A brief look at events over the past 111 years at Westinghouse.
| 1886 |
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Charter granted for Westinghouse Electric
Co. |
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| 1891 |
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Builds first high-voltage transmission line
from San Antonio Canyon to Pomona and San Bernardino, Calif. |
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| 1893 |
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Lights World's Columbian Exposition in
Chicago, the greatest display of incandescent lighting to that time. |
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| 1895 |
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Builds generators for power plant at Niagara
Falls. |
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| 1900 |
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Revolutionizes the generation of electricity
from coal by installing the first steam generator at Hartford Electric and Light Co. |
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| 1909 |
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Introduces continuous-filament tungsten
lamp. |
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| 1910 |
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George Westinghouse retires after losing
control of the company when it went into receivership following the financial panic of
1907 |
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| 1915 |
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Establishes pension plan for all employees. |
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| 1917 |
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Develops first fully automatic electric
range. |
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| 1920 |
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KDKA broadcasts results of Harding-Cox
election, the first commercial radio broadcast. |
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| 1928 |
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Introduces the thermal-trip circuit breaker
and the iconoscope, the first television camera tube. |
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| 1934 |
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Installs electric walkways in Marshall
Field's Chicago store. |
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| 1939 |
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Builds first long-range warning ground
radar. |
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| 1940 |
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Introduces the Laundromat, the first
flexible-mounted automatic washing machine. |
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| 1945 |
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Company renamed Westinghouse Electric Corp. |
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| 1949 |
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First broadcast of "Studio One,"
which ran nearly 10 years and was U.S. television's premier dramatic series. |
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| 1953 |
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Builds an atomic engine that becomes the
prototype for the USS Nautilus, which is launched two years later. |
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| 1954 |
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Starts Westinghouse Credit to finance sales
of Westinghouse televisions, refrigerators, washing machines and other appliances. |
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| 1957 |
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Westinghouse-powered plant in Shippingport
becomes the first U.S. nuclear power plant. |
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| 1965 |
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Gemini 6 and 7 missions use Westinghouse
rendezvous radar for space travel. |
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| 1969 |
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Westinghouse cameras record man's first walk
on the moon. |
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| 1972 |
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Sells electric housewares business. |
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| 1974 |
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Sells major appliance business. |
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| 1981 |
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Acquires Teleprompter Corp., the world's
second-largest cable television operator. |
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| 1982 |
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Sells lamp business. |
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| 1985 |
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Sells its Group W Cable television
operations for $1.7 billion. |
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| 1988 |
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New Chairman John Marous has big plans for
Westinghouse Credit. The financial service unit, on its way to earning record profits of
$159 million, begins committing billions of dollars in financing to commercial real estate
ventures and leveraged buyouts. |
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| 1990 |
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Chairman Paul Lego tells Wall Street
analysts the company will double sales, revenues and profits by the end of the 1990s. Says
the financial services unit, coming off a year of record profits, was healthier than
critics think. |
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| 1991 |
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In February, Lego announces a massive
restructuring of Westinghouse Credit, including a $975 million charge for loan losses.
Another writeoff of $1.7 billion follows in October, resulting in a loss for the year of
$1.1 billion. |
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| 1992 |
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Westinghouse cuts its dividend twice, from
$1.40 to 72 cents, then to 40 cents. The company posts a $2.8 billion charge for
restructuring, bringing Westinghouse Credit losses to $5.8 billion and resulting in a
companywide loss of $1.3 billion for 1992. |
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| 1993 |
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Lego steps down and is replaced by Pepsico
hotshot Michael Jordon. The company reports its third consecutive loss, this one of $326
million. |
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| 1995 |
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Jordan makes $5.4 billion bid for CBS. |
