Cooper Hewitt says...
Born October 1, 1908, Alexander Lurkis was an electrical engineer who worked in both private and civic spheres. Lurkis wrote the he decided to become an engineer at age 12 when a pamphlet was distributed to his class at Public School 52 in the Bronx detailing technical studies at the private, non-sectarian Hebrew Technical Institute in Manhattan. He passed the entrance exam and entered the Institute upon leaving elementary school. He graduated in 1925 and obtained his first technical job working on the Eight and Ninth Avenue railways—first as an inspector, then a survey, and finally as assistant engineer. Meanwhile he attended the Cooper Union Night School of Engineering, a five-night-a-week, five-year Bachelor of Science program. He got his degree in1930, and the same year married Carin Tendler, a Cooper Union art student.
In 1934, Lurkis was among the 500 engineers within the Baord of Transportation laid off by Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia. In response, he and several colleagues formed the Civil Service Technical Guild; Lurkis became its legislative chairman and a lobbyist advocating for employment rights for his fellow engineers. The Guild became part of the AFL-CIO in 1958, with Lurkis as its president and a VP of AFL-CIO District Council 37.
In 1959, Mayor Robert Wager appointed Lurkis Chief Engineer of the Bureau of Gas and Electricity in the Department of Water Supply, Gas and Electricity. He worked uner Commissioner Armand D’Angelo, serving a spell as Acting Commissioner in 1961 when D’Angelo went on leave. In 1959, New York City experienced its first electrical blackout and Wagner appointed Lurkis to investigate Con Edison’s claim that the event was an “act of god.” Lurkis found the issue was a faulty distribution system that also led to subsequent blackouts throughout the remainder of the twentieth century. With Donald Deskey, Lurkis designed the New York City mercury street light post that replaced the older incandescent lights, as well as overseeing the conversion.
Lurkis retired in 1964, serving as a technical witness against Con Ed on behalf of Scenic Hudson; the former was attempting to build a pumped storage plant at Storm King. Lurkis subsequently provided expert testimony for a variety of cases appearing before the Federal Power Commission and Public Service Commissions. In 1964 he also founded the consulting engineering company Alexander Lurkis Associates (later Alexander Llurkis, P.C.), which did work for the American Museum of Natural History, Metropolitan Museum of Art, and Roche and Dinkeloo, Architects, as well as cities such as Cincinnati, Washington, D.C., Miami Beach, and New Orleans. He was an avid gardener and later in life wrote two novels and one play. He died On June 16, 2008 and was inducted into the Cooper Union Hall of Fame the next year.
References:
http://cooperalumni.org/alumni-profile-alexander-lurkis-ee-1930/
https://ethw.org/First-Hand:Unions_and_Utilities_in_New_York
