George Westinghouse

Inventor of the railway air brake and AC power pioneer.

unknown (Life time: subject died before 1914) · via Wikipedia: George Westinghouse · Public domain

George Westinghouse was born in 1846 in Central Bridge, New York, the son of a farmer and machine shop owner.^[1] He received the 1911 Edison Medal for developing the alternating current system.^[2]

Quick Facts

Born

6 October 1846

Birthplace

Central Bridge, New York, U.S.

Died

12 March 1914

Place of death

New York City, U.S.

Spouse

Marguerite Erskine Walker (1867)

Children

Known for

Founder of the original Westinghouse Electric Corporation
the Westinghouse Air Brake Company
and others

Facts from the source article.

Life and work

At age 14 Westinghouse tried to enlist in the Civil War but was stopped by his father.^[3] After the war he briefly attended Union College but dropped out during his first term.^[4] In 1881 he founded Union Switch and Signal to manufacture railway signaling systems.^[5][6] He developed steam turbines for maritime propulsion and invented a compressed air shock absorber for automobiles.^[7]

What the cited sources add

The Edison Tech Center account states Westinghouse promoted William Stanley as chief engineer at his Pittsburgh facility in 1885.^[8] Stanley, working under Westinghouse's direction, devised an improved transformer design using E-shaped plates.^[8] Westinghouse decided to trust Stanley's transformer design despite his patent lawyer's disagreement.^[8] The same source records that Westinghouse himself had suggested transporting power to Buffalo using compressed air in 1890.^[9]

References

Wikipedia, "George Westinghouse" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: "Westinghouse__George.html", PSU.edu; Huber 2022, p. 11; Variants of the name used by descendants include Wistinhausen, Wistenhausen and Wistenhaus. (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
Wikipedia, "George Westinghouse" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: "George Westinghouse", IEEE Global History Network (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
Wikipedia, "George Westinghouse" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Register of Commissioned Officers of the United States Navy. 1865. p. 209. (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
Wikipedia, "George Westinghouse" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Huber, "George Westinghouse, Powering the World", McFarland & Co., 2022, p. 17 (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
Wikipedia, "George Westinghouse" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Becerra-Fernandez, "Knowledge Management: Systems and Processes", Taylor & Francis, 2014, p. 241 (we also read that source) en.wikipedia.org
Wikipedia, "George Westinghouse" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: "Encyclopedia of the History of American Management", Continuum, 2006; "Encyclopedia of American Business History", Facts on File, 2005 (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
Wikipedia, "George Westinghouse" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Prout 1921, p. 190 (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
"William Stanley – Engineering Hall of Fame", Edison Tech Center, 2015. facts only, no text reused. edisontechcenter.org
Harnessing Niagara Edison Tech Center. facts only, no text reused. edisontechcenter.org

Each numbered sentence above was checked against the source it cites before publication. Sentences citing Wikipedia adapt text from the English Wikipedia article George Westinghouse (contributors), used under CC BY-SA 4.0; this entry is available under the same licence. Other sources were used for facts only; no text or images are copied from them.