Carnegie Hero Fund Commission
Near Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
On January twenty-fifth, nineteen oh four, an explosion tore through the Harwick Mine near this site, killing one hundred eighty-one men. Andrew Carnegie, who had made his fortune from the steel and industries that employed these miners, was moved by the disaster and by the stories of those who risked their lives trying to rescue others from the blast.
Three months later, on April fifteenth, Carnegie established the Carnegie Hero Fund Commission, based in Pittsburgh. The foundation awards the Carnegie Medal to civilians in the United States and Canada who risk their own lives to save others in the absence of any obligation to do so. Carnegie also founded ten similar funds across Europe. Some of the Harwick Mine victims are buried in cemeteries nearby, a reminder that the Hero Fund was born from real loss on this ground.
