When Myron Cope, as much a part of Pittsburgh lore as Andrew Carnegie, as classic Western Pennsylvanian as David Lawrence, who cleaned up the smokestacks and gave Pittsburgh a new image, Hall of Fame broadcaster Bob Prince, Dr. Jonas Salk or Mr. Rogers, held a press conference this past Tuesday, there was no doubting the subject matter.

At 76, his voicebox battered by a bout with two cancerous tumors and polymyalgia rheumatica, a degenerating disease that attacks the muscles. "I'm done, folks," Cope said to a rapt press conference audience that morning.

Possessor of a self-proclaimed "Voice that could saw through concrete (pronounced in his Pittsburghese kawncreet), and a face-made-for-radio," this most colorful of color commentators turned Steelers broadcasts into three-hour sociological trips through his beloved hometahn, liberally spliced with one of the more offbeat senses of humor in the entire industry.

The high-pitched, squeaky voice burst through many hundreds of thousands of radios from York to Youngstown, from Fairmont to Fairview.

Myron Cope was more than just the guy the next stool over talking about the Stillers' inability to convert a critical third dahn pass in Sunday's endlessly-analyzed loss. On the air, he was a pied piper leading the black-and-gold legions on a trip that was one part nostalgia, another part cornball, yet another intellectual, but always able to remind his rabid listeners this wasn't open-hear surgery.

As he spoke, his voice barely audible beyond a whisper, this lifelong Steeler fan thought back to the Steelers' playoff win over the New York Jets last fall and the post-game locker room show he'd conducted for lo, those 35 years.

His ability to communicate with athletes dated back to his days as one of the nation's most respected print media, having written Sports Illustrated pieces on two of the more difficult interview subjects, Pirates Hall-of-Famer Roberto Clemente and another very colorful, but media-disdainful broadcaster, Howard Cosell.

He'd had a brief, if not particularly productive career as an amateur welterweight boxer, but his days at Pitt's highly-respected journalism school had prepared him well for his true calling.

But no one was more shocked than he when radio station WTAE came calling in 1968 and asked him to do a weekday sports commentary on the then rock-'n'-roll outlet that would soon replace 50,000-watt KDKA as the Steelers flagship station.

"That came out of the blue," he told me during a 1988 interview for a Pro! Magazine story. "Honest, I thought it over. But they insisted!"

Within two years, WTAE (now ESPN-1250, WEAE) had taken over the Steelers broadcasts because the team's management was weary of second-billing to the Pirates on the big blowtorch.

"I was at a Pirates game in 1970," Cope said then, "and I remember being in the pressbox -- they'd just moved over to Three Rivers Stadium, and this big guy with blond hair comes over to me and sticks out his hand and says, 'Hi, Myron, Jack Fleming.'

"I looked at him and said, 'I don't believe I know you!' He said, "Well, you'd better, because we're gonna be spending a lot of time together!'

"I put my hand to my forehead and said, 'Yoi!'" That was the first meeting of what would become one of pro football's most famous play-by-play/color radio teams.

For many, Myron's voice on dubbed-in Steelers play-by-play highlights on N.F.L. Films became almost as familiar as that of the stentorian John Facenda, whose lyrical creativity played a huge role in establishing the N.F.L. permanently in the minds of sports fans everywhere.

Staccato bursts like "You betcha!" "Mmm-hah," as Cope collected his thoughts, or clicky short-form nicknames like the "Cleve Brownies, Wash Skins, Dallas Cryboys" became part of a region's football parlance for nearly two generations.

But he was more than just a game-day voice. One night, in Cincinnati, he was doing his nightly WTAE talk show before a prime time Steelers-Bengals game and he'd just finished talking about "Handshake Sam" Wyche, the Bengals coach, so named by Cope because he made a major deal out of Chuck Noll not going out of his way to shake his hand after the Steelers had beaten Cincy the year before.

His first caller was a colorful character from one of Pittsburgh's classic ethnic neighborhoods, the late Jerry Finn, known on the air as "Zivko Kovalchuk, the mayor of Pittsburgh's "sahside" (South Side)."

"How do, you're first in the store on the wawshday version of the hawtline," Cope greeted his caller.

"Mahrn, you wanna look down in Section 341 for my uncle Louie," Finn said. "He's the one in the bright orange spiked raincoat."

"Sahnds about as unobtrusive as you, Zivko," Cope responded.

He was an electronic nextdoor neighbor, that's what Myron Cope was. And of course, what story about him would be complete with yet another major Pittsburgh institution -- The Terrible Towel, waved by tens of thousands of Steeler fans both home and away and a vital ingredient to Steeler game days that isn't likely to disappear anytime soon.

In November, 1975, the story goes, the Steelers were headed yet again to the playoffs and victory in Super Bowl X over the Cowboys and then WTAE General Manager Ted Atkins was looking for a new attraction.

"They were looking for a gimmick for fans and listeners and to drive advertising sponsorship for his coverage of the Steelers on the radio," Western Pennsylvania Sports Museum Curator Ann Madarasz told The Pittsburgh Tribune-Review's Maggi Newhouse.

Cope suggested they employ one of a household's most enduring staples. A towel. "Everyone has towels," he emphasized.

Pretty soon, after a raw start of black and gold homebred towels, Pittsburgh's department stores stocked up and sold them. Soon enough, as only Cope could produce and trademark it, "The Terrible Towel" was born.

"It's really a simple concept, but brilliant in its simplicity," Madarasz told Newhouse. "You pick it up and put it in your pocket. Everyone had one; it cost a few dollars and you don't feel silly or stupid having it."

Blend in Polish-born disc jockey Jimmy Pol, who was to singing what Cope was to the spoken word, off-keying the Steelers' trademark polka -- a takeoff on the famous "Pennsylvania Polka," throw in Myron's zany 'Yoi's and double-yoi's," "Mazel tovs" and 'Alas and Alacks" and Steelers football was strictly a radio event with virtually every T.V. volume muted.

There was never any telling what lengths Cope would go to. On Fridays for 20 years, he wore a female surgeon's smock and stethescope as he played the role of Dr. Cope putting Sunday's upcoming opponent under the "Cope-ro-scope".

"We see where the coach of the Cleve Brahnies, the Sam Rutigliano, may be cooking up an offensive witches' brew for Sunday," he once said. "Word from the lakeshore is the Brahnies may actually throw the ball more than they run it. Gadzooks!"

Cope, hardly a traveling partner to the hip-hop generation, put out a rap video in 1995's post-season that would have made a Westminster sentry burst out in laughter.

Time and changes can play cruel tricks on people and things we hold dear. This fall's broadcasts, with Hillgrove and his trusty sidekick, former Steelers offensive lineman Tunch Ilkin, figures to be a good listen. But Cope had made a pact with close friend Joe Gordon, a now-retired Steelers' public relations guy, that when the day came where the broadcasts weren't what they used to be, Gordon would have a sit down with him and discuss his future.

On Friday, June 10, Gordon stopped by Cope's South Hills residence and told him "Your health has affected your work," according to the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.

"That's it, I'm through," Cope told P-G veteran reporter Bob Dvorchak.

And so he is. Largely gone will be a storehouse of anecdotes...

"Y'know," Hillgrove told him at an exhibition game in Green Bay a few years back, "I noticed where the Packers were charging $10 to park."

Cope, as always, had the one-upper: "Well, we see where the 'Baldymore' Birdies (Baltimore Ravens) are charging $15 to park in their new digs. Yoi!"

The world keeps rotating, the sun keeps rising. But somewhere, when they tee up the football this fall, the feeling will be a little emptier.

Myron, from one longtime admirer...mucho thanks and stay healthy.