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Mr. Matthew Campbell of Washington, PA is the guest speaker for the May 22nd meeting of the Peters Creek Historical Society. His subject is the Carnegie Hero Fund, a private, non-profit commission whose focus is to honor and to award the Carnegie Medal to those individuals in the United States and Canada who risked their lives to an extraordinary degree to save others.

Carnegie Medal

The Carnegie Hero Fund Commission, established in Pittsburgh and founded in 1904, was funded by a five million dollar trust fund from Andrew Carnegie, industrialist and philanthropist. The first recipients of the Carnegie Medal were Selwyn M. Taylor and Daniel Lyle, who died in the Harwick Mine Disaster outside Pittsburgh on January 24, 1904. The mine disaster claimed 181 lives, including Taylor and Lyle, who attempted to save the lives of other fellow miners. Carnegie was touched by the two men’s heroic sacrifice and commissioned medals to be minted in their honor for the families.

Within a two month period, Carnegie wrote the Hero Fund’s governing “Deed of Trust” adopted by the newly established Hero Fund Commission on April 15, 1904.

Hear more about the medal and its honored recipients. The meeting is open to the public and begins at 7:30 p.m. in the social room of Wrights United Methodist Church, 788 Venetia Road, Venetia, PA.

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