Commentators Look Back Pt. 1 Erie, Pennsylvania & San Francisco, California

In this installment of The Changing Face of America, commentators David Greenberger and Andrei Codrescu revisit places from their past and observe how things have changed. This is the first piece in three days of stories about writers returning to locales they once knew.

Erie, Pennsylvania

David Greenberger as a child and adult. Photos courtesy David Greenberger. Andrei Codrescu, from the 1970 cover of his book, License to Carry a Gun, and today. Photos courtesy of Andrei Codrescu.

David Greenberger is a writer and music reviewer for All Things Considered. Greenberger now lives and works in Greenwich, New York, but he grew up in northwestern Pennsylvania on the shores of Lake Erie. He went back to Erie, Pennsylvania to tell us about how the world of his youth has changed in the past 30 years.

San Francisco, California

From the North Beach neighborhood of San Francisco, commentator Andrei Codrescu brings us his perspective on immigration and the American counterculture of the 1970's. Codrescu lived in the San Francisco area from 1970 to 1974 after arriving from his native Romania. This picture is from the cover of his first book, License to Carry a Gun, published in the early 1970s.

Join David Greenberger and Andrei Codrescu as they revisit their hometowns.

Listen to previous installments of this special series:

Part Two: Commentator Leon Wynter returns to Prince George's County, Maryland. Part Three: Writer Patricia Presiado Martin goes back to Tucson, Arizona.

The Changing Face of America is an 18-month-long NPR series that tells the stories of regular, everyday Americans and the issues they face at a time of rapid and dramatic change in the U.S. This special series can be heard on NPR's Talk of the Nation, All Things Considered and Morning Edition.

The Changing Face of America series is sponsored by The Pew Charitable Trusts.