Biden's Scranton Roots

My father's extended family (the Nealons and the O'Connors) all lived in Scranton, Pennsylvania and we reluctantly endured the 90-minute pilgrimage to Scranton several weekends every month when I was a kid. I was always vaguely embarrassed by the rough, gnarled hands and working class accents of my O'Connor uncles. They pronounced "Throop Street" as if it were spelled "Troop Street" and worse yet, pronounced "Beethoven Avenue" as....well, you guessed it. Bay-THO-ven. As a young man my father quarterbacked a semi-professional football team named after the neighborhood where he grew up - Bone Hill.

As far as I could tell back in those days, everyone in Scranton was a Catholic. We had our own personal priest, who we called "Uncle Leo the Priest" to distinguish him from the other three Leo O'Connors in the family, and we also had my father's best friend, Father Wheeler. Bill Wheeler grew up with my Dad in Scranton, and he was a rogue who decided to became a priest after promising himself to God if he lived through the assault at the Battle of the Bulge. By the time I knew him, he was a parish priest in rural Little Meadows, Pennsylvania. Fr. Wheeler was very handsome, his humor was sharp and ironic, and he was a most glamorous smoker who entertained us by blowing perfectly formed smoke rings that drifted up to the ceiling in an expanding, concentric parade. Although my father didn't allow alcohol in the house (the consequence of growing up with an abusive, alcoholic grandfather), there was always a bottle of Canadian Club tucked away for Father Wheeler's visits.

Chris Matthews told a wonderful story earlier today about young Joe Biden growing up in Scranton. As a child he had a terrible stutter, and the nun who was his teacher made fun of him in front of the class. The next day, his mother showed up at school and told the nun that if she ever spoke to her son that way again, she would "rip that bonnet right off your head."

That's the Scranton I remember and those are powerful roots. Biden is going to be a huge asset to Obama in working class Pennsylvania and right across the Rust Belt of the U.S.