Edison's Electric Empire

                                                                        Thomas Edison's Early Life

Born on February  11, 1847 in Milan, Ohio, Thomas Edison was said to have risen from humble beginnings to the technological genius that he is known as today. At a young age Edison showed a voracious appetite for knowledge, constantly researching a wide range of subjects. Around the age of 12, young Thomas Edison convinced his parents that he could earn money by using the his access of newspapers and selling them to individuals for a profit. This would become the first of many entrepreneurial ventures where he saw an opportunity to capitalize.

                                                                  Edison's Entrepreneurial Career

Thomas Edison, the man credited with bring light and electricity
to the world

In 1862, Edison move to New York and began to work on his first patented innovation. He improved upon the existing Stock's counter by improving the design and increasing the synchronizing synchronicity. The Gold and Stock Telegraph Company was so impressed that they paid 22 year old Thomas Edison $40,000 for the rights. With his recently found money and success Edison quit his job as a telegrapher, to devote his time and money to invention.

By 1870, Edison had set up his fist small laboratory and manufacturing facility in Newark, New Jersey. He had also create many partnerships between and developed his products for the highest bidder. His entrepreneurial status gave him plenty acknowledgement and his invention of the Quadruplex Telegraph, which was intended for Western Union Telegraph Company, but was sold to Railroad Tycoon Jay Gould gave Edison over $100,000 in not only cash, but also bonds and stocks. This financial success led young Thomas Edison into a cycle of ever-increasing popularity and financial prosperity.   

The Quadruplex Telegraph

Later in 1876, Edison moved to his new laboratory in Menlo Park, New Jersey. Within a couple of years and his new developments in the recording of sound. In 1877, when working on a design aimed at improving the telegraph transmitter Edison had noticed that the movement of the paper tape through the machine made noise, noise that produced what resembled human speech when played at a high speed. Experimenting with a stylus and a cylinder of foil (sound collecting horn) he was able to speak into the capture, on the tape, the vibrations used when speaking and play them back. His first words were "Mary had a little lamb". This is the invention that earned him the nickname "Wizard of Menlo Park".

The vibrations from the sound of the voice can be etched into the
paper and be played back.

Edison's early models of the phonograph later evolved into louder and clearer instruments of sound and also led to the availability to hear previously recorded music whenever the user wished. This device ultimately led to the invention gramophone record player which used nearly the same techniques developed by Edison.

Edison and his Early Phonograph

It could also be used with headphones

Over the years Edison's popularity grew and people from all over the world looked to him as the inventor that would change our world. His investment into new technology proved that he could do just that. During the 1880's Edison's improvement upon Joseph Swan's almost successful incandescent light-bulb led to a new technological revolution.

European Chemist Joesph Swan

The problem with Swans light was that there was not a complete vacuum seal so the carbon filament could not last. When Edison and his employees recognized this, it led them to create a fully functional electric lamp that could burn for up to 40 hrs.

Joesph Swan's incandescent patented electric lamp (Left) and Thomas Edison's electric light (Right) 

So technically speaking Edison did in fact invent the first successful incandescent light-bulb.

                                                                         Thomas Edison's Pearl Street 

With the potential of bringing light to streets, businesses, and eventually homes Edison and his new incandescent light gained the interest of many investors. Edison realized this and set out to develop a company that could manufacture and deliver the electric power to light the world. That same year, with the help of investors such as J.P. Morgan and the Vanderbilt Family, Edison founded the Edison Electric Illuminating Company.

The modern logo of Edison's Electric Illuminating Company 

Edison concentrated on developing a complete system of electric generation and distribution that would turn his light bulb into a commercially efficient and economical business.Pearl Street Station located in Manhattan would be Edison Electric Illuminating Company’s first functioning power plant. By 1884 it was already serving 508 customers with 10,164 lamps.

This map of Lower-Manhattan illustrates the area in which the
Pearl Street Power Plant served

Edison's system would consist of the large central power plant with its Direct Current generators called Dynamos. The "Jumbo" dynamo generators each weighed about 27 tons and had an output of 100 kilowatts. All six dynamo generators in the Pearl Street Station were driven by a steam engine, which was located in another part of the plant.

The Dynamo Room

Edison received more than two hundred patents between 1879 and 1882 as he solved numerous problems in the generation, distribution, and metering of electric current. Edison’s Electric Empire was expanding and the future seemed bright.

Edison's Dilemma

With the growing success of his business it was only natural for him to want to expand his electric power into new territories. Unfortunately because his dynamo machines generated electricity through Direct Current it was impossible to sustain usable power in a high energy circuit in iridescent lamps that were more than a mile away.

Lights powered by Direct Current may not get the energy needed in a circuit
with too much resistance due to distance or lack of power. 

By using the Direct Current method of producing power, the method of generation does not allow for a variation of voltage. In order to generate electricity with the aim of using it in a long distance circuit the voltage needs to be high enough that the resistance doesn't render the current useless. But if the Voltage was too high, then the lamps and filament themselves would burn out and again render the circuit useless. Hypothetically Edison's only solution to this problem was to incorporate a power plant every few miles from one another. While he did go on to produce many power plants Edison's solution to the problem was expensive and impractical.

It seemed as though the only other means to get a consistent, controllable, and reliable form of electric generation would only be possible with an impossible perpetual motion machine. 

One mans attempt to create perpetual energy