My Science School

Western Union promoted the new telephone as a fresh invention; as a new kind of telegraph that could send messages spoken by an operator. Nobody, in those days, thought of the telephone as something to have at home! Remember, houses still had no electricity then. At a gathering of scientists, Edison showed that his loud-speaking telephone was better than the one Alexander Graham Bell had made. He and Bell sat together at the gathering. A colleague of Edison recited a nursery rhyme into the phone, and everybody could hear that. But when it came to Bell’s phone, only the ones sitting close by could hear the sound.

Obviously, Bell was not happy with all this. Soon, Bell dragged Western Union into court over the patent rights. Finally, Western Union agreed to pull out of the telephone market in 1879, and the dispute ended.

Picture Credit : Google

To capture a sound and make it heard again was something unimaginable in those days. When Edison made the first ever machine that could do this, it created a sensation.

It was the phonograph, the first great invention to be developed at Menlo Park. The phonograph first used paraffin paper on a cylinder to record and reproduce sound, but later this was changed to metallic foil. This magical invention brought international fame to Edison.

As we saw earlier, the telephone was then seen as a telegraph machine that uses sound. During the summer of 1877, Edison was trying to make a device that could make markings of the sound it received through the telephone, which could then be delivered as telegraphic messages. He tried this out with a carbon transmitter tipped with a stylus that could make impressions on a strip of paraffined paper. One could hardly see the scratches made by the stylus. But Edison was surprised to note that a vague reproduction of sound was heard when the paper was pulled back under the stylus.

Later that year, Edison had the device made using tin foil instead of wax, and he was able to record the rhyme, ‘Mary had a little lamb’. Later he improved the design to include a lighter needle to trace the grooves and transmit the vibrations to a second diaphragm that recreated a person’s voice. He was granted a patent for this, the following year.

In the years that followed, Edison came up with different improved versions of this device.

Picture Credit : Google

It was soon time for another major move. In 1876, Edison shifted all his firms in Newark to Menlo Park, a small village to the southwest of New York City. His family and assistants were with him, too. An impressive establishment soon came up at Menlo Park. It had a main laboratory building built by Edison’s father, a glass house, a carpenter’s shop, a carbon shed and a blacksmith’s shop.

Another novelty of the place was a research and development laboratory. It had all the equipment needed to work on any kind of invention. The first of its kind anywhere, it later became the model for many modern facilities that came later, like the Bell Laboratories. In fact, some people consider it as Edison's greatest invention!

Soon, Menlo Park became the legendary place where many of Edison’s major inventions were born. With him were a number of brilliant assistants, who had come to live in America from various parts of the world. Inspired by Edison’s passion for hard work, the whole team would often stay up all night working on the project at hand.

Picture Credit : Google

One needed great stamina and nerves to work with Edison. He never tired of hard work, and wanted his assistants to keep the same pace. Menlo Park was fast developing as the world’s first industrial research centre. The place had many specialist workers and to manage their activities was no small task.

The laboratory was the centre of all activity at Menlo Park, and though its working atmosphere was friendly, Edison was a tough taskmaster and expected his people to work very hard, just as he himself did. He kept on trying new ideas, and would ask his technicians to make odd pieces of equipment. Sometimes he got stuck on an invention. Then he would move to another project until the first problem had a solution. Edison always had a thick notebook in his pocket. While talking to someone, or while eating he would often stop to note down a thought, or to sketch a new gadget he had in mind. Edison preferred to work at night, going on till the break of dawn.

Picture Credit : Google

When the telephone was first invented by Alexander Graham Bell, the Western Union Telegraph Co. made a huge blunder. It was then the world’s leading Communications Company, dominating the telegraph business. So, Bell and his friends offered to sell the patents on the telephone to them. But the company thought Bell’s invention was worthless and did not accept the offer!

It hardly took two years for them to realise their mistake. By then the Bell Telephone Co. was in full swing and they were making huge profits. Now Western Union could only hope to find something better to sell, and who did they turn to? Edison, of course! He was very good at adding improvements to existing gadgets. Western Union asked Edison to do some of his magic on the telephone!

Edison decided to try a recent invention of his on the telephone – a microphone and transmitter, which contained tiny speakers. He used it in a telephone model and the voice came out louder and clearer. Edison was also able to increase the range of the telephone, from a few kilometres to hundreds of kilometres, by boosting the electric signals. The ‘new’ telephone made Western Union happy, and they bought the idea from Edison for 1,00,000 dollars.

Picture Credit : Google

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.

In the middle of 1869 Edison started a new chapter in his life, moving to New York City. A friend named Franklin L. Pope was working at the Samuel Laws’ Gold Indicator Company, and he allowed Edison to sleep in a room at the company. One day he fixed a broken machine there, and the company gave him a job to manage and improve the printer machines.

Edison soon got involved in some projects related to the telegraph. He founded a firm named Pope, Edison and Co., in partnership with Franklin L. Pope and James Ashley, promoting themselves as makers of electrical devices. This was in October, 1869. The group later merged with the Gold and Stock Telegraph Co. in 1870.

Edison was able to obtain a number of patents for the improvements he made on the stock ticker or the printing telegraph. Gold and Stock surprised Edison one day, with an offer: $ 40,000 for all the improvements he had made on the printing telegraph. This really was a huge sum at the time.

Newark, New Jersey was then a growing industrial town not far from New York’s business centre. In 1870 Edison started a new business there, named the Newark Telegraph Works, in partnership with William Unger. They made stock printers, and the business flourished. The team had as its backbone three highly skilled persons – a British engineer named Charles Batchelor, a German mechanic Sigmund Bergmann and a Swiss watchmaker, John Kruesi.

Later in the same year Edison started work on developing an automatic telegraph, forming the American Telegraph Works. Another project he undertook in 1874 was on a multiplex telegraphic system for Western Union. It resulted in the quadruplex telegraph, which could send two messages at the same time in both directions. Edison sold his patent rights on the quadruplex to the Atlantic & Pacific Telegraphic Co., a rival group of Western Union. This caused a legal battle which Western Union won.

Edison also had to spend a lot of time with lawyers, to stop rivals trying to steal his inventions or to fight claims that he had taken ideas from someone else.

Picture Credit : Google

In those days it was usual for young boys to earn extra money by doing some work or the other, and Edison was no exception. When he was thirteen, he took a job selling newspapers and candy on the train. He had a three-hour train ride to cover, from Port Huron to Detroit, and earned as much as 50 dollars a week. Most of his earnings went to buying equipment for his experiments. His family needed the money too, as his father’s grain and timber business was in a bad shape.

Young Edison used his free time mostly to read scientific and technical books. He convinced the train conductor to let him set up a small laboratory in the baggage car of the train, where he could conduct experiments while the train waited for its return trip.

One day, when the train lurched, a bottle of yellow phosphorous spontaneously ignited, and a fire broke out. A conductor put out the fire, and the boy and his chemicals were ejected at the next station. This forced him to stop his experiments on board.

Picture Credit : Google

The telegraph changed the world, making instant communication possible across long distances. It was the first step towards the great communication revolution that shaped the modern world.

The second half of the 19th century saw a rapid spread of the telegraph. This gave Edison an opportunity to travel and see the country, enriching his experience. The United States had more than fifty telegraph companies, by 1851. The telegraph spread its net wide, with the newspapers using it to gather news and business houses, to send money by ‘wire’ or to check the stock market prices.

Edison learned to send and receive messages on the telegraph using the Morse code. When he was 15, Edison started to drift around the country as a ‘tramp telegrapher’, working at various places to operate the telegraph. This went on for five years, starting in 1863. He preferred to work at night, spending the days reading science books or working on new gadgets.

Edison had already started to lose his hearing, but thankfully he was still able to hear the telegraph clicks. Edison acquired considerable skill at sending messages on the telegraph, and later he worked for the Union Army during the American Civil War. His hobby during his spare time was to take things apart to see how they worked. This led to a passion to invent new things.

Picture Credit : Google

The American Civil War broke out early in 1861, between the northern and southern states. People were eager to get the latest news of the first battles, and this gave Edison an idea. His idea was to get the latest news through telegraph operators at various places, and print a newspaper of his own!

He took a job selling newspapers and candy on the Grand Trunk Railroad to Detroit. In the baggage car, he set up a laboratory for his chemistry experiments and a printing press, where he started the Grand Trunk Herald, the first newspaper published on a train.

It had just two sheets and the printing was on one side only. Its printing was of poor quality, and the language was often faulty. But the paper contained much information that was of interest to railway-men, and had a circulation of about 400. Its readers were mostly railway employees.

Picture Credit : Google

Many things that made the world ‘modern’ are here, thanks to the genius of Thomas Alva Edison. The electric light, sound recording, motion pictures… the list goes on and on. In the history of Man’s technological progress, no other scientist has given the world so many devices to make life more efficient and comfortable.

Edison did his first scientific experiment at the age of eleven and his last, when he was 84 – a long innings of 73 years! Edison came up with more than a thousand inventions or ideas for inventions.

It is true that brilliant inventors who came after Edison continued to come up with fresh ideas and inventions. But it is also true that they would not have accomplished anything without using some device or apparatus which was either invented or improved upon by Edison.

Thomas Alva Edison was indeed a dreamer, but he was at the same time much more than that. He was extremely practical and created a highly successful business, too. He failed sometimes, but he was always optimistic and never quit his determination and passion for hard work.

No wonder he continues to inspire the world.

Picture Credit : Google

Edison was born on February 11, 1847 in Milan, in the U.S. state of Ohio. He was the seventh and youngest child of Samuel, a small-time business.

Three of the couple’s first six children had died young. The Edison’s named their youngest child Thomas, and added the middle name Alva to remember a business friend of Samuel. Everyone in the family called him Al.

Little Al mostly had to play alone, as his siblings were much older. He had a difficulty to make friends, too, as he did not hear well. Edison later recalled that, by the time he was twelve, he was “too deaf to hear birds sing.”

Picture Credit : Google

Little Edison was always curious, and had an intense desire to know about everything. His mother taught him to read, write and do arithmetic. But he learned much by reading on his own. He kept asking questions all the time, about any subject that came to his mind. He also made efforts to find his own answers, observing the world around and finding out how things worked. He would even dissect animals to gain information first-hand.

Even as a child, Edison learned household chores like filling the oil lamps, and chopping firewood. A new railroad was built in 1853, but it bypassed their town. This affected the stores in Milan badly, because trade flourished where the railway went.

Samuel Edison’s business faced a tough time, and he decided to move to Port Huron, Michigan to start a new life. This was where Thomas Alva Edison spent the rest of his childhood.

Picture Credit : Google

Edison did not have an easy time as a student. He was hyper- active and easily distracted, and the teacher considered him as ‘difficult’. He had a hearing problem and kept on asking questions. His bad-tempered teacher found this annoying, and told his mother Nancy that the boy had a confused mind.

The teacher’s impression was that he was stupid. Nancy, however, knew that he wasn’t, and took him out of school. He had spent just twelve weeks at the public school in Michigan. Outside the bounds of the school, the ever-curious mind of little Edison soared high. He showed great interest in reading books on a wide range of subjects. It was like opening up a wide curriculum of his own, in which Edison developed a wonderful process of self-education.

Young Edison showed a special talent in making things. When he was nine, Edison’s favourite book was one on science experiments. His mother allowed him to set up a laboratory in the cellar of the house. He made a simple form of the telegraph a year later, stringing wires from trees to a friend’s house. He also made small steam engines that rattled, and sometimes exploded, too.

Picture Credit : Google