Westinghouse Fountain

I came to the United States from Korea in 1954, and became a freshman at Carnegie Institute of Technology (now called Carnegie-Mellon University) in Pittsburgh. After my undergraduate years, I went to Princeton for graduate study in 1958.

Pittsburgh is known as Andrew Carnegie's steel city, but it is important to note that the city was also the home base for George Westinghouse who invented air-brake system for trains and initiated the AC-based electrical power distribution. There are still many places in the Pittsburgh area carrying Westinghouse's name.
While I was a student at CMU, my dormitory room was within a comfortable walking distance from the Westinghouse Fountain, and I used to go there for relaxation. As you can see from my photo at the fountain, I was a very skinny boy at that time. Of course, I was curious about this person whose name is associated with Westinghouse Electric Company and the compressed-air brake system for railroad trains.
Please click here for a more detailed story about him.
In order to write a story about George Westinghouse, I visited Pittsburgh in June of 2003 to study more about him and the companies he established. I was particularly interested in how he was able to use the concept of alternating current to transform this world. It was very happy to visit the Fountain and take photos with my new digital camera.
1. Click here for a full view of the fountain.
2. Statue of an employee thanking Westinghouse.
3. Close-up view of the plate.
4. I was there in 1956 and in 2003. Pittsburgh was a smoke-filled city in 1956.
CMU's Business School is about 50 meters away from the fountain. There I met two ladies taking a coffee break. I became their favorite boy when I told them I was a CMU freshmen 49 years ago (photo taken in 2003). The bare-footed lady on my right is the assistant dean of the School of Business and Management, who does all the work in dean's office. I am very happy to introduce to the world two truly American-looking American ladies from my American hometown. I am of course mighty proud of being in a position to introduce George Westinghouse to you.

Y.S.Kim (30 June 2003)