Am I another Bob? Pretty close

It doesn't bother Corey O'Connor in the least that his hair might turn silver in his late 30s.

That happened to his father, Pittsburgh's late Mayor Bob O'Connor, and it only enhanced his political career. The mayor's thick, white mane became one of his trademarks.

"I hope I've got the O'Connor gene," Corey O'Connor, a 22-year-old senior at Duquesne University, said Saturday in an interview.

Asked whether politics was in his blood as well, O'Connor said he's focused right now on a career as a teacher and coach, but he might run for office someday.

"It could happen. We'll see. It's got to be the right time," he said.

His looks are strikingly similar to his father's at about the same age. The similarity doesn't end there. Corey O'Connor inherited his father's gregarious demeanor, love of sports, tenacious optimism and quick wit. He's left-handed, as was the mayor. The most apparent trait the two have in common: a sparkling smile.

"Everybody thinks he's going to be another Bob," Judy O'Connor said of Corey during her husband's funeral on Thursday. "I guess if he just sprinkles his hair with some gray, he can go out there and take over where Bob left off."

Corey O'Connor hasn't been promoting himself as a potential future candidate for anything, but the unmistakable resemblance between him and his father, both in looks and personality, hasn't gone unnoticed at a time the city is mourning a beloved politician.

"Am I another Bob• Pretty close. He's tough to beat, but I learned from a good guy," he said. "I could do a pretty good job from what he's taught me. I don't know if I could do as well as he did, but I'd give it a good shot."

During the funeral, Corey O'Connor reminded more than 2,200 mourners at St. Paul Cathedral in Oakland that he is decidedly his father's son.

He asked the packed church to join him in a rendition of the "Steelers Polka," a tribute to the black-and-gold set to the tune of the "Pennsylvania Polka."

It was a favorite of the mayor's.

Corey O'Connor stumbled through the first verse before joking with the crowd that he didn't know all the words. The moment was classic Bob O'Connor, who often spoke off the cuff and disliked prepared speeches, even at his Jan. 3 inauguration.

Several cousins coaxed him into singing at the funeral, Corey O'Connor said yesterday. "I said, 'OK, but if I start singing, you guys better (sing along and) not leave me hanging up there.' They left me hanging."

His father's death hit him hard, he said.

"It hadn't sunk ... because we've had so much to do. It's sinking in now."

Corey O'Connor, from the time he was a toddler, shadowed his father. At 8, he held yard signs upright while Bob O'Connor, making his first race for City Council, hammered them into place. His dad taught him baseball and encouraged him to become a teacher and a coach. The elder O'Connor learned to play golf after Corey showed interest in it at an early age.

And the father's politics rubbed off on the son. Corey O'Connor spent a semester in 2005 at American University in Washington while he was an intern for U.S. Rep. Mike Doyle, D-Forest Hills. His major at Duquesne is education, and his minor is political science.

Bob O'Connor tutored his son in grassroots politics, teaching him the importance of knocking on doors, working a crowd and looking a voter in the eye when shaking hands.

"He said, 'I won't leave you any money, but I'll leave you a good name, so you might want to learn some of this stuff,' " said Corey O'Connor, a registered Democrat like his father.

Corey O'Connor's friends describe him as affable and generous -- a "people person" -- words that were frequently used to describe Bob O'Connor.

"He's pretty emotional about the things he cares about -- his family and friends, Central Catholic, Notre Dame football, his community and Pittsburgh," said Jason Ott, 22, one of a group of buddies at the O'Connor home in Squirrel Hill yesterday, watching the Notre Dame/Penn State game.

Grieving, Corey O'Connor asks himself what his father would do. Friday night he went to a football game at Central Catholic High School, from which he graduated in 2002 and where he is a varsity golf coach.

"I was shaking hands, telling everybody: 'It's OK. He's watching up there. It will be OK.' "

It's OK, too, to hold on to his sense of humor. Bob O'Connor was trying to get a laugh almost to the end, his son said.

In their last conversation before the mayor became too ill to communicate, Corey O'Connor mentioned there were rumors that Steelers head coach Bill Cowher might be leaving.

"He said, 'Why don't you take over?' and I said, 'Well, I know some football, but...' "

"All you got to do is stick your chin out," the mayor said.

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