'A Labor Of Love': Westinghouse Retirees Give Back By Tending Gardens

PITTSBURGH (KDKA) -- Westinghouse retirees say working at the George Westinghouse Memorial is a labor or love for them to honor Westinghouse and to connect with former coworkers.

In the shadow of a memorial of industrialist George Westinghouse, a group of retirees worked side-by-side Tuesday, not in engineering, but mulching and pulling weeds.

They are tending to the Westinghouse gardens.

"We want to continue to keep it looking great, get the weeds out of here," said Susie Barbour, vice president of the retiree group SURE, the Service Uniting Retired Employees.

The organization is a group of 1,000 former Westinghouse employees. This is the second time they are tending the gardens and using the opportunity to connect with old friends, the way Westinghouse connected with the community.

"He just gave so much to the community, and I think all of us who are either short term or lifetime employees of Westinghouse... George is a legacy and to keep that going, to do it in his memory, that's what this is all about," said Rick Etling, a Westinghouse retiree said.

The group plans to work at the gardens at least twice a year.

"We wanted to move the organization forward to be more of a driven, community service organization, to provide more services and activities to our new retirees," said Etling. "There's a lot of new Westinghouse retirees. We all grew up together so we wanted to be more proactive."