspoken he could be.
• 24:06
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, so so even even without the uh social media you know climbing all over everything kind of mentality.
• 24:13
  SPEAKER_01: He Myron still managed to cause some controversies.
• 24:17
  SPEAKER_01: Uh uh one one that uh you guys have on the again on the YouTube channel is uh the last game at Three River Stadium.
• 24:25
  SPEAKER_01: He was calling the Washington Redskins the Washington Redfaces.
• 24:29
  SPEAKER_01: And Daniel Snyder, the owner of the Redskins, apparently sent an employee in to tell him to stop.
• 24:35
  SPEAKER_01: And and Myron had a great reaction to that.
• 24:38
  SPEAKER_01: Uh typical typical response to that.
• 24:42
  SPEAKER_01: What what what what what other you guys did a whole chapter called Myron the Contrarian.
• 24:47
  SPEAKER_01: So what other controversies do you sort of delve into on the book that that he got himself into?
• 24:53
  SPEAKER_00: Well okay, well, I mean the one that probably got him in the most hot water was uh when Mike Tyson was on trial uh for raping like a beauty uh pageant contestant in Indianapolis.
• 25:11
  SPEAKER_00: And Myron, without really without defending Mike Tyson, he said that this girl, she was only 18, I think.
• 25:20
  SPEAKER_00: She she should have known better than to go into Mike Tyson's um hotel room.
• 25:25
  SPEAKER_00: And he said, you know, she he was implying that she was somewhat guilty for her own rape, as as horrible as this sounds.
• 25:36
  SPEAKER_00: And that was one of the few times people really did raise a cue and a cry, and and there were a lot of telephone calls.
• 25:43
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, and then it kind of died down, and then when Tyson was convicted, he said it again.
• 25:48
  SPEAKER_00: And so there was another um outcry.
• 25:53
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but he survived it.
• 25:55
  SPEAKER_00: Then there was no, you couldn't do obviously a social media campaign in 1992.
• 26:02
  SPEAKER_00: Um that that would be something that he probab that might cost him his job today, I think.
• 26:09
  SPEAKER_00: Uh and he was he was able to get away with other things, like um he was so popular that he decided no smoking signs did not apply to him.
• 26:20
  SPEAKER_00: Um he would uh smoke in the WTAE studio, in the booth at Three Rivers.
• 26:27
  SPEAKER_00: He would go to other stadiums and try to smoke there, and then a security guard would have to tell him to put it out.
• 26:34
  SPEAKER_00: Um time there was uh the Pittsburgh Jewish Chronicle, the columnist criticized him for speaking at a club that barred Jews, and Myron wrote the angriest letter to the to the chronicle, and he ended it with saying, you know, if this guy ever butts into his my business again, I'm gonna find him and bust every tooth out of his mouth.
• 26:58
  SPEAKER_00: But they didn't print that.
• 27:00
  SPEAKER_00: They were either saving Myron's reputation or the other guy's reputation.
• 27:04
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I mean, these were things that, you know, the examples of him being, you know, a little difficult to deal with, a little uh prickly, I guess one might say.
• 27:17
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and then you can just imagine today, right?
• 27:20
  SPEAKER_01: Like that stuff would be Twitter headlines and everything else.
• 27:25
  SPEAKER_00: People would be taking smartphone pictures of him smoking cigarettes and inside, and he he'd he'd basically he'd have hell to pay for things like that.
• 27:34
  SPEAKER_05: He did get into a fight once about the smoking on the Steeler plane going to a game that was interesting with Greg Lloyd, because Greg Lloyd did confront him and told him to put it out, and they had a standoff, and he said no.
• 27:48
  SPEAKER_05: And I guess Greg Lloyd like kicked one of his suitcases or something, and my dad said, you know, you do that again, and you'll get a letter from my attorney.
• 27:57
  SPEAKER_05: And then they just both sat down and I'm like, Dad, what are you doing?
• 28:01
  SPEAKER_05: Picking a fight with a guy like that.
• 28:04
  SPEAKER_05: You know, he's huge.
• 28:06
  SPEAKER_05: But my dad wasn't afraid, and you know, he was so like I wanted him to quit smoking, so obviously I was like, you don't need to be doing that, but you couldn't tell him anything.
• 28:18
  SPEAKER_03: Well, if Greg Lloyd can't get him to quit smoking, what choice, what chance did any of the rest of us have?
• 28:23
  SPEAKER_04: No, it wasn't gonna happen, unfortunately.
• 28:27
  SPEAKER_04: Unfortunately.
• 28:30
  SPEAKER_01: Uh the the you guys talked before about the terrible towel.
• 28:35
  SPEAKER_01: Um, you know, Elizabeth, you you wrote some stuff in the book.
• 28:41
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, you know, that's that's obviously like you guys said, an iconic Pittsburgh symbol, and and people take their towels with them all over the world.
• 28:48
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but you you wrote some very just kind of open and vulnerable and honest feelings uh about that in the book.
• 28:55
  SPEAKER_01: Um would you care to share any of those?
• 28:58
  SPEAKER_05: Um, yeah.
• 28:59
  SPEAKER_05: Um, well, you know, people always come up to me and say, Oh, that's so wonderful what your dad did, giving all the money to charity.
• 29:08
  SPEAKER_05: And I always agree with them that it's wonderful.
• 29:10
  SPEAKER_05: And I mean, it is wonderful, but um, being his daughter, that's also was very painful for me because I'm not a martyr or a saint by any stretch of the means.
• 29:23
  SPEAKER_05: And I like the the lifestyle that money buys as much as anybody else, and I'm not sure anybody would be thrilled off the bat.
• 29:33
  SPEAKER_05: Like, say your dad won like a millions of dollars in the lottery.
• 29:37
  SPEAKER_05: Would you love it if he just gave it to charity?
• 29:39
  SPEAKER_05: Would you be so happy?
• 29:41
  SPEAKER_05: So I I I touch into that.
• 29:44
  SPEAKER_05: Um, it's something that I've worked through.
• 29:46
  SPEAKER_05: I can't change it, and it is nice, and that's probably where the money was meant to go.
• 29:52
  SPEAKER_05: And and you have to be philosophical about it and and realize that that's you know, maybe that was just meant to be there's forces we have no control over, and for the grand scheme of things.
• 30:06
  SPEAKER_05: And if if I was the only one that benefited from it, say he just left it to his daughter, would people like would the Tau be real as successful as it is today?
• 30:15
  SPEAKER_05: Would people love it?
• 30:16
  SPEAKER_05: Would they buy it?
• 30:17
  SPEAKER_05: Would they be do you know what I mean?
• 30:19
  SPEAKER_05: I think part of what people buy it for is because of, you know, my dad didn't even benefit from it.
• 30:26
  SPEAKER_05: He didn't it once when he gave it to charity, he didn't receive a dime from it, my father.
• 30:33
  SPEAKER_05: So um, you know, I don't think I could do that if I had a creation that was that big, I don't think I'd be able to do that.
• 30:43
  SPEAKER_05: So um I I go into that a little bit, you know.
• 30:48
  SPEAKER_05: I mean, I'm a lot better than I used to be as far as like bitterness or um, you know, when I was younger, that that was hard.
• 30:58
  SPEAKER_05: When I was much younger, after I accumulated some life experience, I realized that, you know, people have lots of different reasons for doing what they do.
• 31:09
  SPEAKER_05: And um, you know, you're not in somebody's soul to know why they do what they do.
• 31:14
  SPEAKER_05: And I'm very forgiving of of people.
• 31:18
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, thanks, thanks for that.
• 31:20
  SPEAKER_01: I I agree with you.
• 31:21
  SPEAKER_01: I think most of us would struggle with that decision.
• 31:24
  SPEAKER_01: I it would be difficult for most of us to admit that publicly.
• 31:27
  SPEAKER_01: So kudos to you again for being so so open and and uh honest about it.
• 31:33
  SPEAKER_01: Uh Elizabeth, I I have um I have two special needs daughters, and they're my only daughters.
• 31:38
  SPEAKER_06: Okay.
• 31:39
  SPEAKER_01: But being involved with a lot of other special needs families, one thing I know that's a big struggle sometimes is when you have a child with needs, sometimes the and they have siblings that don't have the same needs.
• 31:53
  SPEAKER_01: Sometimes those siblings uh it's it's a struggle to, you know, make sure you you tend to focus all your energy on the the person that has the needs.
• 32:03
  SPEAKER_01: And I just wondered if if you know part of that did the towel represent maybe some of that as well, like everything is focused on one place.
• 32:12
  SPEAKER_05: And I'm glad you brought that up because I totally forgot about that aspect.
• 32:16
  SPEAKER_05: I mean, not I didn't forget about that aspect of it, but you know, I often think like, you know, I don't know what it was like.
• 32:22
  SPEAKER_05: I mean, I always Danny's older than me, I always grew up with him.
• 32:25
  SPEAKER_05: I don't know how devastating it is to have a child that ends up having special needs, and I'm sure that tormented my parents, and I'm sure that went into my dad's decision as well.
• 32:36
  SPEAKER_05: So I have to have empathy with that.
• 32:38
  SPEAKER_05: And as far as Danny, you know, I was always very close with him growing up.
• 32:44
  SPEAKER_05: I mean, our our he went to school in Philadelphia for many, many years, and we would drive up there, and he would be at school three weeks home a week, at school three weeks home a week.
• 32:56
  SPEAKER_05: And so we were constantly driving, and then he would come home for like a month at like Christmas and different.
• 33:03
  SPEAKER_05: And um, he was real difficult as a as a child, screaming and yelling and kicking, and he had a horrible, I mean, he he's nonverbal.
• 33:13
  SPEAKER_05: Um, he's real easy now.
• 33:16
  SPEAKER_05: Um, but growing up, I wouldn't say that our our household revolved around Danny, and I was never um jealous of Danny as far as attention, but I could see where in other houses that might happen.
• 33:30
  SPEAKER_05: But um, I actually when he went away to school, I hated it.
• 33:34
  SPEAKER_05: I loved it when he was home.
• 33:36
  SPEAKER_05: I liked it.
• 33:37
  SPEAKER_05: So um, but yeah, so I didn't know that you had two daughters that have special needs.
• 33:44
  SPEAKER_05: I hope they're doing well.
• 33:46
  SPEAKER_01: It's it's it's a roller coaster, just like I'm sure it is with all those situations.
• 33:51
  SPEAKER_01: Uh but yeah, we we did not have to deal with the the having the siblings that you know maybe getting left out kind of a thing.
• 33:59
  SPEAKER_01: So it's it's great to hear that you you sort of made your peace with that early and and actually found a you know a a comfortable spot there.
• 34:08
  SPEAKER_01: And I can't imagine too the the kind of stuff that he was dealing with in that era, right?
• 34:13
  SPEAKER_01: Because in this era you have all kinds of um programs and schools are more understanding and all that kind of stuff.
• 34:21
  SPEAKER_01: And back then I'm sure it was much harder.
• 34:24
  SPEAKER_05: Whenever my mom would tell people that Danny was autistic, people uh they'd say, Oh, how wonderful that your son is artistic.
• 34:31
  SPEAKER_06: Oh wow.
• 34:32
  SPEAKER_05: And she'd say, No, not artistic.
• 34:35
  SPEAKER_05: People didn't even know what that meant.
• 34:36
  SPEAKER_05: That's how much like nobody under didn't even know what the word autistic meant.
• 34:41
  SPEAKER_05: They would always think she was saying artistic.
• 34:44
  SPEAKER_01: Wow.
• 34:44
  SPEAKER_01: Wow.
• 34:45
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, again, time it's amazing how much, just like you guys talked about with the the in the social media environment.
• 34:51
  SPEAKER_01: It's amazing just in you know, the span of of 30 to 40 years, how much the world has changed, right?
• 34:58
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 34:59
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, my dad had um he spent a lot of money on my dad, my brother's care.
• 35:04
  SPEAKER_05: And I think that also went into his decision about the Tau.
• 35:07
  SPEAKER_05: Now, he actually is one of the people that got a lot of things funded that people nowadays benefit from it because back when my brother, like medical insurance wouldn't pay for any of his care, they told my parents his um his condition was emotional, not and mental.
• 35:24
  SPEAKER_05: It wasn't physical.
• 35:26
  SPEAKER_05: And my dad fought for it to be recognized as physical and that he deserved to have a lot of this, you know, medical insurance should help out and there should be programs and stuff.
• 35:37
  SPEAKER_05: And so my dad was paying$6,000 a month out of pocket for my brother's school throughout growing up.
• 35:43
  SPEAKER_00: In 1970s, then wow, wow.
• 35:48
  SPEAKER_05: And he, you know, it's not like he was making like the football players do now.
• 35:52
  SPEAKER_05: I mean, this was making him go broke, literally.
• 35:56
  SPEAKER_00: My goodness.
• 35:57
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
• 35:58
  SPEAKER_00: That's one of the reasons he went into broadcasting.
• 36:01
  SPEAKER_00: Uh while he was very successful as a writer financially, broadcasting paid more and enabled him to uh and provided the major medical insurance to help him uh provide for Danny's needs.
• 36:14
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 36:16
  SPEAKER_01: Wow.
• 36:17
  SPEAKER_01: Wow.
• 36:18
  SPEAKER_01: Uh folks, once again, the book is behind the oi.
• 36:21
  SPEAKER_01: You can get it at Barnes Noble and Amazon.
• 36:24
  SPEAKER_03: Um, Myron growing up in what values kind of shaped him, like what neighborhood?
• 36:30
  SPEAKER_03: He's obviously from Pittsburgh, I'm assuming.
• 36:32
  SPEAKER_03: And uh what neighborhood in Pittsburgh did he grow up in?
• 36:35
  SPEAKER_03: Like what obviously he has very strong family ties and family values, Elizabeth.
• 36:40
  SPEAKER_03: Like, where did he get those from?
• 36:42
  SPEAKER_03: Or can you?
• 36:44
  SPEAKER_05: I mean, I guess his parents, I was named after his mother who passed away a few months before I was born.
• 36:50
  SPEAKER_05: And in the Jewish tradition, you can't be named after anybody till they pass away.
• 36:55
  SPEAKER_05: There's no like, you know, Bobby Jr.
• 36:58
  SPEAKER_05: Like when someone passes away.
• 36:59
  SPEAKER_05: In fact, in the Jewish tradition, you're supposed to name people after like your relatives that have passed, but he was very close with his mother.
• 37:07
  SPEAKER_05: And I both his parents adored him.
• 37:10
  SPEAKER_05: I mean, he was the favorite for sure.
• 37:13
  SPEAKER_05: I mean, I kind of, you know, my cousins talk about their moms, you know, my aunts really got like, you know, left in the shadows, so to speak, because, you know, he had three older sisters who were much older than him, like by 15 years and eight years.
• 37:29
  SPEAKER_05: So when he came along, the only boy, oh, just like the sun rose and set on my father.
• 37:36
  SPEAKER_05: And um, but you know, they struggled.
• 37:39
  SPEAKER_05: It was during the depression, and he always had a job from the time he was like 11.
• 37:44
  SPEAKER_05: Anything he could get paid to do, like a paper root, he set pins up at a bowling alley.
• 37:50
  SPEAKER_05: And I know like they taught him, you know, they had strong values.
• 37:54
  SPEAKER_05: My grandparents.
• 37:55
  SPEAKER_05: Um, apparently, my dad like stole a comic book once, like from a store when he was like 10.
• 38:01
  SPEAKER_05: And like my grandfather marched him back to the store and like made him like give the comic book back and like pay restitution and write like a huge letter saying, I'm sorry, I know that was wrong.
• 38:14
  SPEAKER_05: And my dad always remembered that.
• 38:17
  SPEAKER_05: He he said that he my grandfather took him by the ear and like marched him back to the store with the comic book.
• 38:24
  SPEAKER_05: So um, yeah, he he um my grandparents um and my dad, he he felt um very responsible for his sisters, believe it or not.
• 38:36
  SPEAKER_05: Like, he he was close to them, I think, and he was protective of them, I would say, more than like necessarily close.
• 38:44
  SPEAKER_05: He was protective of them, I think, as like the only boy.
• 38:48
  SPEAKER_05: Like he felt this um like like on his deathbed, he actually said to me, please take care of my sisters.
• 38:59
  SPEAKER_05: Please like make sure my sisters are okay.
• 39:01
  SPEAKER_05: I don't know what he wanted me to do, but um, he was worried about them up until the end.
• 39:06
  SPEAKER_05: He was always concerned about them.
• 39:09
  SPEAKER_05: He would try and give them money all the time, and they were proud proud, and they they never wanted to take it.
• 39:15
  SPEAKER_05: You know, they would never ask him for money, but like if he knew one of them was struggling, he would say, please take this, and they would say no.
• 39:22
  SPEAKER_05: And so when he was at their house, he would hide money in their house for them to find, or he'd like shove it in one of their pop pants pockets or in their purse or something.
• 39:34
  SPEAKER_05: Um, because they would they would never accept it or ask.
• 39:39
  SPEAKER_05: So so he he was a good brother and he was a good son, but the house did revolve around him, he was spoiled.
• 39:48
  SPEAKER_05: My aunt said that they would they'd be cleaning the house, like doing chores, and my dad would just be sitting on the couch and they'd be like, Can you move a minute so we can like dust around you?
• 40:01
  SPEAKER_05: You know, so he didn't have to do as much as them.
• 40:05
  SPEAKER_00: I think I think a little bit of that from what uh your cousin Marcia told me, a little there was some sexism going on there.
• 40:11
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, you know, because you know, the boys they didn't have to do the housework.
• 40:16
  SPEAKER_00: This is 1930s, 40s.
• 40:19
  SPEAKER_00: The girls were expected to do the housework, and they the girls didn't get a chance to go to college where you're Myron did.
• 40:27
  SPEAKER_05: And um he was the only one that got to wear braces, go to the dentist.
• 40:33
  SPEAKER_05: My my my aunts all won extremely rare scholar art scholarships to an art school in New York, and they weren't able to accept it because they had to work to help support the family, whereas my father was allowed to go to college.
• 40:49
  SPEAKER_05: So, yeah, that that's a shame.
• 40:53
  SPEAKER_00: But uh I want to make just one related point.
• 40:56
  SPEAKER_00: Um, you know, Byron's upbringing, uh, it was in Squirrel Hill, you know, it almost didn't have anything to do with who he became as as the radio, as the as the guy the Pittsburghers came to know on radio and TV.
• 41:15
  SPEAKER_00: I say in the book, you know, if any boy was ever born to be a Pittsburgh Steelers broadcaster and icon, it was not Myron Got.
• 41:23
  SPEAKER_00: He was uh he was from a non-sports-minded family.
• 41:28
  SPEAKER_00: He was obviously very small, you know, too small to play most sports.
• 41:33
  SPEAKER_00: Um he just sort of latched onto the Steelers as a little kid, almost, you know, no particular reason.
• 41:40
  SPEAKER_00: And he wound up becoming a fanatic about them years before he began broadcasting.
• 41:46
  SPEAKER_00: Um and it's not something anyone could have predicted, but when he joined the Steelers broadcasting booth, it was almost a natural transition because he had been hanging around the team on his own for years.
• 42:01
  SPEAKER_00: Um he would fly to go see their games various places.
• 42:05
  SPEAKER_00: He would he went he would go drinking with uh the players in the 60s, like Bobby Lane and John Henry Johnson.
• 42:13
  SPEAKER_00: You know, they were the they were all in their 30s at the time.
• 42:16
  SPEAKER_00: He would go hang out with them in the at a bar in Rentwood.
• 42:19
  SPEAKER_05: Um that would never happen today.
• 42:23
  SPEAKER_05: No, no, that's definitely the media and players.
• 42:26
  SPEAKER_05: Could you just imagine them hanging out, having a beer together?
• 42:29
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, there'd be a lot of cell phone videos of that on social media once again.
• 42:34
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 42:35
  SPEAKER_01: Uh we we'll close with this.
• 42:37
  SPEAKER_01: I I when I was a kid, my parents used to turn down the volume on the TV and turn on the radio to hear Jack Fleming and Myron Cope announce the games.
• 42:47
  SPEAKER_01: And and for a while, I think my brother and I kind of hated that because the sound was a tiny bit off and and the the commercials wouldn't gel together and all that kind of stuff.
• 42:58
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, but then we sort of got used to it.
• 43:00
  SPEAKER_01: Uh I I don't think we realized at the time, again, you didn't have you know uh widespread social media, so I don't think we realized at the time that that's what a lot of other people in Pittsburgh were doing.
• 43:12
  SPEAKER_01: And Dan, you you devote uh a portion of the book to talking about that, and then you even uh interview some folks, including, I believe, Bill Hillgrove, who who had the same experience of turning off the volume uh on the TV, correct?
• 43:29
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
• 43:30
  SPEAKER_00: He he told me that uh that's what he did.
• 43:34
  SPEAKER_00: Uh I talked to several other people who used to do that.
• 43:37
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, my dad and I tried that once, but it was like it like you just said, it was too far off.
• 43:42
  SPEAKER_00: We just couldn't stand it.
• 43:44
  SPEAKER_00: But um one of the guys who did that was the guy who took the towel up to the top of Mount Everest.
• 43:52
  SPEAKER_00: And then he launched his own foundation to raise money for charity in part because he Just so inspired by Myron and the Terrible Tal.
• 44:04
  SPEAKER_00: At one time, 50% of Steeler fans apparently did this.
• 44:09
  SPEAKER_00: They would turn down the sound and listen to Myron.
• 44:12
  SPEAKER_00: It'd be interesting to see.
• 44:13
  SPEAKER_00: There probably are still some people who do this today.
• 44:16
  SPEAKER_00: I'd be interested to know how many.
• 44:19
  SPEAKER_00: Uh but you know, it was just part of the phenomenon.
• 44:23
  SPEAKER_00: He was just as a Chuck Finder or I'm not sure if it's Finder.
• 44:28
  SPEAKER_00: Finder, yeah.
• 44:29
  SPEAKER_00: Finder.
• 44:30
  SPEAKER_01: Post Gazette guy.
• 44:32
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, he he told me, you know, Myron, he was like part of your family.
• 44:36
  SPEAKER_00: It was the voice everybody wanted to hear called the Steeler games.
• 44:41
  SPEAKER_00: It was familiar and comfortable and also very exciting and invigorating at the same time.
• 44:48
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, definitely.
• 44:50
  SPEAKER_01: Uh his voice was iconic.
• 44:52
  SPEAKER_01: His presence was iconic.
• 44:54
  SPEAKER_01: My mom is in her 80s, and she still tells a story about calling into Myron Show.
• 45:01
  SPEAKER_01: I guess uh everybody was um was really down on um Mike Wagner was the player.
• 45:07
  SPEAKER_03: He's an underrated safety to I went to high school with his daughter.
• 45:11
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 45:12
  SPEAKER_03: Heather was a good safety.
• 45:16
  SPEAKER_01: And my mom called in to defend this guy, and uh, and I guess Myron said, you know, oh, you make a really good point, you know, uh everybody is being too hard on him.
• 45:25
  SPEAKER_01: And my mom still remembers that 50 years later, right?
• 45:29
  SPEAKER_01: Because it was Myron Cope saying, uh, you know, she she she knew something about sports, right?
• 45:35
  SPEAKER_01: And and she had a good point.
• 45:37
  SPEAKER_01: So I think that was kind of the experience in Pittsburgh for people.
• 45:40
  SPEAKER_00: Did she get a coconut award?
• 45:44
  SPEAKER_05: With the sound in the background of the coconut falling.
• 45:48
  SPEAKER_05: I always love the special effects.
• 45:50
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, like Cope cabana with uh with the berry manilow is always fun.
• 45:55
  SPEAKER_03: Oh, that's funny.
• 45:59
  SPEAKER_05: My dad was very he could be very kind and soft spoken.
• 46:02
  SPEAKER_05: He was very sympathetic to other people.
• 46:05
  SPEAKER_05: In fact, he was almost an easy touch.
• 46:08
  SPEAKER_05: You know, he'd be if he were maybe in a different line of work or wasn't well known, he'd be he really would have been one of those guys everyone took advantage of because he was um he uh if you told him a sad story, he was somebody that really would try and do things to help.
• 46:27
  SPEAKER_05: I mean, he was he was very um kind.
• 46:30
  SPEAKER_05: A lot of people probably don't know that.
• 46:33
  SPEAKER_05: He really was.
• 46:34
  SPEAKER_05: He's nicer than I am.
• 46:38
  SPEAKER_05: He's you know, but I try to uh uh emulate both my parents, they were both um special, I think.
• 46:45
  SPEAKER_05: My mother as well.
• 46:49
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and I think you you talked about you know him and Howard Cosell sparring.
• 46:53
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 46:54
  SPEAKER_01: I think I think some of the audio you hear from him years ago, we Steve and I also dug up a clip of him and uh Eleanor Kane, the NFL writer, uh, they were kind of sparring with each other.
• 47:05
  SPEAKER_01: And it it sounds mean spirited, but then you can sort of, if you listen more closely, you can see, okay, these people are friends.
• 47:13
  SPEAKER_01: They're they're really not uh hating on each other, they're just sort of verbally sparring, almost like locker room kind of sparring.
• 47:22
  SPEAKER_01: So that seemed to be part of his personality too.
• 47:25
  SPEAKER_05: Yeah, he never wanted to be mean spirited, you know, when it came to and he got hurt if people said things about him that were nasty.
• 47:34
  SPEAKER_05: That's the only reason, you know.
• 47:36
  SPEAKER_05: I mean, he didn't dislike Mark Madden.
• 47:38
  SPEAKER_05: I don't dislike him, I don't even know him, but um, he would get hurt if uh somebody said something that was nasty, as anybody would.
• 47:49
  SPEAKER_01: Sure, absolutely, especially you know, somebody uh in in the public eye like that.
• 47:55
  SPEAKER_01: Uh all right, uh once again, folks, the book is called Behind the Oi.
• 47:59
  SPEAKER_01: It's out now.
• 48:00
  SPEAKER_01: You can get it on Amazon, you can get it at Pittsburgh Area Barnes and Nobles, you can read it on your Kindle.
• 48:06
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, if you like what you hear in this episode, you you're gonna get a lot more great stuff in that book.
• 48:11
  SPEAKER_01: So go out and get that today.
• 48:13
  SPEAKER_01: Uh Dan and Elizabeth, thank you both so much for your time.
• 48:17
  SPEAKER_04: Thank you for having me.
• 48:19
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, thank you.
• 48:20
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you.
• 48:21
  SPEAKER_00: You're very appreciated.
• 48:22
  SPEAKER_04: It's been great.
• 48:23
  SPEAKER_00: It's a good good conversation.
• 48:26
  SPEAKER_04: I enjoyed it.
• 48:28
  SPEAKER_01: Thanks everybody for listening.
• 48:30
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you so much for supporting our little show here.
• 48:33
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, please check us out on Facebook or on Twitter.
• 48:37
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, we actually now have an option where you can text the show.
• 48:40
  SPEAKER_01: That's in the show notes.
• 48:42
  SPEAKER_01: And uh we'll catch you next time.