No matter how busy he was handling matters with the Steelers or the National Football League, Dan Rooney always managed to find time for his family.
And it was quite a large family.
He was one of five children (all boys), and his wife, Patricia, was one of 10. Together, they had nine children _ five girls and four boys.
Each summer, said Art Rooney II, the oldest of the nine kids, his mom and dad would take them on a vacation, sometimes to the beach at Spring Lake, N.J., other times on educational getaways to the Civil War battlefields or Ireland. The biggest and most ambitious came in 2003 when 30 members of the Rooney family, including in-laws and grandchildren, re-enacted and retraced parts of the Lewis & Clark expedition from nearly 200 years ago.
"A lot of times he'd try to throw some history in the trip and sometimes it would cause more controversy because some people just wanted to go to the beach," said Art II, president of the Steelers. "He enjoyed planning those trips. It was something he always loved _ to have us learn something while we are on vacation."
The Lewis and Clark vacation covered nearly 1,000 miles, beginning in the middle of June in Billings, Mont., and ending a month later in Seaside, Ore., the site where Lewis and Clark finally reached the Pacific Ocean. Dan Rooney kept a daily journal of the trip that was eventually made into a magazine _ "Rediscovering Lewis and Clark: A Journey with the Rooney Family" _ replete with personal photos.
"He'd always try to make sure we'd have a big family getaway," Art II said.
Some of those other vacations actually felt like an expedition because Rooney would cram his wife and kids into a station wagon and drive to the beach or the Civil War battlefields.
"The first time we did the Civil War trip was back when we were all young," Art II said. "He packed us all in the station wagon and we drove around in the station wagon. It was one of those summers when it seemed to rain a lot and we're slogging through the battlefields of Maryland and Virginia and there was a lot of complaining about being stuffed in the back of the station wagon.
"I remember one year the whole station wagon was packed full of stuff and there was room for one person in the way back. I was the one assigned to the way back because I was the oldest."
Dan Rooney carried that same family mentality to the Steelers organization, where the players often looked at him as a father figure, not just the owner/chairman.
"He always cared about everybody individually and wanted to know about their families," Art II said. "He enjoyed having the annual Christmas party when all the families would come together. He loved that."
