Visit to Latrobe, PA

Cross-posting this from Fred Rogers' IMDB message board about my visit to Latrobe over Labor Day weekend.

Mr. Rogers was always one of the celebrities who I'd wanted to meet in person. He and Bob Ross were always at the top of that list with others including George Carlin (who was very down to earth in a couple interviews that I'd seen him do), Robin Williams, Johnny Carson, and others. Unfortunately, I don't have the time or money to make trips to Florida to pay my respects to Bob Ross or go to other distant places to visit the others on my list who I wish I could have met.

So this past spring, being into trains, I bought a 4-disk DVD of a cab ride on Amtrak's Pennsylvanian, showing the entire trip from Philadelphia to Pittsburgh from the locomotive cab back in 1985. It got to the station stop at Latrobe, PA, and I kept thinking that I knew that town from somewhere. Earlier this summer, I looked it up on Wikipedia and saw that Mr. Rogers had been from Latrobe and was interred in a cemetery there. Since it was only a four-hour drive (not counting lunch and rest stops), I figured I could make the drive from my place on the west side of Columbus, Ohio, and get there by early afternoon. So, last Sunday (Labor Day weekend), I made the drive.

The mausoleum where Mr. Rogers is interred is located near the middle of Unity Cemetery west of Latrobe. It's on a hillside at the one corner of a 4-way junction of the driveways around the cemetery. While you can't go inside, you can see where he is just inside of the door on the left. The view from the steps of the surrounding hillsides is really nice. While there, the heat in the air started getting to me. I said to myself that I'd probably have to cut my visit short to get back in the AC in my Jeep. Right as I said that, a cool breeze blew in from the opposite direction that the warm air had been blowing. It was almost like somebody was trying to make my visit more pleasant.

Before leaving the cemetery, I stopped by the church at the entrance to take a couple pictures. It was at that church where Mr. Rogers had been a minister before getting involved in TV.

To round out my trip to Latrobe, I then went into town and stopped at the Amtrak station to watch trains, heading home after the westbound Pennsylvanian departed.

It was a good and relaxing trip. I'll always miss Mr. Rogers and how he helped teach us about the world around us.