Skateboarding star calls Pittsburgh his home

Big — got his own nickname: Mr. Smalls. The new family business had a name.

* Shortly after Mr. Smith and Mr. Speranzo rebuilt the skatepark, they had to dismantle it; the borough of Millvale wanted the space back, and they were left with tens of thousands of dollars of pressure-treated wood.

Rather than let the lumber go to waste, they used it to expand Mr. Smalls, turning the skatepark parts into a restaurant and bar area called the Funhouse.

“When you’re at Mr. Smalls and you’re ordering food, you’ll see these pillars that are curved,” Mr. Smith said. “Those are the ramps we learned 540s on.”

So skateboarding is in the bones of Mr. Smalls, and Mr. Smalls is in Mr. Smith’s bones, too. His sister, Shaunden, works at the venue, as do several members of Ms. Berlin’s family. Mr. Smith plays music with his aunt and uncle in a band called the Drowning Clowns, and the venue’s open mics are in his living room.

“Everything that we built, it’s just been on the steps of not losing what we had,” Mr. Speranzo said. “My skateboarding history came with me. It involved Evan. Evan is now making skateboarding history. It involves me. Smalls was a byproduct of us starting our family together. It follows us.” young kid that could fly.”

Mr. Speranzo never technically went pro. Instead, he started the skateboarding program at Camp Woodward, a summer camp in Centre County.

“I was struggling with personal identity issues and I realized that being there for those kids and that camp was way more satisfying * than continuing to pursue Back at the Bloomfield my career,” he said. parking lot, Mr. Smith soars

Mr. Speranzo got his off a set of concrete steps and GED, enrolled in a continuing lands hard on his board, education program at which breaks in half. Penn State and played in a Skateboards have a band. That’s how he met Ms. short life: Mr. Smith wrote Berlin, who grew up in Pittsburgh song lyrics on this one, he and whose celebrity said, because he didn’t was rising with Rusted Root. have any paper around. As the band’s popularity increased, The art of skateboarding, she was getting hit too, is ephemeral. Even on a lot, and she had her though Mr. Smith’s video walls up. parts are years in the making,

“And then she saw me he might nail a trick skateboarding,” Mr. Speranzo just the one time it appears said, “and I was in.” on film.

When Ms. Berlin became In that way, the steadiness pregnant with their son, Jordan, he’s found in Mr. now a music student at Smalls, and in Pittsburgh, is Carnegie Mellon, Mr. Speranzo unlike his life on four stopped skating. wheels.

“He basically quit everything “There’s still trees in and followed me, followed Pittsburgh; there’s really our tour bus in a car hardworking people,” he from town to town to take said. “People aren’t fake care of me and help me be here. People are right here pregnant and still perform,” on the ground with you, Ms. Berlin said. She paused, present.” adding, “Permanent On his skateboard, Mr. brownie points.” Smith likes to fly high, but in

Mr. Speranzo left the tour Pittsburgh, he prefers to stay and worked on the couple’s on the ground. company in Pittsburgh. Jordan, courtesy of Mr. Speranzo’s friends —who were known as Mr. Handler, Mr. Fuzzy Head and Mr. Freaky