George Bliss authored a biography of Edison that appeared in the 8 April issue of the Chicago Tribune and was reprinted in a revised version in the 15 May and 1 June issues of the Operator. The following year, Chicago publisher James Baird McClure edited Edison and His Inventions, which included a biographical sketch largely based on Bliss’s account with additional material about the inventor and his inventions. These accounts of Edison’s early life and career were extensively relied upon by subsequent biographers and are the source of many errors and misconceptions.

Chicago, April 8, 1878

Thomas A. Edison.^a

Hitherto Unpublished Reminiscences of a Wonderful Genius.^a

The Busy Life of One of the Greatest of American Inventors.^a

His Career as a Newsboy, Amateur Chemist,

Newspaper-Publisher, and Operator.^a

Early Telegraphic Experiments—His First Line,

with Cats for a Battery.^a

What He Has Contributed to the World’s

Stock of Electrical Knowledge.^a

Over Four Hundred Thousand Dollars Expended in Experiments.^a

Written for The Chicago Tribune.

So much attention has recently been attracted to the inventions of Thomas A. Edison, that the facts concerning this remarkable man may be found interesting. It is a matter of pridePage 870 with him that he is a full-blooded American. His ancestry on the father’s side can be traced back 200 years, when they were extensive millers in Holland. In 1730 members of the family emigrated to this country. Thomas Edison was a prominent bank official on Manhattan Island during the Revolution, and his name appears on the Continental money. The race is longlived. Edison’s great-grandfather lived to be 102, and his grandfather to be 103 years old. His father, Samuel Edison, is now living, aged 74, and in perfect health. He stands six feet two inches, and in 1868 out jumped 250 men belonging to a regiment stationed at Ft. Gratiot, Mich. He learned the tailor’s trade, but subsequently entered commercial life, and engaged consecutively in the grain, commission, lumber, nursery, and land business. He has always been in comfortable circumstances. Edison’s mother, Mary Elliot Edison, was of Scotch parentage, but born in Massachusetts. She was finely educated, and for several years taught in a Canadian high school. She was an industrious, capable, literary, and ambitious woman. She died in 1862 at 67 years of age. Thomas Alva Edison was born Feb. 11, 1847, at Milan, Erie County, Ohio. This was then a thriving town of several thousand inhabitants. Located at the head of the Milan Canal four miles from Lake Erie, it was the centre of the ship-building, wheatshipping, and stave-making interests of that region. Exhaustion of the surrounding timber, and the construction of the Lake Shore Railroad some distance south of the town, brought about decay, which compelled Edison’s parents to remove to Port Huron, Mich., when he was 7 years old, which has since been their home. Edison never went to school over two months in his life. His mother taught him spelling, reading, writing, and arithmetic. She was a fine reader, and often read aloud to the family. Edison acquired his love of reading from her, which was encouraged by his father, who paid him for each book mastered. At 10 years old he had read “The Penny Encyclopedia,” Hume’s History of England, History of the Reformation, Gibbons’s Rome, Searl’s History of the World, several works on chemistry, and other similar works. He read them all with the utmost fidelity, never skipping a word or a formula, although mathematics were and are especially repulsive to him. It is this habit of concentration which has led him to the accomplishment of many astonishing results. As a boy, he was always occupied, and amused himself making plank roads, digging caves, and trying experiments, his mind being full of subjects. He was uneasy to get into business, and at 12 years of age his father secured him a place asPage 871 train-boy on the Grand Trunk Railroad. When the road was completed between Detroit and Port Huron, he acquired an exclusive newsdealer’s right, having as high as four assistants. During the four years he ran the road, his earnings averaged a dollar a day, which was given to his mother. In commencing to visit Detroit he joined the library, and started to read it through. He began on the bottom shelf, and read every book for fifteen feet, when the job was given up as hopeless, and thereafter congenial selections were made. He was an occasional reader of fiction and poetry. Victor Hugo is his favorite author. The “Les Miserables” he read a dozen times, and has reviewed it as often since. “The Toilers of the Sea” he considers a grand book. His memory is so retentive that he can quote extensive extracts from many sources, and can usually refer direct to the book and page of his scientific library for any fact or information needed for experiment or research. His mind is crammed with an immense mass of information, it being difficult to mention a subject about which he knows nothing. He has a partial knowledge^b of the French, German, Italian, and Spanish languages. Attached to the mixed train upon which he sold papers was a freight-car having a room partitioned off for smoking purposes. As the car was without springs or ventilation, no one would ride in it. Edison obtained “Tresenius’ Quality of Analysis,” bought some chemicals on the installment plan, induced the hands at the railroad shop to make him some retort stands in exchange for papers, and turned the smoking-room into a laboratory. The Detroit Free Press, then owned by Wilbur E Storey, came out in a new dress. Edison purchased 300 pounds of old type, and for six months published a weekly paper on the train called the Grand Trunk Herald. The price was 3 cents, and the subscription list ran up to several hundred. It was printed on one side only, by hand, and was devoted to railroad gossip, changes, accidents, and information. George Stephenson, the English engineer, who built the tubular bridge at Montreal, when passing over the road, found Edison at work, and ordered an extra edition for himself. The paper was afterwards noticed by the London Times. One day the water in Edison’s phosphorus bottle evaporated, it fell on the floor, and ignited the car. The conductor with difficulty extinguished the fire, threw the materials out of the car, and gave Edison a threshing, so that his newspaper and laboratory came to a sudden end. He continued his experiments in the cellar at home, and carried his printer’s material with him for several years.

While running into Detroit he became acquainted with thePage 872 telegraph operators, and in hanging about the office the idea suggested itself to telegraph the newspaper headings to the stations in advance of the train. The effect was to spread the information of the battles then taking place and greatly increase his sales. The success taught him the value of the telegraph, and he determined to learn the business. He purchased a work on the electric telegraph, and, in conjunction with James Ward, one of his assistants, they constructed a telegraph line between their residences in Port Huron. They used common stove-pipe wire insulated with bottles placed on nails driven into trees and crossed under an exposed road by means of a piece of abandoned cable, captured from the Detroit River. The first magnets used were made with wire wound with rags for insulation, and a piece of spring brass was used for a key. They were somewhat mixed as to the relative value of dynamic and static electricity for telegraph purposes, and the first attempt to generate a current was by means of a couple of cats rubbed vigorously at each end at an appointed time. This effort proved a failure, although they succeeded in getting rid of the cats with lightning-like rapidity. Soon after this experiment, some old telegraph-instruments and battery-materials were purchased, and a successful short line was inaugurated. This was quite an achievement in those days, although now there are hundreds of such short lines throughout the country.

About two months afterward, as the railroad train was switching some cars on to the side track at Mt. Clements Station, the agent’s little boy, two years old, crept upon the track in front of the approaching cars. Edison, seeing the danger, sprang to the ground, seized the child, and barely saved his life. J. A. McKenzie was the agent and operator, and in gratitude for the act volunteered to assist Edison to learn telegraphy. Thereafter, on reaching the end of his route, Edison would go back by freight-train to Mt. Clements, and worked nights to perfect himself in operating. In five months^c he was sufficiently advanced to secure employment in the telegraph office at Port Huron. The office was in a jewelry store, and Edison had an opportunity to indulge his mechanical inclinations. He worked night and day to improve himself, but resigned in six months because compensation promised for extra work was withheld. His regular salary was $25 a month.

He next went to Stratford, Canada, as night operator. The operators were required to report “six” every half hour to the Circuit Manager. Edison indulged his ingenuity to a bad purposePage 873 by making a wheel with Morse characters cut in the circumference in such a way that when turned it would write the figure six, and sign his office-call. This the watchman turned for him while Edison slept.

His stay at this point was brief. One night the dispatcher sent an order to hold a train. Edison repeated back the message before showing it to the conductor. When he ran out for the purpose the train had pulled off from the side track and was gone. When the dispatcher was notified, the opposing train was beyond reach. Fortunately the two trains met on a straight track, and no accident happened. The railroad Superintendent sent for Edison and so frightened him with threats of imprisonment that, without getting his wardrobe, he started for home, and was greatly delighted to reach his native land. He spent a few weeks at Port Huron in study, but operators were in demand, and he obtained a situation at Adrian, Mich. Here he had a small shop and a few tools, where his spare time was used in repairing instruments and making such experiments as he had the means to accomplish. It was then a peculiarity of the Morse telegraph system that only one message at a time could be sent on a wire at the same time. It is also a characteristic of young operators, that each considers himself the most important personage on the line, and that his business must go first. Being at safe distances operators fling the most violent abuse at each other with impunity, and meanwhile messages wait. Edison proved no exception to the rule, and on one occasion when he had some message from the Superintendent insisted on taking the line from all comers. The Superintendent of Telegraph lived in the same town and had an instrument in his house. Hearing the tussel on the wire, he rushed to the office, pounced upon Edison, and discharged him for violation of rules.

His next situation was in night service at Fort Wayne, and in two months he had improved so as to secure a situation at Indianapolis. Here he invented his first successful automatic repeater, which is an arrangement for transferring the writing from one telegraph line to another without the medium of a sending or receiving operator. It was an important achievement for so young and inexperienced an operator.

The ambition of all operators is to be able to take “press report.” Edison practiced nights incessantly to accomplish this end. He was finally given a trial, but finding himself making too many breaks or interrogations he rigged two more recording registers, one to receive and one to repeat the embossedPage 874 writing at slower speed so it could be copied. When this was done he told the sending operator to “rush him,” which gave him a brief reputation, for the “copy” was so slow in reaching the press it caused complaint, and he was suspended from the work.

At the end of six months he was transferred to Cincinnati. Here he worked a day wire, but continued to practice nights and “subbed” for the night men whenever he could get the privilege.

He had been in Cincinnati three months when a delegation of Cleveland operators came down to organize a branch of the Telegraphers’ Union, which resulted in the great strike a few years since. They struck the office in the evening, and the whole force, with one exception, went off on a gigantic spree. Edison came round as usual to practice, and finding the office so nearly deserted took the press report to the best of his ability, and worked through the night, clearing up business. The following day he was rewarded by an increase of salary, from $65 to $105 per month, and was given the Louisville wire, one of the most desirable in the office. Bob Martin, one of the fastest senders in the country, worked the Louisville end, and from the experience here acquired, Edison dates his ability as a first-class operator.

Edison’s utter negligence of dress and appearance, his willingness to work at all hours, night or day, his unsatiable thirst for reading, and his enthusiastic attempts to solve what appeared to his companions impossibilities, earned for him the name of “luny” or crazy man, which clung to him a number of years. He retained, however, the personal good will of his associates.

In 1864 he went to Memphis and obtained a more remunerative salary. His associates were dissolute and imposed upon his good nature to such an extent that the work he did was enormous. Abstemious himself almost to stoicism, he freely loaned his money to his companions or expended it in the purchase of books and apparatus. He made and put into operation his automatic repeater, so that Louisville and New Orleans could work direct. The idea of duplex transmission^d had taken possession of him, and he was perpetually advocating and experimenting to accomplish it. These efforts were looked upon with disfavor by the management, and in the changes resulting upon the transfer of the lines from the Government to the Telegraph Company he was dismissed.

Being without money, and having transportation to DecaturPage 875 only, he walked to Nashville, where Billy Foley, an operator in the same predicament, was found, and they traveled together to Louisville. Edison had only a linen suit, and on arriving at Louisville he found the weather extremely chilly. He hunted up a friend who loaned him money for his immediate need. Foley’s reputation was too bad to obtain a situation himself, but he recommended Edison, who obtained work. For this service Edison supported Foley till he could get a job.

Edison describes the Louisville office at this time as the dirtiest and most free and easy in the business. The common disposition of tobacco-quids was to hurl them at the ceiling, where they stuck by the hundred. Rats in great numbers kept the operator company at night. The discipline was lax in all things except the quality and promptness of work. Edison was required to take reports on a line worked from the blind side of a repeater, where he had no chance to break. This required skill, and he attained to a rare perfection by the most careful study of names, markets, and general information. The line was old and in poor condition, being subject to many interruptions and changes. To assist in his work, Edison was in the habit of arranging three sets of instruments, each with a different adjustment, so that, whether the circuit was strong or weak, or no matter how rapid the change, he was able to receive the signals accurately. He remained in Louisville for nearly two years, and then got the South American fever. In connection with Messrs. Keen and Warren, two of his associates, he saved money for the trip, and they started, intending to go via New Orleans. On arriving at the latter place, the vessel upon which they were to ship had fortunately sailed. Edison fell in with a Spaniard who had traveled round the world. He told him of all the countries visited the United States was the best, having the most desirable Government, institutions, climate, and people. This wholesome advice shook Edison’s determination in connection with his disappointment at delay, and he resolved to go home. He went to Port Huron via the Gulf and Atlantic States. After remaining a few weeks he again got work at Louisville, and returned there. He now began to save his earnings more than ever, and invested them in additions to his library, apparatus, printing-office, and shop. He started to publish a work on electricity with his own office, but the task proved too much for his facilities. He went into a most elaborate series of experiments, as was his custom when investigating any subject, to determine the most rapid and best-adapted style of penmanship for an operator’s use. HePage 876 finally fixed upon a slightly back-hand, with regular round characters, isolating the letters from each other, and without shading. This beautiful penmanship he became able to produce at the speed of forty-five words per minute, which is the extreme limit of a Morse operator’s ability to transmit. Edison’s description of the habits of his associate operators at this time is amusing in the extreme. Often when he went home from his work in the small hours of the morning, he would find three of the boys on his bed with their boots, where they had crawled after an evening’s dissipation. He would gently haul them out and deposit them on the floor, while he turned in to sleep. Meanwhile, the office was removed to a new building with improved fixtures, and the instruments were fastened to the tables. Orders were issued not to move the instruments. Edison, however, could not desist from taking three sets to connect up, so as to get report correctly, for the line outside had not improved. At one time he had every instrument in the office out and connected together to try an experiment.’

Beneath the office was a bank, and in the back office an elegant carpet covered the floor. Over this was the battery room, and one night, in trying to abstract some sulfuric acid for experiments, he tipped over the whole carboy. The acid ran through the floor and ceiling, destroying the carpet and doing other damage. This proved the climax of endurance, and Edison was discharged. He went immediately to Cincinnati, and obtained work as “report operator.” This was the scene of some of his first achievements? He always had a hankering for machinery, and when on the Grand Trunk Railway frequented the machine-shops, and learned to run an engine. On one occasion, when the engineer and fireman were exhausted from overwork and fell asleep, he ran a train nearly the entire trip. He unfortunately pumped the engine too full of water, so that it was thrown from the smoke-stack, and deluged the engine with filth, much to the discomfiture of the engineer, who had slept while Edison ran the train. In Cincinnati, on his first stay, he made an ingenious small steam-engine, and arranged his first duplex instruments. The instruments were very crude, as he had so little to work with, but the drawings, which still exist, show conclusively that double transmission was possible at a much earlier date than when put into practical use.

His second stay in Cincinnati was very unpopular on account of his continued experiments. He would get excused from duty, and take a bee-line to the Mechanics’ Library,Page 877 where his entire day and evening would be spent reading the most ponderous electrical and scientific works. He remained in Cincinnati only a short time, and returned home.

He had a warm personal friend, M. T. Adams, in the Boston office. An expert was needed to work a heavy New York wire. Several candidates had failed, as the New York end was worked by “York and Erie” operators, who, as a class, had the reputation of writing anything but the “Morse” alphabet. G. F. Milliken, the manager, offered the situation to Edison by telegraph, and he accepted. He started via the Grand Trunk, and the train was snowed in for two days near the bluffs of the St. Lawrence River by a violent storm. The passengers nearly perished with cold and hunger. When all resources for fuel and food were exhausted, a delegation was sent out to hunt for relief. They were gone so long, another expedition was about starting in search of them, when they returned and reported a hotel not far distant where cigars were one cent apiece, whisky three cents a glass, and board 50 cents a day. A shout of relief went up from the crowded cars, and they were soon comfortably housed till the storm was over. Edison finally reached Boston all right. His reception at the telegraph office, and the manner in which he so successfully overcame the prejudices inspired against him by his uncouth appearance, was described at length in The Tribune a few days ago. Although somewhat exaggerated, the account is substantially correct. The table at which he had been placed was in the centre of the room, for the better enjoyment of his discomfiture. He noticed the arrangement, and says he would have died rather than made a break. He arrived in Boston in 1868, and in the person of Mr. Milliken found the first superior officer who could appreciate his character^f Mr. Milliken was an accomplished gentleman, a thorough master of his profession, and an inventor of merit. He made allowance for the gawky and hungry look of his subordinate, and in the secret excitement under which he seemed to labor recognized the fire of genius. Edison’s stay in Boston was congenial. There is a vein of humor running through his character, and he played a practical joke on the cockroaches, which infested the office in great numbers. He placed some narrow strips of tin-foil on the wall and connected them with the wires from a powerful battery. Then he placed food in an attractive manner to tempt them. When these clammy individuals pased from one foil to the other they completed the battery connection, and with a flash were cremated, to the delight of the spectators. EdisonPage 878 started a shop in Boston, and gave all his spare time to it. His ideas here began to assume practical shape. He invented a dial instrument for private line use, and put several into practical operation. He made a chemical vote-recording apparatus, but failed to get it adopted by a Massachusetts Legislature. He commenced his experiments on vibratory telegraph apparatus, and made trial tests between Boston and Portland. He matured his first private line printer, and put eight into practical operation. From lack of means to pay for quotations, his venture was not successful, and he sold out. This patent subsequently came into possession of the Gold and Stock Telegraph Company, and was considered to have a base or foundation value upon which many subsequent improvements were built.

At one time he was invited to explain the operation of the telegraph to what he supposed was a girl’s school. He forgot the appointment, and when found was putting up a line on a house-top. He went directly from his work, and was much abashed to find himself ushered into the presence of a room full of finely-dressed young ladies. He was actually timid in ladies’ presence, but his subject was understood, and the occasion passed pleasantly. He was introduced to a number of the young ladies, who always recognized him on the street, much to the astonishment of his fellow-operators not in the secret. Edison is a strong believer in the Boston girl.

His idea of a duplex system constantly burned in his brain, and in 1870 he went to Rochester, N.Y., to try his apparatus between the two cities. Mr. F. L. Pope, the present patent adviser of the Western Union Telegraph Company, assisted in New York. The effort was a failure, although Edison has always claimed it ought to have succeeded. He then went to New York, arriving there dead broke and discouraged. He hung around the office of the Gold Indicator Company for several days. Their apparatus was cumbersome and imperfect, and frequently out of order. At such times the brokers would rush to the office and demand instant repairs. One day when there was an unusual excitement in the gold market, the apparatus failed. The confusion at the Indicator office was great. The Superintendent was out. Edison happened in and stood watching the confusion. He volunteered to fix the machinery. The President looked upon him with amazement, but, being in the mood to catch at straws, gave him permission to try. He speedily found the defect, and the next day was engaged to fill a responsible position with the Company. He immediatelyPage 879 began to improve the apparatus, and soon invented a gold printer. The Company was purchased by the Gold and Stock Company, and Edison was thrown out. He then went into company with Pope and Ashley (the latter now being editor of the Journal of the Telegraph). The Pope and Edison printer^g was brought out, and a private line system was put in active operation. This was soon sold to the Gold and Stock Company, and Edison has for many years been retained in the service of that Company and the Western Union Telegraph Company at a large salary, they having the first option to purchase his inventions pertaining to telegraphy at prices agreed upon in each case. Edison’s inventions pertaining to the gold and stock telegraphy soon replaced the old apparatus, and that system is interwoven with his inventions and improvements. At the formation of his intimate connection with the Gold and Stock Company he established an immense electrical manufacturing establishment at Newark, which was divided into three large shops and two laboratories for experiment. He employed upwards of 300 men, and was himself the busiest man in America. He gave himself scarcely any time for sleep. An idea of his determination and persistence can be gained from the following incident: He had been given an order for $30,000 worth of improved printers. The sample instrument had worked an experimental circuit, but the first instruments for practical use proved a failure. In vain he sought to remedy the defect, till finally, taking four or five of his best men, he went to the top floor of his factory, remarking that they would never come down till the printer worked. They labored continuously for sixty hours, and he was so fortunate as to discover the fault, and made the printers operate perfectly at an expense of $5,000. Such severe and protracted labors are common with him. He says after going without sleep more than the ordinary hours he becomes nervous, and the ideas flow in upon him with great rapidity. His sleep after these efforts is correspondingly long, sometimes lasting thirty to thirty-six hours. He knows no such division as day and night in his labors, and, when the inspiration is upon him, pursues the investigation and experiment to the end. As a manufacturer he did not prove a success. The more resources at command, the greater his efforts at invention. At one time he had forty-five distinct inventions and improvements under way. All the large sums received for his patents and the profits arising from manufacturing to the amount of nearly $400,000 have been expended in inventive efforts. He finally became excessivelyPage 880 annoyed at the tax upon his powers arising from regular business, and concluded to remove to some small place inconvenient to reach, where he would be free from curiosity-seekers, and have opportunity to put into practical shape his conceptions. In 1876 he sold his machinery, and moved his family to Menlo Park, N.J., on the Pennsylvania Railroad, twenty-four miles from New York. Here, on the crest of a hill, remote from other buildings, he built a laboratory 28 × 100 feet, two stories in height. In one room on the ground floor he has a machinery apartment, in which is located a ten-horse-power engine, and a collection of expensive tools, so that any appliance, however intricate, can be made under his own inspection. In another room are ranged on shelves and in cases the models of a large number of his experiments and inventions. Here are also to be found many instruments of precision which he has purchased at great cost to assist in his investigations. His library is entirely scientific, and costly, but not large. On his upper floor he has ranged upon shelves thousands of bottles of chemicals, and he makes it a rule to purchase some of every known chemical or mineral, to have at hand in case of need. Here he conducts his experiments under his personal supervision. He has always with him three or four assistants, whom he has selected on account of their skill as draughtsmen or workmen, willingness to comply with his wishes, and their physical endurance, which, with him, is an important consideration. Messrs. Charles Batchelor, Scotch, and James Adams, Irish, and Mr. Kusel, of German descent, are the principal assistants. Sometimes he has fifteen men employed exclusively in developing his inventions, if of importance and near completion. Edison was described by the United States Patent Commissioner as the young man who has kept the path to the Patent Office hot with his footsteps.^h He has been granted 112 patents in this country, and has some twenty applications pending in the office. His most valuable inventions have been patented in many foreign countries. Of his American patents, thirty-five pertain to automatic and chemical telegraphs, eight to duplex and quadruplex telegraphy, thirty-eight to printing telegraph instruments, fourteen to Morse telegraph apparatus proper, and the remainder relate to fire-alarms, district and domestic telegraphy, electric signals, the electric pen, the speaking phonograph, and a variety of electrical and non-electric apparatus.

The printing telegraph instruments, the automatic orPage 881 chemical system, by which 1,000 words a minute can be transmitted on a single wire for medium distances; the quadruplex system, by which four messages at a time are sent on the same wire by the Morse method; the electric pen; the carbon telephone, which exceeds all others for its loudness and distinctness; the speaking phonograph, and the aerophone are among his most valuable productions.

He has made many extremely interesting and minor discoveries, such as the lubricating property of electricity upon which the electro motorgraph is based, and upon which could be built an entirely new system of telegraphy. His mind is so prolific that he can always afford to accept reasonable compensation for his inventions.

He is sharp at a bargain, and has been styled a Tallyrand in negotiating for the disposition of his inventions. His peculiarities and the great value of his inventions have led to severe struggles for the possession of some of them. His great anxiety seems to be to give an equivalent invention for the price asked, but he professes to be utterly without conscience in case of any attempt to overreach him. In person he is five feet nine and one-half inches tall; he wears a seven and seven-eighths inch tall hat; his hair is black and worn short and is slightly gray. His complexion is pale and fair, his eyes are gray and piercing; he has a sharp nose and countenance. When in application his look is most intense, although there is often a merry twinkle in his eye. His chest expansion is five inches. His powers of application, patience, and endurance are something wonderful. He begins where most people leave off, and, like a Morphy at chess, carries on five or six lines of experiment in totally different divisions, never ceasing any of them till a result is reached or an impossibility proved. He keeps a careful record of each day’s experiments, properly witnessed, and has numerous volumes of such statistics. He is quite hard of hearing, and his accomplishments with the telephone are most remarkable on account of this defect. For a long time he was unable to distinguish the sound produced, and depended on his assistants. He many times despaired of a result. At last he got his carbon telephone sufficiently loud so that he could hear it over long distances without difficulty, and was satisfied. That such a man should go on and eliminate the speaking phonograph is surprising, and, in view of his defect, he may almost be forgiven the production of the aerophone, intended to talk from three to ten miles. He was married to Miss MaryPage 882 Stillwell, of Newark, in 1873. The medallion on the new silver dollar is an excellent profile likeness of her. Their honeymoon was eccentric, as Edison, although in the same city, could not leave his work for more than a few hours two or three times a week, the remainder of his time being used at his factory. The influence of his wife has greatly improved his habits and appearance of recent years. They have two children,—a little girl 5 years and a boy 2 years old,—who are nick-named “dot” and “dash,” after the characters in the Morse alphabet. He is affectionate and generous in his family but rides rough shod’ over the ordinary mannerisms of life, and gets down to what he calls solid business. He has a large and comfortable residence near his laboratory. He says the existence of a God can be demonstrated in a thousand ways to an absolute certainty, but he has no religious convictions in the ordinary sense. His attention has heretofore been largely turned to electricity, but his knowledge extends over a wide field. He feels confident of being able to produce one or two things equally good as the quadruplex, telephone, electric pen, or phonograph, a year. He fully expects to live to the age of the oldest member of his family, in which case, if the public desire a relief from his inventions, the only way will be to hang him, as the New York Times suggests, for prevention. His income from his inventions the present year will probably reach $50,000, all of which will undoubtedly be spent in pushing his inventions to completion. His personal tastes are very simple. When invited to dine recently at Delmonico’s, he satisfied himself with a piece of pie and cup of tea, greatly to the astonishment of his host, who wanted to do the handsome thing. When tendered a public dinner he declined, stating that $100,000 would not induce him to sit through two hours of personal glorification. He dislikes personal notoriety, and says a man is to be measured by what he does, and not by what is said of him.

When a success is reached, it rapidly loses interest for him, and he must find some fresh impossibility upon which to expend the fuel of his genius, and burn out his life.

Where can an example be found who has done more in his own sphere than Thomas A. Edison to promote knowledge and bring the secrets of Nature under the useful control of his fellow-men?