The Pittsburgh Press from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania • Page 131

Sunday, November 17, 1985 The Pittsburgh Press J3 TRAVEL from page Jl iiri ill 4mm signs lead the way for the last five miles. Information: Linden Hall, R.D. 1, Dawson, Pa. 15428; (412) 461-2424 (Pittsburgh) or 529-7543 and 529-2882 (Dawson). (Ruth Heimbuccher is The Pittsburgh Press travel editor.) taurant's specialties.

Linden Hall closes for the season Dec. 20 and re-opens March 1 of next year. Roads can get bad in the winter. Linden Hall is 38 miles south of Pittsburgh by way of Route 51 to Perryopolis, where Linden Hall iff aaBmmiiMiiii ii riiT 1 1 1 iaiti i RentACar taste for beauty and luxury. On the third floor, where servants lived, a long, wide chest of drawers was constructed to hold bed sheets folded only once.

Sarah as she's known by some people at Linden Hall, couldn't abide lying on wrinkles. Outside, she had linden trees planted along the driveway. She admired them in Berlin, but they have not thrived in Fayette County. Only two or three survive. Linden Hall, its grounds, mansion and other buildings, changed hands four times since Mrs.

Cochran's death in 1936. The entire estate sold first for $50,000 in 1942, when the mansion alone cost $2 million to build. Its present owner is the United Steel Workers of America, which in 1976 paid less than $2 million for everything. It was still a bargain, even though extensive restoration and repairs were needed. Today, the place looks like an elegant resort.

Besides bringing the mansion back to mint condition, complete with some new furnishings, the USW razed the Cochrans' white frame summer house, used before the mansion was built. Their winter home was in nearby Dawson. Where the summer home stood on a slope below the mansion are two buildings that form the USW's "educational center." They would look at home on a college campus. They're plain and sleek, and inside are meeting rooms where union members from many parts of the United States and Canada attend seminars or classes on the economy, unemployment, stress on the job or other subjects. Sometimes union members and management work out their problems at Linden Hall, a more neutral ground than their workplaces.

Together, the buildings have a total of 74 guest rooms. The good news is that, besides steelworkers, they're also open to other groups there are frequent religious retreats and to individual travelers. Although steelworkers and guests 60 and older get a discount of almost 17 percent, regular room rates are reasonable. A room for one is $42; for two, $52; an additional person theater in the round. For warm-weather visitors, there's a 75-by-40-foot heated pool and a children's pool, both outdoors, four tennis courts, a 25-acre fishing lake, stocked weekly with trout, bass, perch and catfish.

Tours of the Cochran mansion are offered from 1 to 6 p.m., Fridays through Sundays now till Dec. 15. The cost is $4, free to children 12 and under, and free to USW members and their families. During the holiday season, Christmas choral concerts are held on weekends between Nov. 29 and Dec.

15. The mansion will be decked for the season. Tour director Patty Lint said the chorales started about seven years ago, just for fun. Her husband, Eugene, played the piano and the Aeolian pipe organ in the Great Hall and she sang with one of the groups. Now the concerts are sellouts: 30 bus groups are scheduled for the 13 concerts and there's barely a space left, except for the Nov.

29 and 30 and the Dec. 12 concerts (call 412-529-2731 for information). The $6 concert includes a tour of the mansion, punch and cookies. If you'd just like to visit the grounds, Linden Hall has 20 picnic groves with tables and grills for rent $10 a grove. A large pavilion is also available and rents for depending on the season.

With all its attractions and activities, rustic beauty and quiet are Linden Hall's main assets. Even the people who work there sense it. Helen Kasisky, group coordinator, comes in daily from Mount Pleasant, 5 miles to the west. "If I feel down when I leave home, as soon as I drive into the property I know all's well with the world." Manager Ron Ventura, who lives on the golf course ninth hole became a golfer by necessity and now loves it. He often goes out with the grounds crew to discuss improvements to the course planting trees, bushes and flowers, adding sand traps and bringing lakes and ponds on the property into play.

There's an airstrip on the property for light planes. A few Pittsburghers drop in for lunch and golf; one man regularly flies in for a supply of barbecued spareribs, one of the res A dinner theater package, available for the first two weeks of December, includes dinner, a performance of "Two By Two," overnight accommodations, breakfast, taxes and gratuities. It's $42.50 a person. A holiday package, $44 a person, now through Dec. 15, covers dinner, cocktail, dancing in the main lounge, a tour of the mansion, hors d'oeuvres, room, breakfast, taxes and gratuities.

Rooms in both buildings are attractive and comfortable, and views from all windows are lovely the Laurel Ridge of the Appalachians in one direction, woods and trees and the undulating green of a golf course in another. The registration desk is in the first building, opened in 1977, off a gigantic lobby with glass walls (more soothing views of greenery) and a huge fireplace. There's no scarcity of firewood, cut and gathered from Linden Hall's 785 acres. Upstairs is a big recreation room ping pong, pool, video games as well as a meeting room large enough for 42 swivel chairs with arms set around a U-shaped table below clerestory windows where sky and trees can be glimpsed. Opened in 1980, the second building is connected to the first by a covered walkway, which rambles past a garden with benches placed cozily among alcoves formed by thick hedges.

The restaurant, serving breakfast, lunch and dinner, is in the newer building. It's open daily, March through mid-December. The food is good, the portions plentiful, the waitresses cheerful and prices affordable from $6.95 for the daily pasta to $22 for surf and turf, with many prices and selections in between. Salvaged from the Cochrans' summer home, leaded glass panes and some stained glass add decorative touches in the restaurant, and as a divider in the bar and in office doors. Other buildings on the grounds have been adapted to new uses.

A 19th-century log house serves the USW as its education department office. A former barn houses the pro shop for the 18-hole, golf course, as well as an art gallery and pays $8 ill It i -J Lucille Brown Purveyor of chocolates Diversions from page Jl Information: Box 963, Mount Pleasant, Pa. 15666; (412) Instead of plant tours, the Lenox factory has a video tape playing continuously in the big, elegant showroom, which is open Monday through Sunday 9 a.m.-6 p.m. Information: The Lenox Shop, Mount Pleasant, Pa. 15666; (412) 547-4541.

In West Overton, along Route 819 between Scottdale and Mount Pleasant, you can tour the Overholt Home ad. The Overholt home belonged to Henry Clay Frick's grandfather, Abraham Overholt. The reconstructed stone cottage where Frick was born is also on the grounds. The homestead is open Tuesday through Saturday 11 a.m.-4 p.m. and Sunday from 1-5 p.m.

Information: (412) 887-7910. In Perryopolis, you'll find a number of historic sites: the foundation of a grist mill owned by George Washington; an old fulling mill, where flax and wool were processed; a log house, one of the first homes in Perryopolis; an 18th-century Quaker meeting house just outside town on Quaker Church Road, off Route 51. Information: Fayette County Tourism, Box 63, Hopwood, 15222; Laurel Highlands Association. (Westmoreland County information), 120 E. Main Ligonier, Pa.

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