Thomas Edison

One of the most remarkable and creative people ever to have lived was an American inventor and scientist called Thomas Edison. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries he created hundreds of inventions that greatly changed everyday life—and his influence is still felt today. Without Thomas Edison we may never have had lights in our home, or the opportunity to buy music from shops or to visit a cinema to see the latest blockbuster. It is hard to imagine life without these things.

EARLY LIFE

Thomas Alva Edison was born in Milan, Ohio, on February 11, 1847. He attended school for only three months. As an 11-year-old boy he worked in the family market garden, delivering produce on a pony and trap. His main interest at this time was science, and he had a great thirst for technical knowledge. In his spare time he experimented with printing presses and with electrical and mechanical equipment. When he was 12, in order to buy books and chemical apparatus to continue his studies, he began selling newspapers and country produce on the Grand Trunk Railway. He even had a laboratory in a compartment on the train. In 1862 he began publishing the Grand Trunk Herald, a weekly newspaper that he produced on board the train.

FIRST INVENTIONS

At 16 he saved the life of a railway station official's child and was rewarded by being taught telegraphy, which he soon mastered. He moved about from one station to another, working as a telegraph operator for the Grand Trunk Railway, and within a year he was working for the Western Union Telegraph Company. The railway brought him into contact with engines and electricity, and he soon made his first important invention: a telegraphic repeating instrument that enabled messages to be transmitted automatically over a second line without the presence of an operator.

Edison moved to Boston, Massachusetts, and devoted all his spare time to research. In 1868 he gained his first official patent for an invention. It was for an electric vote recorder, for use in the American government’s House of Representatives. It was never used, probably because it was not practical enough. He then invented the Edison Universal Printer. It was the world's first really practical tape printing machine, and was used in stock exchanges and news agencies all over the world.

In 1874 he devised a system of quadruplex telegraphy. This was an automatic telegraph system that made itpossible to transmit several messages on one line simultaneously. For this and the sale of other telegraphic appliances, the Western Union Telegraph Company paid Edison US$40,000. It was a huge sum of money and in 1876 Edison built his own laboratory. He could now afford to invent full time, and he began taking out patents year after year.

MUSIC, LIGHTS AND FILM

Edison's next important invention was the carbon telephone transmitter. This played a vital role in the development of the telephone, which had recently been patented by the American inventor Alexander Graham Bell.

In 1877 Edison invented the phonograph, which was the world's first machine for both recording and playing back sound—it was the equivalent of the CD of today. His phonograph had a tinfoil-covered rotating cylinder onto which mechanically recorded sounds were made by converting vibrations of air into a groove that was engraved on it. He later improved on this with the gramophone, where the sound was impressed onto a disc instead of a cylinder. The gramophone had a diamond needle and other improved features.

Two years later he showed the world his incandescent electric light bulb, which was probably his most important creation. It had taken more research and experimentation to perfect than any of his previous inventions. It was a great success. Now Edison had to create an electrical generating system. He knew that huge electric dynamos would be needed to generate the necessary electric current to power the millions of light bulbs that would illuminate America's towns and cities. In 1882 he developed and installed the world's first large central electric-power station, located in New York. In the future his direct electric current system was bettered by an alternating-current system developed by fellow American inventors Nikola Tesla and George Westinghouse. Soon the major cities of the world were adopting Edison's ideas to power and light their homes, streets, shops and factories.

In 1888 Edison invented the kinetoscope, an early film projector. It was the first machine to produce 'cinema' films, and did so by showing a rapid succession of individual images. By synchronizing his gramophone and kinetoscope, he produced, in 1913, the first sound film. His other later discoveries include the mimeograph (a duplicating machine), the microtasimeter (a machine to detect tiny changes in temperature), a wireless telegraphic method for communicating with moving trains, and the nickel-iron storage battery, which was the result of many thousands of experiments and is very important in heavy industry. His later work consisted mainly of improving and perfecting previous inventions.

A REMARKABLE LIFE

Edison’s great achievements were recognized throughout the world and he was awarded many medals and prizes. In 1878 he was appointed Chevalier of the Légion d'honneur of France and in 1889 was made Commander of the Légion d'honneur. In 1892 he was awarded the Albert Medal of the Royal Society of Arts of Great Britain. During World War I he worked for the United States government, and in 1928 he received the Congressional Gold Medal “for development and application of inventions that have revolutionized civilization in the last century”.

Thomas Edison died in West Orange on October 18, 1931. Many people have made great contributions to life, but few have made as great a contribution as Thomas Edison in shaping modern society.

Did you know?

• In 1882, Edison took out an astonishing 107 patents on new inventions. That is more than one every three days.
• In one of the most famous quotes in history, Edison once said: 'Genius is 1 per cent inspiration and 99 per cent perspiration.' He truly believed in the importance of hard work above all else.
• Sound was first recorded by Thomas Edison in 1877. The first reproduced phrase, 'hello', was actually recorded on a telephone repeater, but Edison invented the more sophisticated phonograph the same year.
• Thomas Edison is known as the inventor of the light bulb, but it is not widely known that he used to sit in a dark cupboard to think up all his best ideas and inventions.
• Edison's home and laboratory in West Orange, New Jersey, where he lived from 1887 until his death, were established as the Edison National Historic Site in 1955.