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[[centered]]STEINMETZ: AFTER HALF A CENTURY[[/centered]]

[[bold]]He was an immigrant, born deformed as a hunchback. He created artificial lightning, hurling man-made thunderbolts at will. He expressed the complexities of alternating current in mathematical terms [[hole-punch cut-off word]] assigned 201 patents to General Electric. He was a naturalist and recognized humanitarian. He was Dr. Charles Proteus Steinmetz, who died 50 years ago this month. The Monogram asked Joseph Steinmetz Hayden, son of Steinmetz' adopted son and now owner of his own photocopy business in Schenectady, to look back over half a century to the memories of his illustrious "grandfather."[[/bold]]

[[photograph - automobile parked in front of a brick building. A bearded and bespectacled man leaning out of the window of the automobile. A man standing outside of the automobile leaning against the rear door. Three children, one girl and two boys, leaning/sitting on the running board.]]

[[caption]]In family pose, Joe Hayden is seated on running board of Steinmetz' electric car.[[/caption]] [[handwritten note]]Marjorie Hayden at left.[[/handwritten note]]

[[centered]]BY JOSEPH STEINMETZ HAYDEN[[/centered]]

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He seems, if anything, more widely known and respected today than he was then. I'm particularly aware of him now because of the Companywide competition for Charles P. Steinmetz Awards to recognize outstanding technical achievement.

But mostly my recollections are on a more personal plane. Because, while he was my grandfather through adoption, he was also my closest friend and confidant.

Six weeks before his death I had been his roommate on a whirlwind coast-to-coast speaking tour that "Dad" (as everyone in our family called him) had carefully planned to be a big family vacation. I was just 17 then. 

The trip west turned out to be a triumphal affair. At every stop, crowds waited to see him--including mayors, governors and other celebrities. The list of stars on hand to greet him in Hollywood included Douglas Fairbanks and
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Mary Pickford. While Dad was amazed that such personalities wanted to meet him, I simply basked in his reflected glow and felt very grown-up.

Young people quickly took to him, after accepting the fact of his odd appearance. The reason was that he himself was so childlike in many ways. My mother always treated him like one of the children--looking after him, buying his clothes, disciplining him if he misbehaved. Like us, he would receive no dessert if his plate wasn't clean.

He was generous to a fault. An example I'm fond of recalling goes back to when we were returning from the trip west--the day before I was due to report to prep school. "Now be certain to write home once a week," he told me, "and if there's something private you want to say to me, say it in the Morse Code I taught you at camp last summer." The "something private"
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