Thomas Edison Biography
Thomas Edison Biography
One of the outstanding geniuses in the history of technology, Thomas Edison earned patents for more than a thousand inventions, including the incandescent electric lamp, the phonograph, the carbon telephone transmitter, and the motion-picture projector. In addition, he created the world's first industrial research laboratory. Born in Milan, Ohio, Edison was an inquisitive child. By the time he was 10 he had set up a small chemical laboratory in the cellar of his home after his mother had aroused his interest in an elementary physical science book. He found the study of chemistry and the production of electrical current from voltaic jars especially absorbing and soon operated a homemade telegraph set. In 1868 he obtained a position in Boston as an expert night operator for Western Union Telegraph Company; by day he slept little, however, for he was gripped by a passion for manipulating electrical currents in new ways. Borrowing a small sum from an acquaintance, he gave up his job in the autumn of 1868 and became a free-lance inventor, taking out his first patent for an electrical vote recorder. In the summer of 1869 he was in New York, sleeping in a basement below Wall Street. At a moment of crisis on the Gold Exchange caused by the breakdown of the office's new telegraphic gold-price indicator, Edison was called in to try to repair the instrument; this he did so expertly that he was given a job as its supervisor. Soon he had remodeled the erratic machine so well that its owners, the Western Union Telegraph Company, commissioned him to improve the crude stock ticker just coming into use. The result was the Edison Universal Stock Printer, which, together with several other derivatives of the Morse telegraph, brought him a sudden fortune of $40,000. With this capital he set himself up as a manufacturer in Newark, New Jersey, producing stock tickers and high-speed printing telegraphs. In 1876 Edison gave up the Newark factory altogether and moved to the village of Menlo Park, New Jersey, to set up a laboratory where he could devote his full attention to invention. He promised that he would turn out a minor invention every ten days and a big invention every six months. He also proposed to make inventions to order. Before long he had 40 different projects going at the same time and was applying for as many as 400...