BEN - Bama Environmental News

Thursday, October 23, 2008

The Curse of William (Billy) Penn - and the World Series

A quick break from Environmental News...


On my recent visit to Philadelphia, my friend Jon Meade told me about the curse of "Billy Penn."   As told to me by Jon, up until the early 80s there was a city ordinance that no buildings in the city center should be taller than city hall, which has a statue of William Penn on top of  it.  That ordinance was taken off the books in the 80s, so if you ever visit Philadelphia today you are greeted with some impressive skyscrapers, including the 80 story Comcast Building (also above). 

 The curse?  

Since the ordinance change, Philadelphia has been shutout of sports championships for 20 years.  Is there a curse???  I guess we'll find out this week when the Phillies play Tampa Bay in the World Series.

Here is wikipedia's take on the curse.  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curse_of_Billy_Penn

BTW - Some construction workers placed a Billy Penn replica on top of the just finished Comcast Building this past year.



0 Comments:

Post a Comment

Links to this post:

Create a Link

<< Home