Edison reached Boston in 1868, and joined the huge Western Union Telegraph Company. He enjoyed his life in Boston, as the city was then America’s centre for science and culture. The most brilliant technicians in the country had their workshops and businesses there. There were other shops, too, that met their needs – like books, chemicals or equipment. Edison used his pay money at one of these shops to buy the works of Michael Faraday, the great British scientist considered as the father of electrical engineering.
Edison was gradually changing from a telegrapher to an inventor. The first patent he received was on an electric vote recorder, a device to speed the voting process in elected bodies like the U.S. Congress. But the legislators in Massachusetts were not interested in the device: they said most legislators did not want to tally the votes quickly, wanting time to influence the others. This taught a lesson to Edison: in future he should only invent things people are sure to want.
He left his job with the Western Union on January 30, 1869. Eighteen days later he submitted his second patent application, on a stockbroker printing instrument. It aimed at a coming new market for alphanumerical printers that brought in the latest reports from the New York gold and stock exchanges. It soon became clear that the ambitions of Edison were too big to be confined to Boston.
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