Emil Keller remembers George Westinghouse

In 1936, to commmemorate the 90th anniversary of George Westinghouse’s birth, dozens of employees and former employees of his companies offered personal remembrances of “the old man.” Most of these memories were a page or two, as collected in a separate entry in this archive.

But Emil Keller, whom Westinghouse had hired as a 23-year old to design and electrify the 1893 Columbian Exposition in Chicago, had much more to say.

Keller, who went on to be Vice-president and General Manager of Westinghouse Machine Company, penned this detailed 39-page memory of the man he called his mentor. In it, he chronicles the development of numerous Westinghouse innovations and offers an insider’s vision of life at Solitude.

Keller concludes his recollection, “George Westinghouse was a genius and was one of the grestest men this country has produced. It was much more than a priviledge to have known him.”

Remembrance from the Westinghouse Collection at the Heinz History Center