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"We could do this program forever," said Sebak. "There are so many places and interesting old things to see in the big area around Pittsburgh, and one story just leads to another and another. One of my favorite surprises, J.H. Shoop & Sons, I discovered while driving through Freeport one day in search of an ATM machine. How can you not stop for a look in a shop with a sign that says 'Oldest Family Owned Men's Clothing Store in the U.S.A'?"

John Hempel, chairman of the restoration committee at the Braddock Carnegie Library, stands in front of the old tunnel entrance where workers came in to take a bath before going upstairs to the library and the Carnegie Club.

Sebak and his crew visited Nicholas Coffee in Market Square, one of those beloved downtown businesses with an 80-year history. They spent a day in Fayette County shooting the odd brick structures that once were coke ovens in the 19th and early 20th centuries.

"And thanks to a tip, we found Standard Horse Nail in New Brighton, said Sebak. It's a company that started making nails for horse shoes in 1872, but its adapted with the times, and for years they've survived by making the part of engines known as Woodruff keys, a steel piece that fits on a shaft to lock gears in place. And they're still here."

Other things featured in the program include Fiesta dinnerware (introduced at the Pittsburgh Pottery and Glass Show in 1936 and still made about an hour west of the city in Newell, West Virginia, at the huge Homer Laughlin China Company factories), the Braddock Carnegie Library (with its very unusual Carnegie Club facilities including a swimming pool, bowling alley, and the worlds first Carnegie Music Hall), and the big old Westmoreland County swimming pool known as Ligonier Beach (a landmark beside the old Lincoln Highway, Route 30, since 1925).

Things That Are Still Here also includes a trio of stories that feature movie-related subjects. First, a building in New Castle that's being saved because it once housed the Cascade Theatre, the first movie house owned and operated by four siblings from Youngstown who became known as the Warner Brothers.

Second, there is a set of local newsreels from Waynesburg in Greene County that were shot by Charles Silveus who ran a local theatre. He started shooting parades and fires and fairs as early as 1913, and his work survives as a priceless record of one small town's history.

Third, there's an unusual set of around 400 hand-painted movie posters that have been discovered in an old abandoned sign shop above what's now the Harris Theatre downtown on Liberty Avenue. These posters were often gaudy and sensational as they tried to lure viewers into the old Art Cinema for many years.

Wow! John Claus and his buddies hold the Great Mammoth Tusk that they found in Sharpsburg on March 3, 1909. The tusk is now stored at the Carnegie Museum of Natural History. PHOTO: Carnegie Museum of Art.

"This documentary is our usual hodgepodge of subjects," Sebak admitted, "but we like to think many of our wanderings around the Pittsburgh region were at least partly connected by the various belts. Started in 1950 and still maintained by the Allegheny County Traffic Department, the Belt System, including the Red, Orange, Yellow, Green and Blue Belts, is really just a set of signs that guide you on designated roads that skirt you around the city.

"I love this classic sort of frugal Pittsburgh idea that meant we didn't have build any new roads, we just redesignated the ones that were already there."

Since 1938, the folks at Orams Donuts on Seventh Avenue in Beaver Falls, Pa., have been making phenomenal deep-fried donuts. The shop is shown here in the late 1940s.

Like all of Sebak's programs, Things That Are Still Here is as much about people as it is about places and buildings and belts. There's the usual collection of wonderfully comfortable characters with oddly familiar faces, some experts, some not, all apparently happy to be still here too. And, of course, there's Rick's recognizable voice leading us from story to story.

Produced by WQED Pittsburgh. Producer/Writer/Narrator is Rick Sebak; Editors are Kevin Conrad and Dickran H. Manoogian; Associate Producer is Joe Abeln; Cameraman is Norris Brock; Sound Engineer is Bob Lubomski; Executive Producer is Deborah Acklin; and Executive Director of Production is Carolyn Wean.

Funding for production of THINGS THAT ARE STILL HERE was provided by The Buhl Foundation. Additional support came from the Henry L. Hillman Foundation and The James McQuade Family, founders of The Friends of The Pittsburgh History Series.

Exclusive promotional support for the special program was provided by Columbia Gas of Pennsylvania -- one of the oldest and largest natural gas-utilities in the state, backing its expert service to 382,000 customers in 451 communities in 26 counties with more than 100 years of experience. Columbia Gas of Pennsylvania is a civic and industry leader, through its award-winning community relations department, innovative customer choice programs and business- friendly economic development team. Information about Columbia Gas of Pennsylvania is available on the World Wide Web.