Biography of Thomas Edison - photos, quotes, inventions, interesting facts, success story. Thomas Edison - biography, information, personal life

Thomas Edison at Wikimedia Commons

Biography

Origin

In 1804, a son, Samuel Jr., was born into the family of John Samuel's eldest son. future father Thomas A. Edison. In 1811, not far from what is now Port Barwell in Canada, the Edison family received a large plot of land and finally settled in the village of Vienna. In 1812-1814, Captain Samuel Edison Sr., the future grandfather of Thomas Alva, took part in the Anglo-American War. In subsequent years, the Edison family prospered, and their hospitable manor on the river bank was known throughout the area.

In 1828, Samuel Jr. married Nancy Eliot, the daughter of a minister who received a good upbringing and education and worked as a teacher at the Vienna School. In 1837, under the influence of the economic crisis and crop failure, a rebellion broke out in Canada, in which Samuel Jr. took part. However, government troops suppressed the rebellion and Samuel was forced to flee to Mylan (Ohio, USA) to avoid punishment. In 1839, he manages to transport Nancy and her children. Edison's business was going well. It was during this period of Edison's life in Mailan that his son Thomas Alva was born (February 11, 1847).

Childhood

In my younger years

As a child, Thomas Alva was called Al, he was short and looked a little frail. However, he was very interested in the life around him: he watched steamships and barges, carpenters at work, boats being lowered at the shipyard, or sat quietly for hours in a corner, copying the inscriptions on warehouse signs. At the age of five, Al visited Vienna with his parents and met his grandfather. In 1854, the Edisons moved to Port Huron, Michigan, located at the bottom of Lake Huron. Here Alva during three months attended school. His teachers considered him "limited." Parents were asked to pick up their child from school. His mother took him and at home gave him his first education.

Edison often visited the Port Huron People's Library. Before the age of twelve, he managed to read Gibbon's History of the Rise and Decline of the Roman Empire, Hume's History of Great Britain, and Burton's History of the Reformation. However, the future inventor read his first scientific book at the age of nine. It was "Natural and Experimental Philosophy" by Richard Greene Parker, containing almost all the scientific and technical information of that time. Over time, he carried out almost all the experiments described in the book.

Since childhood, Edison helped his mother sell fruits and vegetables. However, the pocket money earned in this way was not enough for his experiments, especially chemical ones. Therefore, in 1859, Thomas got a job as a newspaperman on the railroad line connecting Port Huron and Detroit. Young Edison's earnings reached 8-10 dollars a month (about 300 dollars in 2017 prices). He continues to be interested in books and chemical experiments, for which he seeks permission to set up his laboratory in the baggage car of a train.

Edison took every opportunity to increase demand for the newspapers he sold. So, when in 1862 the commander-in-chief northern army suffered a serious defeat, Thomas asks the telegraph operator to transmit a brief message about the battle to Port Huron and all intermediate stations. As a result, he managed to increase newspaper sales at these stations several times. A little later he becomes the publisher of the first train newspaper. It was also during this time that Edison developed an interest in electricity.

In August 1862, Edison saved the son of the head of one of the stations from a moving carriage. The boss offered to teach him telegraphy in gratitude. This is how he became acquainted with the telegraph. He immediately sets up his first telegraph line between his house and his friend’s house. Soon there was a fire in Thomas' carriage, and the conductor threw Edison and his laboratory out.

Traveling Telegraph Operator

In 1863, Edison became a night shift telegraph operator at the station with a salary of $25 a month. Here he manages to automate part of the work and sleep on the job, for which he soon receives a severe reprimand. Soon, due to his fault, two trains almost collided. Tom returned to Port Huron to live with his parents.

All this time, Edison cared little about clothing and everyday life, spending all his money on books and materials for experiments. It was in Boston that Edison first became acquainted with the works of Faraday, which were of great importance for all his future activities.

In addition, it was during these years that Edison tried to obtain his first patent from the Patent Office. He is developing an “electric voting machine” - a special device for counting “yes” and “no” votes cast. The demonstration of the apparatus before a special parliamentary commission ended unsuccessfully due to the reluctance of parliament to abandon paper counting. In 1868, Edison went to New York to sell another of his inventions there - an apparatus for automatically recording stock exchange rates. However, these hopes were not justified. Edison returns to Boston.

Moving to New York

With the money received, Edison buys equipment for making stock tickers and opens his own workshop in Newark, near New York. In 1871, he opened two more new workshops. He devotes all his time to work. Subsequently, Edison said that until the age of fifty he worked on average 19 and a half hours a day.

The New York Automatic Telegraph Society suggested that Edison improve an automatic telegraphy system based on paper perforation. The inventor solves the problem and gets, instead of the maximum transmission speed on a manual device, equal to 40-50 words per minute, the speed of automatic devices is about 200 words per minute, and later up to 3 thousand words per minute. While working on this task, Thomas meets his future wife, Mary Stillwell. However, the wedding had to be postponed because Edison's mother died in April 1871. The wedding of Thomas and Mary took place in December 1871. In 1873, the couple had a daughter, who was named Marion in honor of older sister Tom. In 1876, a son was born, who was named Thomas Alva Edison Jr.

After a short stay in England, Edison began working on duplex and quadruplex telegraphy. The principle of quadruplex (double duplex) was known earlier, but in practice the problem was solved by Edison in 1874 and is his greatest invention. In 1873, the Remington brothers bought an improved model of the Scholz typewriter from Edison and subsequently began to widely produce typewriters under the Remington brand. In three years (1873-1876), Thomas applied for new patents for his inventions forty-five times. Also during these years, Edison's father moved in with him and took on the role of economic assistant to his son. For inventive activities, a large, well-equipped laboratory was needed, so in January 1876 its construction began in Menlo Park near New York.

Menlo Park

Menlo Park, a small village where Edison moved in 1876, acquired world fame. Edison gets the opportunity to work in a real, equipped laboratory. From this moment on, invention becomes his main profession.

Telephone transmitter

Edison's first work in Menlo Park included telephony. The Western Union Company, concerned about the threat of competition to the telegraph, turned to Edison. After trying many options, the inventor created the first practical telephone microphone, and also introduced an induction coil into the telephone, which significantly increased the sound of the telephone. For his invention, Edison received 100 thousand dollars from Western Union.

Phonograph

In 1877, Edison registered the phonograph with the Bureau of Inventions. The appearance of the phonograph caused general amazement. The demonstration of the first device was immediately carried out in the editorial office of Scientific American magazine. The inventor himself saw eleven promising areas for the use of the phonograph: recording letters, books, teaching eloquence, playing music, family notes, recording speeches, the area of advertising and announcements, watches, learning foreign languages, recording lessons, connecting to the telephone.

Electric lighting

Edison's incandescent lamp in the Myers Encyclopedia 1888

In 1878, Edison visited Ansonia William Walas, who was working on electric carbon arc lamps. Walas gave Edison a dynamo along with a set of arc lamps. After this, Thomas begins work towards improving the lamps. In April 1879, the inventor established the critical importance of vacuum in the manufacture of lamps. And already on October 21, 1879, Edison completed work on an incandescent light bulb with a carbon filament, which became one of the largest inventions of the 19th century. Edison's greatest achievement was not in developing the idea of the incandescent lamp, but in creating a practical, widespread system of electric lighting with a strong filament, a high and stable vacuum, and the ability to use many lamps simultaneously.

On the eve of 1878, giving a speech, Edison said: “We will make electricity so cheap that only the rich will burn candles.” In 1878, Edison, along with J.P. Morgan and other financiers, founded the Edison Electric Light Company in New York, which by the end of 1883 produced 3/4 of the incandescent light bulbs in the United States. In 1882, Edison built New York City's first distribution substation, serving Pearl Street and 59 customers in Manhattan, and founded the Edison General Electric Company to manufacture electric generators, light bulbs, cables, and lighting fixtures. To conquer the market, Edison set the selling price of a light bulb at 40 cents, while its cost was 110 cents. For four years, Edison increased the production of light bulbs, reducing their cost, but suffered losses. When the cost of the lamp dropped to 22 cents, and their production increased to 1 million units, he covered all costs in one year. In 1892, Edison's company merged with other companies to form General Electric.

Working with Nikola Tesla

In 1884, Edison hired a young Serbian engineer, Nikola Tesla, whose duties included repairing electric motors and direct current generators. Tesla proposed using alternating current for generators and power plants. Edison perceived Tesla's new ideas rather coldly, and disputes constantly arose. Tesla claims that in the spring of 1885 Edison promised him 50 thousand dollars (at that time an amount approximately equivalent to 1 million modern dollars) if he could constructively improve the direct current electric machines invented by Edison. Nikola actively got to work and soon introduced 24 varieties of Edison's alternating current machine, a new switch and regulator that significantly improved performance. Having approved all the improvements, in response to a question about the reward, Edison refused Tesla, saying that the emigrant still did not understand American humor well. Insulted, Tesla immediately quit [ ] . A couple of years later, Tesla opened his own Tesla Electric Light Company next door to Edison. Edison began a widespread information campaign against alternating current, claiming that it was dangerous to life.

Kinetoscope

Kinetoscope (from the Greek “kinetos” - moving and “skopio” - to look) is an optical device for displaying moving pictures, invented by Edison in 1888. The patent described a perforated film format (35 mm wide with perforations along the edge - 8 holes per frame) and a frame-by-frame transport mechanism. One person could watch the film through a special eyepiece - it was a personal cinema. The cinematography of the Lumière brothers used the same type of film and a similar transport mechanism. In the USA, Edison started a “patent war”, justifying his priority on perforated film and demanding royalties for its use. When Georges Méliès sent several copies of his film A Trip to the Moon to the United States, Edison's company remade the film and began selling copies by the dozen. Edison believed that in this way he was reimbursing the patent fee, since Méliès's films were shot on punch-hole film. A Trip to the Moon opened the first permanent movie theater in Los Angeles, one of the outskirts of which was called Hollywood.

Edison, Lodygin, Goebel, Just, Hanaman and Coolidge

It is a mistake to consider only Edison as the creator of the incandescent lamp. The honor of the invention also belongs to the German inventor Heinrich Goebel. Goebel was the first to think of pumping air out of a glass lamp bulb; Russian inventor Alexander Nikolaevich Lodygin, he was the first to propose making an incandescent filament not from coal or charred fibers, but from refractory tungsten. But it was only in 1904 that Austro-Hungarian specialists Sandor Just and Franjo Hanaman were the first to use tungsten filament in lamps and such lamps entered the market through the Hungarian company Tungsram in 1905. In 1906 William Coolidge invents an improved method for producing tungsten filament. Subsequently, the tungsten filament displaces all other types of filaments.

But it was Edison who came up with the modern form of the lamp, a screw base with a socket, a plug, a socket, and fuses. He did a lot for the widespread use of electric lighting.

Later life dates

1880 - dynamo, magnetic ore sorting device, experimental railway
1881 - three-wire electrical lighting network system
1884 - death of wife Mary
1885 - train induction telegraph
1886 - wedding of Edison and Mina Miller
1887 - laboratory in West Orange, birth of daughter Madeleine
1890 - birth of son Charles, improvement of the phonograph
1892 - ore beneficiation plant, improvement of the phonograph
1896 - father's death
1898 - birth of son Theodore
1901 - cement plant
1912 - kinetophone
1914 - production of phenol, benzene, aniline oils and other chemical products
1915 - Chairman of the Marine Advisory Committee
1930 - the problem of synthetic rubber, Edison’s election as an honorary member of the USSR Academy of Sciences

Spiritualist experiments

Edison family friend John Eggleston ( John Eggleston) stated in the magazine Banner of Light dated May 2, 1896, that the inventor’s parents were staunch spiritualists, and held seances at home even when their son was a child. In adulthood, Edison called such sessions naive, and believed that if communication with those who left our world was possible, then it could be established by scientific methods. When Helena Blavatsky, founder of the Theosophical Society in New York (1875), sent Thomas Edison, as the inventor of the phonograph, her book “Isis Unveiled”, published in 1877, enclosing a form for joining the society, Edison responded positively, and his application membership was received by the Theosophical Society on April 5, 1878.

During the last 10 years of his life, Thomas Edison was particularly interested in what is commonly called “occultism” and the afterlife and conducted relevant experiments. Together with colleague William Dinudi ( William Walter Dinwiddie, 1876-1920) tried to record the voices of the dead and entered into an “electric pact” with him, according to which both swore an oath that the first of them to die would try to send the other a message from the world of the departed. When Dinwiddie's colleague died in October 1920, 73-year-old Edison gave an interview to Forbes, in which he notified the public of his efforts to create a device for communicating with the dead - the "necrophone". This is also evidenced by the last chapter of his memoirs - “The Otherworldly Kingdom” (USA, 1948), published as a separate book in France (2015). In it, Edison touches on the existence of the soul, the origins of human life, the functioning of our memory, spiritualism and technical capabilities communication with the deceased.

According to the inventor, the necrophone was supposed to record last words newly deceased - its "living components" just dissipating into etheric space before they group together to form another Living being. Edison's necrophone has not survived, nor have his drawings, which has given some biographers the opportunity to express doubts about its existence and even about the sincerity of Edison's words regarding this project. After Edison's death (1931), engineers and psychologists who knew him formed the Society for Etheric Research. Society for Etherique Research) to continue his business technical creation necrophone and methods of communication with those who have left the physical world.

Thomas Edison's grave

Death

Thomas Edison died from complications of diabetes on October 18, 1931, at his home in West Orange, New Jersey, which he purchased in 1886 as a wedding gift for Mina Miller. Edison was buried in the backyard of his home.

Video on the topic

Famous inventions

Title page of Edison's 1880 electric lamp patent

Among them:

Invention	year
Aerophone	1860
Electric vote counter for elections	1868
Ticker machine	1869
Carbon telephone membrane	1870
Quadruplex (four-way) telegraph	1873
Mimeograph	1876
Phonograph	1877
Carbon microphone	1877
Carbon filament incandescent lamp	1879
Magnetic Iron Ore Separator	1880
Kinetoscope	1889
Iron-nickel battery	1908

Characteristic

Edison was distinguished by his amazing determination and efficiency. When he was searching for a suitable material for the filament of an electric lamp, he went through about 6 thousand samples of materials until he settled on carbonized bamboo. While testing the characteristics of the lamp's carbon circuit, he spent about 45 hours in the laboratory without rest. Until his very old age, he worked 16-19 hours a day.

Memory

In astronomy

The asteroid (742) Edison, discovered in 1913, is named after Edison.

To the cinema

The Mystery of Nikola Tesla / Tajna Nikole Tesla (Yugoslavia 1979, Director: Krsto Papich) - as Thomas Edison Dennis Patrick.
My 20th century (Hungary/Germany, 1989) - Peter Andorai as Thomas Edison.

Notes

BNF ID: Open Data Platform - 2011.
SNAC - 2010.
Find a Grave - 1995. - ed. size: 165000000
Tsverava G.K. Edison Thomas Alva // Great Soviet Encyclopedia: [in 30 volumes] / ed. A. M. Prokhorov - 3rd ed. - M.: Soviet Encyclopedia, 1978. - T. 29: Chagan - Aix-les-Bains. - pp. 566–567.
https://www.biography.com/people/thomas-edison-9284349
Edison's Patents - The Edison Papers(English) . Retrieved September 8, 2012. Archived October 15, 2012.
Edison created 1073 inventions without co-authors. 20 inventions were created jointly with other inventors. In total, Edison had 13 co-authors.
See Incandescent light bulb: history of invention.
Edison Thomas Alva - Historical background (Russian)(02.12.2002). - “Honorary member since 02/01/1930 - USA.” Retrieved January 4, 2016.
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Samokhin V. P. In memory of Thomas Alva Edison
$50,000 (1885) = $1,082,008 (2006) The Inflation Calculator
Cheney, Margaret (2001). Tesla: Man Out of Time. Simon and Schuster. ISBN 0-7432-1536-2.

16 min. reading

Updated: 02/19/2019

Most people miss an opportunity because it comes in overalls and looks like work / T. Edison

Thomas Alva Edison (eng. Thomas Alva Edison; 02/11/1847 – 10/18/1931) is a famous American inventor and businessman, co-founder of the General Electric Corporation. At the age of 23, he became the founder of a unique research laboratory.

During his professional career, Thomas received 1,093 patents in his homeland and about 3,000 outside the United States.

A talented organizer, with his discoveries Edison put high-brow science on a commercial footing and linked the results of experiments with production. He improved the telegraph and telephone, and designed the phonograph. Thanks to his persistence, millions of incandescent light bulbs lit up the world.

Edison did not become a “mad scientist” vegetating in his declining years in obscurity and poverty, but achieved recognition. But he had neither higher education nor even primary education: He was kicked out of school with the stigma of “brainless.” The biography of Thomas Edison will tell you what qualities lead to success.

Edison's childhood

NEWBORN WITH “BRAIN FEVER”

The future genius was born in the American city of Milen (Ohio) on 02/11/1847. The newborn Thomas Alva Edison surprised the doctor who delivered the baby: the obstetrician expressed the opinion that the baby had “brain fever,” because the baby’s head exceeded the standard size. The doctor was right about one thing - the baby was definitely not “standard.”

LONG LIVING FATHERS

Thomas was born into a family of descendants of Dutch millers. In the 18th century, part of the family emigrated to the USA, where they took root. Both Edison’s great-grandfather and grandfather were long-livers: the first lived to be 102 years old, the second to 103.

Samuel Edison, Thomas's father, was a wide-ranging businessman: he traded in timber, real estate, and wheat. He built a 30-meter-high staircase in his yard at home and collected a quarter of a dollar from everyone who wanted to enjoy the panorama from above. People laughed, but they paid money. Thomas will inherit his father's business acumen.

Reread the previous paragraph again, a quarter of a dollar for viewing from a 30-meter ladder. It's practically money out of thin air. The idea was elementary, but a daredevil was found and brought it to life. This distinguishes successful people from ordinary people; their brains generate ideas of different kinds, and their hands bring them to life. Coming up with an idea is easy, but implementing it becomes an impossible task for many people. If you want to succeed, learn to act. And the sooner the better. Take the first step immediately after reading this article.

Nancy Eliot, the mother of the future genius, grew up in the family of a priest, was a highly educated woman, and worked as a teacher before her marriage.

Thomas's parents are Samuel Edison and Nancy Eliot

Thomas's parents married in 1837 in Canada. Soon, a rebellion began in the country due to economic decline; Samuel, who took part in the riots, fled from government troops to America. In 1839, his wife and children joined him.

Thomas was the couple's youngest child, the seventh. The family's name was Alva, Al or El. He often played alone as a child. Even before his birth, the Edison couple had three children who died; the older brother and sisters were older than Thomas and did not share his games with him.

CHILDHOOD WITHOUT TOYS

In 1847, Edison's hometown was a thriving center on the Huron River, thanks to a water canal that carried farm crops and timber to the industrial centers.

Al grew up as an inquisitive child who got into trouble: once he fell into a canal and miraculously survived; fell into an elevator and almost suffocated in the grain; started a fire in my father's barn. According to the memoirs of Edison Sr., his son “did not know children’s games; his amusements were steam engines and mechanical crafts.” The boy loved to “build” on the river bank: he laid roads and constructed toy windmills.

SCATTERED FROM THE HURON RIVER

Once Thomas went with a friend to the river. While he was sitting on the bank in thought, his comrade drowned. Alva woke up from his thoughts and thought that his friend had returned home without him. Later, when his friend's body was discovered, the inattentive Thomas was blamed for the accident. This event was deeply imprinted in the boy’s mind.

RELOCATION TO THE GREAT LAKES STATE

In 1854 the family moved to the state of Michigan, the city of Port Huron. Thomas's native Mylen, where he spent the first 7 years of his life, began to fall into disrepair: the city canal lost its commercial importance because a railway line was built nearby.

In their new location, the family occupies a beautiful house with a large garden and views of the river. Alve works on a farm, collects fruits and vegetables, and sells crops, traveling around the area.

RUMORS OF LOST HEARING

Thomas begins to hear worse, sources indicate different reasons for this:

The “prosaic” version: the boy suffered from scarlet fever;
“Romantic”: the conductor “ran into” the young inventor’s ear with a composter;
“Plausible”: heredity is to blame (Alya’s dad and brother had a similar problem).

His deafness increased throughout his life. When films with sound appeared, Edison complained that actors began to play worse, concentrating on their voices: I feel this more than you because I am deaf.

Inventor Education

SCHOOL: “HELLO AND GOODBYE”

In 1852, a law was passed requiring children to attend school. However, the majority continued to help their parents family farms and didn't study. Thomas's mother taught him to read and write, and placed his grown son in primary school.

IN educational institution Schoolchildren were punished with a belt, and Alya was punished as well. The boy was hard of hearing, absent-minded, and had difficulty cramming the material. The teacher more than once ridiculed the careless student in front of schoolchildren, and once called him “stupid.”

CREATOR OF GENIUS

His mother took Thomas from school, where he suffered for 2 months. A tutor was hired for home education, and the boy learned a lot on his own. Mom did not require me to cram uninteresting subjects. Edison would later say: My mother was my creator. She understood me, she gave me the opportunity to follow my inclinations.

On this issue, I share the opinion of Edison’s mother. My eldest daughter will start school in a year, but she already reads perfectly, which we taught her on our own. And when she goes to school, I will never demand from her fours and fives, as was the case with me in childhood, I will not force her to cram something that is not interesting to her. I will even let her “skip” boring subjects. This does not mean that she will be idle; instead of boring lessons, she will do what interests her (creativity, sports, other subjects). The parent’s task is to identify the child’s creative abilities and direct all his energy in this direction, cutting off everything unnecessary. note from editor Roman Kozhin

There is a beautiful instructive story.

One day, little Thomas returned from class and gave his mother a note from the school teacher. Mrs. Edison read the message aloud: “Your son is a genius. There are no suitable teachers in this school who can teach him anything. Please teach it yourself."

Being a famous inventor, when his mother had already died, Edison found this note in family archive, her text read: “Your son is mentally retarded. We can't teach it at school with everyone else. Please teach it yourself."

Thomas Edison as a child (about 12 years old)

BOOKWORM

Just as a sculptor needs a block of marble, so the soul needs knowledge.

By the age of 9, Alva was reading books on history, the works of Shakespeare and Dickens, and visiting the local library. In his parents' basement, he sets up a laboratory and performs experiments from the book “Natural and Experimental Philosophy” by Richard Parker. So that no one touches his reagents, the young alchemist signs all bottles “poison”.

Thomas Edison's track record

12 YEARS EMPLOYER

In 1859, Alya’s father found him a job as a “train boy” - the duties of the “trainboy” included selling newspapers and sweets on the train. The former book lover shuttles between Port Huron and Detroit and quickly catches on to the trade. He expands the business, hires 4 assistants and brings $500 into the family annually.

PRINTING HOUSE ON WHEELS

Business-minded and resourceful from a young age, Al organizes a couple of sources of income. In the train where he traded there was an abandoned carriage - a former “smoking room”. In it, Al sets up a printing house and publishes the first travel newspaper, the Grand Trunk Herald. He does everything himself - types the text, edits articles. “Vestnik...” informed about local news and military events (was Civil War North and South). The train leaflet received positive comments from English edition Times!

WORKING ADVANCED

Al comes up with the idea of telegraphing newspaper headlines to the stations of his railway line. Upon the arrival of the train, the public eagerly buys up the latest press from the boy, wanting to know the details. The telegraph helped Thomas increase his newspaper sales. The guy will continue to strive to benefit from scientific inventions in the future.

LABORATORY ON WHEELS

You’re amazed at how much energy the little boy contained. In the same former smoking carriage, Thomas sets up a laboratory. But while the train is moving, a container with phosphorus breaks due to shaking and a fire starts. Alya is kicked out of work, his enterprises “burn out” in every sense.

UNDERGROUND

The guy transfers his vigorous activity to the basement of his father’s house. He designs a steam engine, arranges a telegraph message, using bottles for insulators. Typographical work also returns: Al publishes the newspaper “Paul Pr”. In one note he managed to insult a subscriber. The offended reader ambushed Thomas by the river and threw him into the water. It’s good that the teenager swam well, otherwise the world would have lost hundreds of his inventions.

RESCUE A CHILD

At the Mont Clemens station, Edison had to save a 2-year-old child when he climbed onto the rails. Thomas rushed onto the track and managed to snatch the child almost from under the locomotive. The noble act made Thomas popular in the city. The baby's father, stationmaster James Mackenzie, in gratitude, offered to teach Thomas how to operate a telegraph machine.

In 1863, 5 months after the start of his studies, 16-year-old Edison received a position as a telegraph operator in a railroad office with a salary of $25 and extra pay for working at night.

PROGRESS IS DRIVEN BY LAZY PEOPLE

Thomas loved night shifts; no one bothered him to invent, read or sleep. But the head of the office demanded that the given word be transmitted by telegraph twice an hour to make sure that the employee was awake. The resourceful Thomas designed an “answering machine” by adapting a wheel with Morse code. The boss’s order was carried out, and he himself went about his business.

ALMOST CRIMINAL CASE

Soon the enterprising employee is fired with a scandal: the two trains miraculously avoided a collision, and all because of Edison’s oversight. Thomas was nearly prosecuted.

VERY LONG RESUME

From Port Huron, Thomas leaves for Adriana, where he finds a job as a telegraph operator. In subsequent years, he worked at Western Union subsidiaries in Indianapolis and Cincinnati.

Thomas then moved to Nashville, from there to Memphis, and finally to Louisville. Working there for the Associated Press telegraph office, Thomas again became the culprit of an emergency in 1867. For his chemical experiments, the guy kept sulfuric acid on hand, and one day he broke the jar. The liquid burned through the floor and damaged valuable property of the banking firm on the floor below. The restless “telegraph operator-alchemist” was fired.

Thomas's main troubles happened because he could not simply carry out routine operations; it was too boring for him.

THE FIRST PANCAKE IS LOMIC

The first patent received by Edison in 1869 for an “electric voting apparatus” did not bring him success. The machine presented before Congress in Washington received a verdict of “slow”: congressmen manually recorded their votes faster.

Starting a successful career

CITY LIGHTS

In 1869, Edison came to New York with the desire to find a permanent job. Luck smiled on Thomas, setting up a fateful meeting: in one of the companies he found the owner repairing a machine for sending reports on the exchange rate of gold and valuable papers. Edison quickly repairs the device himself and gets a job as a telegraph operator. By using the ticker, Thomas improves the design of the device, and the entire office where he works switches to his updated machines.

UNSEEN CAPITAL

Most people believe that one day they will wake up rich.They're half right. Someday they will really wake up.

In 1870, Mr. Lefferts, head of the Gold and Stock Telegraph Company, offered to buy out Edison's development. He hesitated how much to ask: 3 thousand dollars? Or maybe 5? Edison admits that the first time he almost fainted was at the moment when the head of the company wrote him a check for $40,000.

Edison received the money through adventure. At the bank, the teller returned the check to him for signature, but Thomas did not hear it and thought that the check was bad. Edison returned to Lefferts, who sent an employee to the bank to accompany the deaf inventor. The check was cashed in small bills, and Edison was afraid of a police patrol on the way home: what if he was confused with a robber? The inventor did not sleep at night, guarding the fallen treasure. He calmed down only after getting rid of large sum cash by opening a bank account the next day.

FIRST WORKSHOPS

In the city of Newark, New Jersey, a young man opens a workshop where he produces ticker devices. He enters into contracts with telegraph companies for the supply and repair of devices, and hires over a hundred workers.

In letters home, 23-year-old Edison said: “I have now become what you Democrats call a “bloated Eastern entrepreneur.”

Smiling Edison and Henry Ford as Sheriff

Two Muses of Thomas Edison

PICKUP LESSONS FROM EDISON

Thomas Edison's personal life did not take up much of his time; he endeared himself not with long courtships, but with determination. Among his employees was a pretty girl, Mary Stillwell. One day, the head of the workshop slowed down near her workplace and asked:

– What do you think of me, baby? Do you like me?

- What are you doing, Mr. Edison, you're scaring me.

– Don’t rush to answer. Yes, this is not so important if you agree to marry me.

Seeing that the young lady was not serious, the inventor insisted:

- I am not kidding. But don’t rush, think carefully, talk to your mother and give me an answer when it’s convenient - even on Tuesday.

The date of their wedding had to be postponed due to the death of Edison's mother in April 1871. Thomas and Mary got married in December 1871, the groom turned 24, the bride 16. After the ceremony, the newlywed went to work and stayed late, forgetting about his first wedding nights.

The couple moved in with Mary's sister Alice, who kept her company while her husband spent days and nights at work. The couple had three children: daughter Marion (1873), son Thomas (1876) and another son William (1878). Edison jokingly called his daughter “Dot”, and his middle son “Dash”, according to Morse code. Mary, Edison's wife, died at the age of 29 in 1884, presumably from a brain tumor.

SECOND CHANCE FOR PERSONAL HAPPINESS

In 1886, 39-year-old Edison married 21-year-old Mina Miller. He taught his beloved the rules of Morse coding, which allowed her to secretly communicate in the presence of Mina’s parents by tapping long and short symbols on her palm.

Mina Miller - Edison's second wife

In his second marriage, the inventor also had three heirs: daughter Madeline (1888) and sons Charles (1890) and Theodore (1898).

Thomas Edison was the father of six children, Charles (pictured with Edison) was one of four sons

Edison's inventions and operating principles

QUADRUPLEX

In 1874, Western Union acquired Thomas's invention - the 4-channel telegraph (aka quadruplex). Quadruplex allowed the transmission of 2 messages in two directions. This principle was formulated earlier, but Edison was the first to put it into practice. The scientist estimated the development at 4-5 thousand dollars, but again “cheapened”: Western Union paid 10. The chairman of the company will write in the report that Edison’s invention brought annual savings of half a million dollars.

By the age of 29, Edison had become familiar with the Patent Office: over the past 3 years, he came to register developments 45 times. The head of the office even commented: “The road to me does not have time to cool down from the steps of young Edison.”

ATHLETIC JUMP

In 1875, Edison’s father moved to Newark, whose arrival was associated funny story. The ferry was leaving from the embankment. Suddenly, an old man of about 70, who was late for it, suddenly ran up and covered the distance between the embankment and the ferry with a huge leap. This old man turned out to be Edison Sr., heading towards his son. Reporters trumpeted the story about the inventor's bouncy parent.

Friends Henry Ford and Thomas Edison - icons of the era

"DO NOT ENTER! SCIENTIFIC WORK IN PROGRESS"

Edison uses the funds received for the quadruplex to build a laboratory in the town of Menlo Park.

I understood what the world needed. Okay, I'll invent it

In March 1876, construction of the research center was completed. Journalists and idle onlookers were prohibited from entering the territory. Laboratory experiments were carried out under the cover of secrecy, and the scientific genius himself received the nickname “the wizard of Menlo Park.” From 1876 to 1886, the laboratory expanded; Edison managed to organize its branches outside the United States.

SYMBOL OF PERSISTENCE

The biggest mistake is that we give up quickly. Sometimes, to get what you want, you just have to try one more time.

Edison's workaholism could not be treated; he spent 16-19 hours working every day. Once a great worker worked for 2.5 days in a row, and then slept for 3 days.

Healthy genes and love for his work helped him cope with such a load. The inventor stated that he did not divide the week into “workdays” and weekends, he simply worked and enjoyed it. His quote is widely known:

Genius is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration.

Thomas became a living example of perseverance and determination.

TEAM EDISON

The workday was irregular not only for the manager, but also for the center’s employees. The scientist selected for his team people who were as enthusiastic and hardworking as he was. His workshop was a real “forge of personnel.” Among the “graduates” of the scientific center are Sigmund Bergman (later the head of the Bergman companies) and Johann Schuckert, the founder of the company, which later merged with Siemens.

MERCANTILE INVENTOR

The center’s strategy was determined by the rule: “Invent only what will be in demand.” The center functioned not for the sake of scientific publications, but for the mass implementation of developments.

In 1877, Thomas invented the phonograph, the first apparatus for reproducing and recording sound.

The development, demonstrated at the White House and the French Academy of Sciences, created a sensation. During its demonstration in France in 1878, a philologist professor attacked the commissioner Edison with accusations of ventriloquism. Even after an expert opinion, the humanist could not believe that the “talking machine” reproduced the “noble voice of a person.”

The phonograph's recordings were short-lived, which did not prevent the device from glorifying the name of Edison. The scientist did not expect such popularity and stated that he did not trust things that worked the first time.

Thanks to Edison's invention, the living speech of Leo Tolstoy has reached us. The writer, having ordered the device, received it as a gift. Edison, having learned who the device was intended for, sent it to Yasnaya Polyana free of charge with an engraving - “A gift to Count Leo Tolstoy from Thomas Alva Edison.”

When the inventor was asked whether in the future it would be possible to record human thoughts on a phonograph, he replied that most likely this would be possible, but warned that then “all people would hide from each other.”

Edison did not mind using ready-made ideas: “the best of them you can borrow.” In 1878, he set about improving the incandescent light bulb, the idea of which had been proposed even before him.

– Do you know why you created an incandescent lamp?

- No, but I think that the government will soon figure out how to take money from people for this.

The lamps existing at that time quickly burned out, consumed a lot of current and were expensive. The inventor promised: “We will make electricity so cheap that only the rich will burn candles.” This is perhaps called "vision" or the art of goal setting. “I look forward,” said the magician from Menlo Park.

The shape of the lamp known to us, the socket and base, plug and socket - all this was invented by Edison.

Having finalized the prototype of the lamp, the scientist made it suitable for industrial production and mass use. No one had managed to do this before Edison.

Edison with his product - the incandescent lamp

FACTS ABOUT PERSISTENCE

To find a suitable material for the filament, the technical characteristics of about 6,000 materials were analyzed. During the experiments, charcoal fiber from Japanese bamboo showed good performance, which was the choice: the thread burned for 13.5 hours (later the duration was increased to 1200);
9,999 experiments were carried out, and the prototype lamp did not light up. Colleagues urged Edison to leave the experiments, but he did not give up: “I have 9999 experiments on how not to do it.” On the ten thousandth attempt the light came on.

BURN-BURN CLEAR

The year 1878 was fruitful: the scientist invented a carbon microphone, used in telephones until the 1980s, and in the same year he co-founded the Edison Electric Light company (from 1892 - General Electric). Then the company produced lamps, cable products and electric generators, now GE is a diversified corporation, in Forbes ranking“The most valuable brands” are in 7th position (2017), in value ($34.2 billion) second only to IBM, Google and McDonald’s.

In 1882, having found investors, Edison built a distribution substation and launched an electrical supply system in Manhattan, a borough of New York.

The cost of the lamp was 110 cents, and the market price was 40. Edison suffered losses for four years, and when the price of the lamp reached $0.22, and their production increased to a million units, he covered the costs for the year.

Fact: Incandescent light bulbs reduced average sleep time by 1-2 hours.

MEETING OF TWO GENIUS

In 1884, Edison hired an engineer from Serbia, Nikola Tesla, to repair electrical machines. The new employee turned out to be a supporter of alternating current, while his manager sympathized with the “constant” one. Tesla claimed that Edison promised him $50,000 for significantly improving the performance of electric cars. Tesla presented 24 options during the “recess” with improved performance, and when reminded of the reward, Edison replied that the employee did not understand the joke. Tesla quit his workshop and founded his own company.

AC vs. DC: Battle of the Currents

Edison proved the dangers of alternating current and even participated in an information campaign against “change.” In 1903, he took part in organizing the execution by alternating current of a circus elephant, who trampled three people.

THE MAN INVENTS

In 1886, Edison presented his second wife with an estate in Llewellyn Park, West Orange (New Jersey), where he moved his science Center.

It is now home to the Thomas Edison National Historical Park.

Edison's genius manifested itself in a variety of areas; he was a broad-spectrum inventor. The answer to a phone call “hello” (from the English “hello”) is his proposal, as is the idea of using waxed paper to wrap sweets.

In 1888, Edison invented the kinetoscope - an optical device for demonstrating moving pictures; one person could watch the “movie” through a special eyepiece.

Kinetoscope

In 1894, the first kinetoscopic salon opened in New York, equipped with 10 devices, each of which showed a 3-second video. But in 1895, the Lumière brothers patented the cinematograph for mass screening of films, and the personal kinetoscope could not compete with it.

In 1896, a kiss was shown on the big screen for the first time: Edison filmed the romantic ending of the play “Widow Jones.” The 27-second video was banned from showing.

After the discovery of X-rays in 1895, the scientist delegated the development of a device for fluoroscopy to employee Clarence Delley. This is how the fluoroscope was born. At that time, the dangers of X-ray radiation were not known. Clarence tested the X-ray tubes on himself, his health deteriorated and he died. Edison stopped developing the fluoroscope, and stated: “Don’t talk to me about X-rays, I’m afraid of them.”

Life priorities of Thomas Edison

During World War I, Edison was offered a position as a military consultant. The scientist warned that he would only design protective equipment. The inventor did not want to create weapons of destruction.

Money and fame did not spoil Edison; friends claimed that he remained the same sincere and handsome Tom. But he was a legend of American science; his name was given to an asteroid discovered in 1913.

Among his friends, the scientist was known as a humorist; the following anecdotal story is known:

There was a gate leading to Edison's estate that was difficult to open. Those entering quipped that the great inventor could have designed a better gate. Edison replied: “In my opinion, the gate was designed ingeniously. It is connected to the home water pump and anyone who opens it pumps 20 liters of water into the tank.”

Edison's time clock often read 90 hours a week.

One day, an experimenter refused a public dinner, declaring that “for $100,000 I would not agree to sit for 2 hours listening to praise.” Successful people They understand the value of every minute, and do not like to waste time.

I don’t need horses or yachts; I don’t have time for all this. I need a workshop!

Many celebrities are vegetarians, for example. Mr. Edison also did not eat meat. He was indifferent to alcohol, declaring that he could “find a better use for his mind.”

Death

The last decade of his life the scientist was interested in the afterlife. The 73-year-old inventor, in an interview with Forbes, notified readers that he was constructing a device for communicating with the dead - a necrophone. William Dinudi, Edison’s colleague, entered into an “electric pact” with him: the first person to die promised to send the survivor a message “from the other world.” Dinudi died first, in 1920. Probably, Edison's attempt to establish communication with the other world was not successful, judging by the lack of industrial production of necrophones.

Edison was not sure whether there was an existence after death, but one day he admitted to his wife: “I lived my life and did the best I could.” The scientist died on October 18, 1931 at the age of 84 from complications of diabetes mellitus. Mina's wife survived her husband by 16 years. The inventor's grave is located in the backyard of his estate.

In Dearborn, the museum displays a glass flask with the sealed “last breath” of a genius - the air from Edison’s room was sealed into a beaker by his attending physician.

In September 2017, the trailer for the film “War of the Currents” was released, in which the role of Thomas Edison is played by Benedict Cumberbatch.

Thomas Edison is one of the greatest minds of his era, the most successful inventor of the 19th century.

If we did everything in our power, we would surprise ourselves

These words belong to a man who knew how to implement ideas and bring what he started to completion.

Often people with unconventional thinking, for example, innovators and inventors, are not understood by society and are considered eccentric dreamers. Today it is difficult to imagine our existence without incandescent light bulbs or batteries, mobile phones or washing machines. However, back at the end of the year before last and the beginning of the last century, even electricity itself seemed something new and unusual, and some believed that machines based on it were dangerous and of little use.

Fortunately for us, there were people, such as Thomas Edison, for whom new inventions and developments turned out to be more than just a means of making a profit. They created just like that, from the heart, because they could not exist otherwise. It is thanks to them that today we have many of the benefits of civilization, which was so actively suppressed by conservatives. But what was the inventor himself like, how did his earthly path develop, and what innovations do we owe to this man?

Incapable student Thomas Edison: biography of the one who invented everything

The telegraph, phonograph, incandescent lamp, ticker machine and battery, the first kinescope and even the electric chair - we got to see and even use all this only thanks to this scientist. He, without listening to retrogrades, did not give up his inventive activity, which subsequently brought him luck and prosperity. He really left a deep mark on the history of mankind, because after more than a hundred years people successfully use his creations, use them, perhaps having improved them somewhat, but still.

When understanding what Thomas Edison invented, you should remember that it was he who came up with the idea of a single greeting for all subscribers - the word “hello”. In August 1877, he even decided to write a message to the head of the telegraph company in Pittsburgh (Pennsylvania). It said that it is optimal to choose the wording hullo. At the same time, the founder of AT&T, which determined the direction further development throughout the industry, Alexander Graham Bell recommended the use of the ship's greeting ahoy. Anyone who has ever used a telephone knows which one was chosen.

Briefly about the researcher and entrepreneur

Edison did not immediately become a famous inventor, entrepreneur and electrical engineer. He came from a fairly wealthy family that went bankrupt early on. Therefore, he had to achieve everything on his own, which the talented young man did very well. Already at the age of ten, the boy set up an improvised laboratory at home, and by twelve he went to work. Ten years later, Thomas received his first patent, but did not achieve understanding in the scientific and technical society. They simply laughed at his ticker machine, which takes into account the number of voters. When the machine began to be used for telephone transmission of stock exchange quotes, he first earned a colossal amount of forty thousand dollars.

The inventor significantly improved the telegraph, created a new type of mobile laboratories that began to be actively used in industry, developed and tested a new carbon microphone, made an incandescent lamp and a phonograph. It is difficult to list all his achievements in a short article; it is enough to know that over the years of his activity he received more than a thousand inventive patents in the United States, as well as three times more in other countries. The assessment of his work was not slow to appear: in the late twenties of the last century he was awarded the country's highest award - the Congressional Gold Medal. In addition, every descendant can remember Edison with gratitude every day, turning on the light in his own apartment.

Alva's family

At the beginning of the eighteenth century, the family of the Dutch flour miller Edison moved to America. There he hoped to get a better life in new lands and actually acquired a plot in the state of New Jersey, namely in the tiny village of Caldwell at that time. During the War of Independence, the head of the family took the side of colonial Britain, trying to preserve his acquired wealth, but made a mistake. The colony was liberated, and the Edisons were exiled to cold and snowy Canada. Our character's father, Samuel, acquired large lands near Port Barwell, and settled in a village called Vienna.

In 1937, a serious economic crisis arose, causing a series of rebellions, in which Samuel did not fail to take part. The government suppressed the rebellion, and Edison himself had to quickly leave Canada so as not to receive a prison sentence. We managed to settle in a town called Mailan. He married the daughter of a clergyman, Nancy Eliot. On the eleventh of February 1847, she gave birth to a baby named Thomas Alva Edison. At home his name was simply Al, he grew up quiet but inquisitive and could sit for hours at the port, watching the work of the loaders and copying what was written on signs or boxes.

Thomas's childhood

When the boy turned seven, the Edisons moved again, this time to Port Huron, which is located near the lake of the same name. Here he was enrolled in school, but he only managed to study for a few months. The teachers considered the silent boy underdeveloped, the children teased him, and he simply could not bring himself to answer in front of the public. Then Nancy took Thomas from school and began to teach herself everything she knew, and she had an excellent education. The woman was able to instill a thirst for knowledge in the boy, and at the age of ten he independently read and comprehended “Natural and Experimental Philosophy” by Richard Greene Parker, which his peers would personally consider useless and stupid. Moreover, over time, he managed to repeat almost all the experiments that were described on the pages of this work.

Al helped his mother from an early age; he willingly sold fruits and vegetables, earning pocket money from this. However, this was very little for the experiments that he was already considering. In 1959, he got his first job - as a newspaperman at a railway station. It was here that he first came up with the idea of setting up a laboratory on wheels. At that time, his earnings barely reached ten dollars a week, which is approximately equivalent to three hundred today.

The Making of an American Inventor: Edison on a roll

While working on the railroad, Thomas managed to significantly increase the number of newspapers sold, and in the end he even organized the publication of the very first train newsletter. It was then that he became keenly interested in issues of electricity. In sixty-two, a guy literally pulled the young son of the head of one of the stations out from under the wheels of the train. In gratitude, he offers to teach him telegraphy. At that time, only a few knew who Thomas Edison was, but soon the whole world was talking about him, since this was only the beginning of a long and difficult path.

Migrating telegraph operator in New York

In 1963, a fire broke out in Edison’s mobile laboratory, which was set up in a baggage car, and the inventor was politely asked to leave, which he did. The guy got a job as a telegraph operator at one of the stations, and improved the device so much that he could easily sleep while on duty. But trouble happened while he was soundly sleeping; two trains almost collided. He was fired, and had to go back to Port Huron under the wing of his beloved mother. True, he could not sit at home for long; his active nature pushed him to go in search of new adventures. Therefore, the next year he became a telegraph operator in Fort Wayne.

Thomas stayed in his last place for no more than a couple of months, and then moved to the larger Indianapolis, where he worked for The Western Union Company, which is well known today. In February sixty-five, Edison reached adulthood. By that time he was already in Cincinnati, where he also worked at the telegraph office. Here he received the highest qualifications and a fabulous salary of one hundred and twenty-five dollars. Then his path lay to Nashville, then to Memphis and Louisville. Here he almost burned down the manager’s office, for which he was fired without severance pay, and returned home. By winter, he got a job at Western Union in Boston. He independently developed and assembled an electric voting apparatus and a machine for quickly recording stock exchange rates, which he applied to the Patent Office.

In the early spring of sixty-nine, Thomas moved to New York, where he again got a job as a telegraph operator, and at the same time as a tester of new equipment. All this time he had to live from hand to mouth, because he spent all his money on inventions and developments. By October, he decides to open his own company, or rather, so far only a company called “Pop, Edison and Company,” when his stock ticker was bought by the Gold and Stock Telegraph Company for the colossally huge sum of forty thousand American dollars.

In the seventies, he organized the first workshop for the manufacture of his machines, and then two more. Also at this time, he achieved new revolutionary results - transmitting two hundred words per minute instead of the previous forty to fifty. Later this figure increased to three thousand. During the years 72-76, he received new patents more than forty times, which made it possible to open a new, well-equipped and equipped laboratory, which began to be built near New York in Menlo Park.

Inventions and improvements to devices

By that time, it had already become clear what level the scientist Edison could reach by engaging exclusively in invention. He moved to live closer to the laboratory. It was rumored that he worked twenty hours a day during this period, sleeping right there, not in a room specially equipped for this, but on an ordinary medical couch, pushed against the wall in the corner. But this time can definitely be called extremely productive.

First of all, Thomas fulfilled the order of Western Union, for which he worked for many years. He invented a telephone transmitter, creating practically the first working microphone, and also installed a special coil in the device, which made it possible to significantly amplify the sound. For this he received one hundred thousand dollars from the company.
In 1977, a phonograph was invented and even assembled, which Thomas presented to the editorial office of Scientific American.
In 1978, Edison received a dynamo and several arc lamps as a gift from William Walas, on the basis of which, already in 1979, he produced a light bulb with a vacuum inside.
In 1882, he built the first substation, and also created the Edison General Electric company, which was engaged in lighting one street - Pearl Street, as well as parts of Manhattan.

Edison's most advanced invention of that time was the kinetoscope, through which it was possible to view moving pictures. It was a one-person cinema, as you had to look through a special eyepiece.

Interactions with other brilliant inventors

The story of Thomas Edison is full of incidents and oddities, as well as inconsistencies. For example, you should not think that the invention of the light bulb belongs only to him. The Russian scientist Alexander Nikolaevich Lodygin had the opportunity to invent it. The American never refused; it was he who came up with the idea of pumping out the air and using a thin tungsten wire instead of coal. But the shape of the lamp, as well as the characteristic base in the form of a screw, was already invented by Edison. When George Eastman invented and made the first Kodak camera in 1988, it became the impetus for the development of Thomas's famous "Kinetograph".

The story of the Serbian physicist Nikola Tesla, who got a job with him in the early eighties, attracts numerous oddities. He turned out to be a “fan” of alternating current (all Thomas’ machines ran on direct current) and managed to upgrade the devices to a new type of power supply. Thomas accepted all these works, but did not pay the young talent any money. When the Serb moved to the USA and came back to Edison, he hired him again, used his inventions and labor, but was never ready to pay him back. When the Tesla Electric Light Company opened next to his laboratory in New York, he was greatly offended and in every possible way incited an information war against it.

The famous automobile inventor Henry Ford also worked for this man's company. For some reason, Thomas immediately “loved” this man, helped open the first workshop, and even supported the development of the first batteries for electric vehicles. When Ford turned to Harvey Firestone with the question of developing tires not made from natural rubber, but its synthetic analogues, Edison also took part in the invention.

Occultism and magic in the life of a researcher

Due to their growing popularity, various rumors circulated about Thomas and his family. Family friend John Eggleston, in an interview, claimed that the inventor’s father and mother were engaged in occult experiments, which is why their son, who seemed to be a slightly underdeveloped boy, later became a renowned genius. Thomas himself laughed at this and did not believe in ghosts and spirits, but when Helena Blavatsky herself sent an invitation to join the Theosophical Society, he filled out the form and studied the book “Isis Unveiled” from cover to cover.

At the end of his life, the pragmatic scientist became keenly interested in the other world and communication with the beyond. He became intimate with another former skeptic, William Dinudi. They made a pact according to which the one who dies first must try to contact the still living. Together they recorded voices “from the other world” and even allegedly invented a “necrophone” that would allow one to talk with the dead. True, no drawings, sketches or descriptions were ever found after the death of Edison himself.

Personal life of the father of the phonograph

Contrary to stereotypes, family life The inventor's life turned out very well. He never really delved into the intricacies of everyday life, had little interest in new or even clean clothes, and could live on dry food for months. Only a patient woman could withstand such a husband, who disappeared for fifteen to twenty hours in the laboratory.

Wives and children

In the seventies, a girl who could withstand such a “lazy bumpkin”, who sometimes even forgot to change his underwear, was finally found. Her name was Mary Stillwell, and she worked at his workbench. The girl bore him three children.

Marion Estelle (1873) subsequently married Karl Oskar Oeser, a German subject.
Thomas Alva Jr. (1876) worked for his father's company, eventually became an alcoholic and died. It was rumored that the cause was not a heart attack, but a deliberate overuse of sleeping pills.
William Leslie (1878) followed in his father's footsteps and became an inventor.

In 1988, Mary died unexpectedly. Many modern researchers believe that she had a brain tumor. After grieving for two years and sending his children to be raised by his mother-in-law, Thomas decided to get married again. This time his wife was twenty-year-old Mina Miller. She also bore her husband three children.

Madeline (1888), later wife of John Eyre Sloan.
Charles (1890), who became an outstanding politician and even received the seat of governor of New Jersey.
Theodore Miller (1898), inventor who received more than eight dozen original patents.

Mina, who was nineteen years younger than her husband, survived him and mourned him for a very long time. Apart from Thomas Jr., all the children settled down well and became outstanding personalities or just lived good life, raising wonderful grandchildren for the inventor.

The last days of a hardworking engineer and the rewards of a tenacious scientist

Just four months before his eightieth birthday, Edison's life was suddenly cut short. Even earlier, he felt a serious malaise, the tormenting recent years diabetes. He began to sleep poorly, could not eat anything, and already on October 18, 1931, on his own West Orange estate, which he bought for the occasion of his marriage as a wedding gift for his beloved Mina, he died without regaining consciousness. The farewell lasted two days, after which he was interred in the backyard of his own estate. The monument and grave of the inventor is still located there.

In 1899, he was awarded the Edward Longstreth Medal for outstanding technical and scientific achievements, and four years earlier he received the Rumford Prize, a scientific award from the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Congressional Gold Medal We have already mentioned the United States; it is also worth noting the Franklin Medal (1915), as well as the Technical Grammy Award.

In memory of America's greatest inventor

It is impossible to forget the services of this inventor to humanity, since they really seriously spurred progress. In many cities and towns there are monuments in honor of him, for example, in New York, Port Huron, Cincinnati, and also far beyond the country - in Vienna, London and even Taganrog.

An asteroid discovered in 1913, as well as many streets, squares and roads in the United States, are named after him. The image of Edison has been repeatedly played out in films. In 1979, the film “The Mystery of Nikola Tesla” was released, in which Thomas was played by Dennis Patrick, and in the Hungarian-German project “My 20th Century” his role was played by Peter Andorai.

Interesting facts about the life and work of Edison

It is believed that until the age of four, Thomas did not speak at all. The anecdote about the boy who, at the age of five, asked to pass him a salt shaker at the table, although he had not uttered a word before, comes from the time when rumors about the childhood of the great inventor began to circulate.

Few people know that in childhood and adolescence this shy, thin boy with a large forehead wrote good poems.

In his youth, Thomas suffered from an ear disease. The infection left him virtually deaf for life.

The confrontation between Edison and Tesla, who argued about the advantages of direct and alternating currents, received given name. Journalists called it the “War of Currents.”

This scientist managed to invent a device for killing cockroaches using electric current. Due to the danger to people and domestic animals, it was never produced on an industrial basis.

Thomas Alva Edison - who is he?

Having begun his career as a teenager in 1863 at the telegraph office, when virtually the only source of electricity was a primitive battery, he worked until his death in 1931 to usher in the era of electricity. From his laboratories and workshops came the phonograph, the carbon capsule of a microphone, incandescent lamps, a revolutionary generator of unprecedented efficiency, the first commercial lighting and power supply system, experimental basic elements of film equipment and many other inventions.

Brief biography of his youth

Thomas Alva Edison was born on February 11, 1847 in Milena, the son of Samuel Edison and Nancy Eliot. His parents fled to the United States from Canada after his father's participation in the Mackenzie Rebellion in 1837. When the boy turned 7, his family moved to Port Huron, Michigan. Thomas Alva Edison, the youngest of seven children, lived here until he began life on his own at the age of sixteen. He studied very little at school, only a few months. He was taught reading, writing and arithmetic by his mother, a teacher. He was always a very inquisitive child and was drawn to knowledge himself.

Thomas Alva Edison spent his childhood reading a lot, and his sources of inspiration were the books “The School of Natural Philosophy” by R. Parker and “Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and the Arts.” The desire for self-improvement remained with him throughout his life.

Alva started working at an early age, like most children of that time. At 13, he got a job selling newspapers and candy on the local railroad that connected Port Huron with Detroit. He devoted most of his free time to reading scientific and technical books, and also took the opportunity to learn how to operate the telegraph. By the age of 16, Edison was already experienced enough to work full time as a telegraph operator.

First invention

The development of the telegraph was the first step in the communications revolution, and it grew at an enormous rate in the second half of the 19th century. This gave Edison and his colleagues the opportunity to travel, see the country and gain experience. Alva worked in a number of cities throughout the United States before arriving in Boston in 1868. Here Edison began to change his profession as a telegraph operator to an inventor. He patented an electrical vote recorder, a device intended for use in elected bodies such as Congress to speed up the process. The invention was a commercial failure. Edison decided that in the future he would only invent things that he was completely confident in the public demand for.

Thomas Alva Edison: biography of the inventor

In 1869, he moved to New York, where he continued to work on improvements to the telegraph and created his first successful device, the Universal Stock Printer. Thomas Alva Edison, whose inventions earned him $40,000, had the necessary funds in 1871 to open his first small laboratory and production facility in Newark, New Jersey. Over the next five years, he invented and made devices that greatly increased the speed and efficiency of the telegraph. Edison also found time to marry Mary Stilwell and start a family.

In 1876, he sold all his production in Newark and moved his wife, children and employees to the small village of Menlo Park, 40 km southwest of New York. Edison built a new facility that contained everything necessary for inventive work. This research laboratory was the first of its kind and became the model for later institutions such as Bell Laboratories. They say it was his greatest invention. Here Edison began to change the world.

The first phonograph

The first great invention in Menlo Park was the phonograph. The first machine that could record and reproduce sound created a sensation and brought Edison worldwide fame. With her he toured the country and in April 1878 was invited to The White house to demonstrate the phonograph to President Rutherford Hayes.

Electric light

Edison's next great endeavor was the development of a practical incandescent lamp. The idea of electric lighting was not new, and several people were already working on it, even developing some forms of it. But until this time, nothing had been created that could be practical for home use.

Edison's merit is the invention of not only the incandescent lamp, but also an electrical supply system that had everything necessary to be practical, safe and economical. After a year and a half of work, he achieved success when an incandescent lamp, which used a carbonized filament, shone for 13.5 hours.

The first public demonstration of the lighting system took place in December 1879, when the entire Menlo Park laboratory complex was equipped with it. The inventor devoted the next few years to creating electric power. In September 1882, the first commercial power plant, located on Pearl Street in Lower Manhattan, began operating, providing electricity and light to customers in an area of one square mile. Thus began the era of electricity.

Edison General Electric

The success of electric lighting led the inventor to fame and fortune, as new technology quickly spread throughout the world. Electric companies continued to grow until they merged in 1889 to form Edison General Electric. Despite the use of the inventor's last name in the name of the corporation, he did not control it. The enormous amounts of capital required to develop the lighting industry required the involvement of investment banks such as J.P. Morgan. When Edison General Electric merged with its main competitor, Thompson-Houston, in 1892, the inventor's name was dropped from its name.

Widowhood and second marriage

Thomas Alva Edison, whose personal life was overshadowed by the death of his wife Mary in 1884, began to devote less time to Menlo Park. And because of his involvement in business, he began to visit there even less. Instead, he and his three children—Marion Estelle, Thomas Alva Edison, Jr., and William Leslie—lived in New York City. A year later, while vacationing at a friend's house in New England, Edison met twenty-year-old Mina Miller and fell in love with her. The marriage took place in February 1886, and the couple moved to West Orange, New Jersey, where the groom purchased the Glenmont estate for his bride. The couple lived here until their death.

Laboratory in West Orange

After the move, Thomas Alva Edison experimented in a makeshift workshop at a light bulb plant in nearby Harrison, New Jersey. A few months after his marriage, he decided to build a new laboratory in West Orange, a mile from his home. By that time, he had sufficient resources and experience to build the best equipped and largest laboratory, superior to all others, for the rapid and inexpensive development of inventions.

The new complex of five buildings opened in November 1887. The three-story main building housed a power plant, mechanical workshops, warehouses, experimental facilities, and a large library. Four smaller buildings, built perpendicular to the main one, housed physical, chemical and metallurgical laboratories, a sample workshop and storage chemical substances. Big size complex allowed Edison to work on not one, but ten or twenty projects at the same time. Buildings were added or rebuilt to meet the inventor's changing needs until his death in 1931. Over the years, factories were built around the laboratory to produce Edison's creations. The entire complex eventually covered more than 8 hectares, and 10,000 people worked there during the First World War.

Recording industry

After opening the new laboratory, Thomas Alva Edison continued work on the phonograph, but then put it aside to work on electric lighting in the late 1870s. By 1890, he began producing phonographs for home and commercial use. As with electric lights, he developed everything needed to make them work, including devices for playing and recording sound, as well as equipment for releasing them. At the same time, Edison created an entire recording industry. The development and improvement of the phonograph proceeded continuously and continued almost until the death of the inventor.

Cinema

At the same time, Edison set about creating a device that could do for the eyes what a phonograph does for the ears. Cinema became it. The inventor demonstrated it in 1891, and two years later it started industrial production"movies" in a tiny film studio built in a laboratory known as "Black Maria".

As with electric lighting and the phonograph, a complete system for making and exhibiting motion pictures had previously been developed. Edison's initial work in cinema was innovative and original. However, many people became interested in this new industry and wanted to improve on the inventor's early cinematic works. Therefore, many people contributed to the rapid development of cinema. The new industry was already thriving in the late 1890s, and by 1918 it had become so competitive that Edison left the business altogether.

Iron ore failure

Advances in phonographs and motion pictures in the 1890s helped offset the greatest failure of Edison's career. For ten years he worked in his laboratory and in the old iron mines of northwestern New Jersey on methods for extracting iron ore to satisfy the insatiable demand of Pennsylvania iron and steel mills. To finance this work, Edison sold all his shares in General Electric.

Despite ten years of work and millions of dollars spent on research and development, he was unable to make the process commercially viable and lost all of his investment. This would have meant financial ruin if Edison had not continued to develop the phonograph and cinema simultaneously. Be that as it may, the inventor entered the new century still financially secure and ready to take on a new challenge.

Alkaline battery

Edison's new challenge was the development of a battery for use in electric vehicles. The inventor was very fond of cars, and throughout his life he was the owner of many types of them, working for different sources energy. Edison believed that electricity was the best fuel for them, but the capacity of conventional lead-acid batteries was not enough for this. In 1899 he began work on an alkaline battery. This project turned out to be the most difficult and took ten years. By the time the new alkaline batteries were ready, gasoline cars had improved so much that electric cars were being used less frequently, mostly as delivery vehicles in cities. However, alkaline batteries proved useful for lighting railroad cars and cabins, marine buoys, and Unlike iron ore, the significant investment paid off handsomely, and the battery eventually became Edison's most profitable product.

Thomas A. Edison Inc.

By 1911, Thomas Alva Edison had developed extensive industrial activities in West Orange. Numerous factories were built around the laboratory, and the complex's workforce grew to several thousand people. To better manage the work, Edison gathered all the companies he founded into one corporation, Thomas A. Edison Inc., of which he himself became president and chairman. He was 64 years old, and his role in the company and in his life was beginning to change. Edison delegated much of his daily work to others. The laboratory itself engaged in less original experiments and improved existing products. Although Edison continued to file and receive patents for new inventions, the days of creating new things that changed lives and created new industries were behind him.

Work for defense

In 1915, Edison was asked to chair the Naval Advisory Committee. The United States was approaching participation in World War I, and the creation of the committee was an attempt to organize the talents of the country's leading scientists and inventors for the benefit of the American military. Edison accepted the appointment. The council did not contribute significantly to the final victory, but it served as a precedent for future successful collaboration between scientists, inventors, and the US military. During the war, at the age of seventy, Edison spent several months on Long Island on a Navy ship experimenting with methods of detecting submarines.

Golden Jubilee

Thomas Alva Edison went from being an inventor and industrialist to a cultural icon, a symbol of American enterprise. In 1928, in recognition of his achievements, the US Congress awarded him a special Medal of Honor. In 1929, the country celebrated the golden anniversary of electric lighting. The celebration culminated with a banquet in honor of Edison, given by Henry Ford at Greenfield Village, a museum of new American history(It was a complete recreation of the Menlo Park laboratory). The honor was attended by the President and many presenters and inventors.

Replacement for rubber

Edison did his last experiments in life at the request of his good friends Henry Ford and Harvey Firestone in the late 1920s. They wanted to find an alternative source of rubber for use in car tires. Until that time, tire production used natural rubber, extracted from the rubber tree, which does not grow in the United States. Crude rubber was imported and became more and more expensive. With characteristic energy and thoroughness, Edison tested thousands of different plants to find suitable substitutes, and ultimately found that goldenrod was a substitute for rubber. Work on this project continued until the death of the inventor.

Last years

During the last two years of Edison's life, his health deteriorated significantly. He spent a lot of time away from the laboratory, working instead from home in Glenmont. Trips to the family villa in Fort Myers, Florida, became longer. Edison was past eighty and suffering from a number of ailments. In August 1931 he became very ill. Edison's health steadily deteriorated, and at 3:21 a.m. on October 18, 1931, the great inventor died.

A city in New Jersey, two colleges and many schools are named in his honor.

Thomas Edison's short biography is presented in this article.

Thomas Edison short biography

Thomas Alva Edison- American inventor who received 1093 patents in the USA and about 3 thousand in other countries; creator of the phonograph; improved the telegraph, telephone, cinema equipment, developed one of the first commercially successful versions of the incandescent electric lamp. It was he who suggested using the word “hello” at the beginning of a telephone conversation.

Thomas Edison was born on February 11, 1847 in Milen, Ohio, into a family of carpentry store owners. When he was 7 years old, the family went bankrupt and moved to Michigan.

Little Thomas was completely fascinated by learning. He was especially interested in various experiments, and at the age of 10 he set up his own laboratory at home. Experiments required money, so at the age of 12 he got a job as a railway newspaperman. Over time, his laboratory is moved to the baggage car of a train, where he continues to conduct experiments. In 1863, he became interested in telegraphy, and over the next five years he worked as a telegraph operator. At this job he used his first invention - a telegraph answering machine, allowing young Thomas to sleep at night; At the age of 22 he founded his own company selling household electrical appliances.

Edison patented his first invention in 1869. It was an electronic recorder of votes during elections. There were no buyers for this patent. However, for the invention of the stock ticker (a telephone device that transmits stock quotes) in 1870, he received 40 thousand dollars. With the proceeds, he opened a workshop in New Jersey and began producing tickers. In 1873, Edison discovered duplex and then four-way telegraphy. In 1876 he created a new and improved laboratory for commercial purposes. This type of industrial laboratory is also considered to be Edison's invention. The carbon telephone microphone was invented here in the late 1870s. The next product of the laboratory was phonograph. At the same time, the scientist began to work hard on the implementation of his most important invention - incandescent lamps.

In 1882, Edison's first power plant was opened in New York. Moreover, he seriously thought about merging his companies into a single concern. In 1892, he managed to annex his largest rival in the field of electricity, forming the world's largest industrial concern, the General Electric Company. During his life, Edison was married twice and had three children from each marriage. The scientist’s deafness progressed due to scarlet fever suffered in childhood.

Biography

Origin

Childhood

Traveling Telegraph Operator

Moving to New York

Menlo Park

Telephone transmitter

Phonograph

Electric lighting

Working with Nikola Tesla

Kinetoscope

Edison, Lodygin, Goebel, Just, Hanaman and Coolidge

Later life dates

Spiritualist experiments

Death

Video on the topic

Famous inventions

Characteristic

Memory

In astronomy

To the cinema

see also

Notes

Edison's childhood

Inventor Education

Thomas Edison's track record

Starting a successful career

Two Muses of Thomas Edison

Edison's inventions and operating principles

Life priorities of Thomas Edison

Death

Incapable student Thomas Edison: biography of the one who invented everything

Briefly about the researcher and entrepreneur

Alva's family

Thomas's childhood

The Making of an American Inventor: Edison on a roll

Migrating telegraph operator in New York

Inventions and improvements to devices

Interactions with other brilliant inventors

Occultism and magic in the life of a researcher

Personal life of the father of the phonograph

Wives and children

The last days of a hardworking engineer and the rewards of a tenacious scientist

In memory of America's greatest inventor

Interesting facts about the life and work of Edison

Thomas Alva Edison - who is he?

Brief biography of his youth

First invention

Thomas Alva Edison: biography of the inventor

The first phonograph

Electric light

Edison General Electric

Widowhood and second marriage

Laboratory in West Orange

Recording industry

Cinema

Iron ore failure

Alkaline battery

Thomas A. Edison Inc.

Work for defense

Golden Jubilee

Replacement for rubber

Last years

Thomas Edison short biography

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