Steinmetz, Charles Proteus << STYN mehts, charlz PROH tee uhs >> (1865-1923), was a German-born mathematician and engineer. He is best known for his development of a method for solving problems in alternating-current circuits, and for his experiments with artificially created lightning. Despite poverty, political misfortune, and a disabling spinal deformity, Steinmetz became an engineering genius.
Steinmetz established his reputation in the American engineering community in 1892. He established a formula for calculating hysteresis loss, a magnetic effect peculiar to alternating current. He was soon invited to join the newly founded General Electric Company, where he spent his career in research on electricity. Out of his home laboratory, which the company funded, came many experimental discoveries and inventions.
Steinmetz was born on April 9, 1865, in Breslau, Germany (now Wroclaw, Poland). Fearing arrest for socialist activity, he fled the country in 1888, just before receiving a Ph.D. from Breslau University. He came to the United States in 1889. He taught electrical engineering at Union College in Schenectady, New York, and wrote several books on electrical engineering theory. Steinmetz also held political office in Schenectady as a socialist. He died there on Oct. 26, 1923.
