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George
Westinghouse, Jr. formed the Westinghouse Electric Company in 1884,
which he eventually developed into one of the greatest electric
manufacturing companies in the U.S. After obtaining exclusive
rights to Nikola Tesla's patents for a polyphase system of alternating
current in 1888, Westinghouse began studying the possibility of using AC
electric systems to transmit power over long distances.
In the late
1800's, electric power distribution did not yet exist. The public
generally opposed AC electric power because of concerns about the risk
of electrocution. One of the biggest opponents of AC current was
Thomas Edison who, at the time, was selling DC power to customers nearby
his laboratory. Edison held public demonstrations where his
assistant executed animals using AC power to demonstrate the danger of
alternating current. In fact, the media's coverage of these events
is where the term "electrocution" was born.
In 1888, after
intense lobbying by Edison, the New York legislature changed the method
for execution of prisoners from hanging to electrocution. Edison
also managed to get the legislature to adopt AC current as the method of
execution - in the hopes of convincing the public of the dangers
inherent in AC power.
Westinghouse
refused to sell AC generators to prison authorities, so Thomas Edison,
with the help of engineer Harold Brown, provided the AC equipment
required for New York's first executions by electricity.
Westinghouse countered by funding the appeals of the first prisoners
scheduled to be executed by electrocution on the grounds that
electrocution was "cruel and unusual punishment". The state of New
York eventually won the appeals and the executions proceeded. For
many years the public referred to executions on the electric chair as
being "Westinghoused".
Despite
Westinghouse's early losses in the battle for public perception, his
alternating current system eventually beat out Edison's DC system.
Westinghouse demonstrated the superiority of alternating current in the
areas of power generation and transmission by building the first
long-distance transmission system at Niagara Falls, which provided power
to Buffalo, NY - more than 20 miles away.
A financial panic
in 1907 caused Westinghouse to lose control of the companies he had
founded. He spent the latter years of his life in public service.
George Westinghouse, Jr. died in 1914 at the age of 67.
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