 Remember a Hallmark card when you carry enough to send the very best. The makers of Hallmark greeting cards bring you Van Heflin in Francis Rebellion Miller's The Life of Thomas Edison on the Hallmark Playhouse. This week Hallmark will bring you Hollywood's greatest stars in outstanding stories chosen by one of the world's best known authors. They distinguish novelist Mr. James Hilton. Ladies and gentlemen, this is James Hilton. Glad to be back with you again and to welcome you to our new season of the Hallmark Playhouse. Tonight, our opening night, it's appropriate that we should tell the story of a great American, Thomas Edison, the inventor. You all know his inventions, you use them every day. This very microphone I'm speaking into now came partly from his brain. And here is his actual voice, recorded by the machine which he did so much to make universal. He's speaking at the close of the First World War. And remember, this is a very old and worn recording. Listen. Ladies and gentlemen, I'm speaking. The word American has been used mainly in Europe. Our soldiers have made it to be courage, generosity, self-restraint and modesty. We are proud of the best Americans who risk their lives for the liberty of the world. And we too are proud today of this man who is not only a great citizen of his country, but a benefactor of all mankind. A man who, as much as anyone who ever lived, lightened the burdens and added to the pleasures of our daily lives. It's a great story that's already been made the theme of many books. And to play the exacting role of Thomas Edison tonight, we are delighted to have with us one of Hollywood's most brilliant young actors, Van Heflin. And now a word about Hallmark cards from Frank Goss before we begin the first act of the life of Thomas Edison, starring Van Heflin. I should like to join Mr. Hilton in welcoming you back to another season on Hallmark Playhouse. And to remind you once again that for every occasion important to your friends and loved ones, there are Hallmark cards to carry your thoughts across the miles, across the years, often merely across the way. A Hallmark card says what you want to say, just the way you want to say it. And that identifying Hallmark on the back says you cared enough to send the very best. Now Hallmark Playhouse presenting Francis Trevelyan Miller's The Life of Thomas Edison, starring Van Heflin. On August 1, 1931, the news swept around the world that Thomas Edison was at the point of death. But his was an almost indomitable will. Even as the news went flashing out into space through means he had helped create, he sat by the window looking off into the summer sunshine, looking back across eight to four years. They think I'm dying today. Well, let's soon see. I'm up in my chair today. Tomorrow I'll be back in the laboratory. I've got work to do. There's no time for being sick. And certainly no time for dying. Why, I've got at least 15 years more work ahead of me. But I never did intend to retire before I was a hundred. Strange how many sounds a deaf man locks inside of his heart and listens to over and over when he's alone. And that's the voice of the Boston nightclub. I sailed into New York on her and looked New York over from her decks with a feeling of a Columbus discovering the world of his dreams. I had bought my ticket with the last penny that I had to my name. I was 22 years old and didn't know one person in New York. So while I hunted for a job, I persuaded the superintendent of a firm known as the Gold Indicator Company to let me sleep at nights in the battery room. This firm had a transmitter that sent quotations to the floor of the gold exchange and it was to play an important part in my life. One day the machine, it broke down and I was able to fix it. The next morning, the head of the firm sent for me. Did you send for me, sir? Yes, sit down, boy. You did me a great service today. You must know a great deal about machinery. Well, I've always been interested in things like that, sir. Since I can remember, I've been fooling around with chemicals and machinery trying to find out what I could about them. Hey, tell me you're a telegraph operator from Boston. What are you doing in New York? Well, sir, it sounded a little foolish to say that I'd come to seek my fortune, wouldn't it? Not at all. Sounds extremely practical. What do you want to do? Well, in a certain sense, I want to be an explorer. An explorer? Yes, sir. I want to explore the whole world by microscopic test tubes. The world is full of wonders. It's waiting discovery. Just imagine a few decades ago, this room where we sit was wilderness. Now there's an office, a city, a civilization. A few decades ago, if anyone could have foreseen it, well, this would have seemed wonder itself. So who can say what wonders lie ahead tomorrow? Two men may sit 3,000 miles apart and converse as though they were in the same room. That picture on the wall. Tomorrow, science may find a way to give movement to that picture. Even even voice. Today, men travel on the ground. They may have highways in the heavens. Nothing is impossible in the world we're in. We're emerging from darkness and delight. And I want to hang up my hat with the scientists and get to work. Well, scientists have to eat sun. Do you want a job? Oh, I certainly do. Any kind of a job. All right. I'm going to put you in charge of my entire plant. Your entire plant? I'll give you $300 a month. I spent the winter days in the plant and the winter nights working and experimenting in a small shop in Jersey City. I was working on an improvement in the printer in my spare time. And one day, the president of Western Union sent for me. They bought my invention for $40,000. And now I had funds with which to start my journey in science. I invested the money and machinery. And I started this small shop where I could experiment. I worked day and night, taking half-hour to sleep on. I worked in three or four hours out of every 24. I worked with Scholes on the development of the typewriter. I worked on telegraph systems to improve speed and efficiency. I must have worked then on a hundred different things. And one day while I was working, a new sound entered my heart and made its home. I had an assistant in my laboratory. I mean, Miss Dowa, I've never heard you sing before. Oh, I'm sorry, Mr. Edison. I had no idea you were anywhere about it. I was just finishing this experiment with a paraffin paper. You know, I think it's a wonderful invention. Mary, Miss Dowa? Yes, Mr. Edison. When I came in just now and heard you sing, I... Well, of course I have absolutely nothing to recommend me. I have no money to speak of and the life I live is hardly a recommendation either. To live a life devoted to mankind is to live a life that is its own greatest recommendation, Mr. Edison. Would that be a recommendation to a woman, Miss Dowa? I can hardly speak for women at large, Miss Dowa. I don't ask you to speak for women at large, Miss Dowa. Only for yourself. I don't quite understand what you're asking me, Mr. Edison. I suppose what I'm asking you is the... Miss Dowa, I should be happy if you do me the honor of becoming my wife. Oh, come on, we better get on back to work. I'm not half good enough for you. You couldn't possibly accept me, so I suppose the less said about it, the better. But, Mr. Edison, I'm in love with you. Miss Dowa. And I should consider it a privilege and an honor to be your wife, Mr. Edison. Mary. Tom. 173. And I was the most fortunate and the happiest man alive. The sounds that a man carries in his heart and listens to over and over. Sounds. Recorded sounds. I was working in my laboratory one day when a strange thing happened. Mary, Mary, Mary, come in here, Mary. Darling, what is it? Well, I want to show you something. Listen, you know, I was working with a telephone. I was trying to figure out one of the principles involved. And I started singing into the mouthpiece of the telephone. And the vibrations of my voice sent this steel point into my finger. Well, you see, you can see where it was bleeding? Yes, yes. Well, I began to think that if I could record the actions of the point on a given surface and then send the point over the same surface afterwards, I should be able to reproduce the human voice. Tom. I tried it on a sheet of telegraph paper. Hello, hello, into the mouthpiece. And then I ran the paper back over the steel point. Well, let me show you what happened. Darling, that's incredible. Yes, shall I call him? No, no, no, I'll call him. John, John, please come in here a minute. What is it, Tom? I'm right on the brink of something really big. John, I'm going to make a machine that talks. You're going to what? I'm going to make a machine that talks. You're the best model maker I know. I'll make your drawing and I want you to build it for me. Will you do that, please? A machine that talks, Tom. Shall I make a sketch and build it right away? Of course I will. Mary, give me a sketch pen and some pencils. John, sit down here beside me. I'm ready. I'm going to make a machine that talks with God's help and yours. I'm going to make a machine that talks. We'll return to the second act of the life of Thomas Edison, starring Van Heplen. This week, boys and girls are going back to school. I have a good idea for teaching children thoughtfulness. You may have trouble getting them to write letters, unless your children are different from the ones we always will, but they'll love to send hallmark cards. How they'll enjoy choosing a beautiful hallmark card for father on his birthday. A funny get-well card to an absent schoolmate. A card to fond grandparents on their wedding anniversary. All through the year, you can train children in kindness and thoughtfulness. For hallmark cards not only have power to influence the lives of others, they also help people to become more thoughtful, more likeable. You develop discriminating tastes, too, by teaching a child to look for hallmark cards. If that seems prejudiced on my part, just ask your friends what name they think of in greeting cards when they want to send the finest. See if they don't answer immediately. Hallmark cards. So you can teach a child to choose with pride, a card with that hallmark on the back, because it says you cared enough to send the very best. Now back to James Hilton in the second act of the life of Thomas Edison, starring Van Heplen. The old man sat by the window, looking reflectively off into the late summer afternoon. He had lived for a long time in two worlds, the world as he found it, and the world which he helped to create. He had given that world some 3,000 inventions, which tremendously changed our everyday life. And beyond his garden, the entire world waited for news of him. But he wasn't aware of that. His mind was still busy with the past. Yes, it's strange how many sounds a deaf man locks inside of his heart and listens to over and over when he's alone. Footsteps. My own footsteps. I remember how loud they seemed to me and how it was one night. I walked up the stairs of the White House in Washington and into the president of the president of the United States president, Brotherford B. Hayes. I want to congratulate you, Mr. Edison. You have made history with this little box you call the bomb level. My son, my firstborn. My son. Mary, there must be something you can do. Oh, what would you suggest? Well, I don't know. I don't know how to handle babies, but do something. Well, I'll put it up to him squarely. Now look here, son. Your father wants to make a record of you crying. So please cry. Immediately. Immediately. Oh, now look. Please listen to your father. I've got records of you laughing. I want you to cry. Could we spank him, Mary? We could spank that poor little baby for nothing? Could we pinch him? No, indeed. Just a little pinch. Absolutely not. I'm going to take him right out of here and put him to bed while he isn't safe around you. Oh, he's beautiful. He's the most beautiful baby that I've ever lived. And the image of his mother. Oh, darling, I love you so much. So very much. Mary, I'll never be able to tell you what you mean to me. All that a man could hope to find in a woman I found in you. And Mary? Yes, dear. That baby. Let me tell you something. That baby is the most wonderful thing I ever invented. That's the recording of the baby's cry, but it took a lot of time and patience. My baby just wasn't the crying sword. None of my children were. There is a sound that has echoed and re-echoed through my memories, the absorbed years of my thought and study, thunder and the mystery behind the thunder. You look so tired if you just rest for a while. Look at that flash of lightning. Oh, Mary, the secret of electricity is so close in it so far. I'm positive that my theory that you can subdivide electricity is correct. I'm sure that the entire world can be lighted by electricity, but I just can't seem to prove it. Newspapers are calling me a fool. Maybe I am. I'm going to lose my backing. The financiers who put up the money are losing faith in me, and without the money to conduct my experiments, I'll be helpless. Let there be light, it says in the Bible. Let there be light, and there was light, and God saw the light. And it was good, and God divided the light from the darkness. My mind keeps going back to those words. Over and over it keeps going back. God divided the light from the darkness. Divided it. Divided it. Help me to solve that mystery. Help me to solve that mystery. Can I get you anything? No, no, thank you. You've got to eat something. You've sat there for almost two days. We have the glass bulbs. We know the glass bulb is the correct dick. We know that, but the filament that goes inside, every time we try to inject the filament, either the bulb breaks or the filament. Now, how can I get a filament that will conduct the electricity but not break? How can... Now, what have I got all over my sleeve? Let's see. Oh, that's that lamp black mixed with tar that we were using on the experiments with the telephone transmitter. It's a shame I'm afraid that code is ruined. Lamp black mixed with tar. Lamp black mixed with tar. John, John, go out and get me some spools of cotton thread. Hurry, will you? Hurry just as fast as you can. Cotton thread, strong cotton thread. The thread has been baked in nickel mold for five hours. Gotta be careful. I don't want to break it again now. Insert the carbonized thread in the bulb slowly. There, there we are. All right now, so far so good. We've gotten the carbon into the bulb. The bulb's been exhausted of air, sealed. Now, let me install it in the fixture. There. All right. Turn on the current. We first, 1879. We sat spellbound before the lamp. Holding our birthlets, it flickered out, but it continued to burn. None of us could go to bed that night or the next day. I sat there with a fine laboratory assistant who had worked with me so long on this project. We sat for 45 hours watching the lamp burn, and only then were we finally able to admit success and turn from the electric light and sleep at last. Many are the friends I can look back on across those crowded years. Many are the people that I cherish, and high among those people must come the name of a man who endeared himself to me in many ways. He encouraged and helped me from the hour of our first meeting, who personally arranged one of the most thrilling moments of my life, the golden jubilee of light. On the 50th anniversary of my discovery, Henry Ford, unreal, the applause seemed at night. I looked about me, my eyes burning with tears of the people that haunt me. Mr. and Mrs. Ford, or of a right, Madame Currie, Jane Adams, Henry Morkinthor, and the president of the United States president, Herbert Hoover. Our scientists and inventors are among our most priceless national possessions. Not by all the profits in the world can we measure the contribution which these men make to our progress. Mr. Edison, by his own genius and effort, rose from modest beginning to membership among the leaders of men. His life gives renewed confidence that our institutions hold open the door of opportunity to all of those who would enter. This experience makes me realize as never before that Americans are sentimental in this crowning event of light's golden jubilee fills me with gratitude. I thank our president and you all. As to Henry Ford, words are inadequate to express my feelings. I can only say to you that in the fullest and richest meaning of the term, he is my friend. Good night and passes how swiftly the moments wing from year to year, 84 years behind me and my memories of them measured in sounds. Now those sounds seem to me the voice of progress made audible. The staccato cry of the telegraph and wireless, the ring of the telephone bell, the roar of the airplane, the sound of radio and of the talking picture. It's over 60 years back to those days when I stepped off the Boston night boat and since then life has been adventure in the most progressive and exciting sense of the word. I have witnessed many wonders and I have been privileged by God to participate in some of them. Whatever lies ahead for me now, I am content and grateful for life and God has been very good to me. Whatever lies ahead, I am content. Thomas Edison, whose inventions have changed our lives in so many ways. Thomas Edison, benefactor of all mankind, died on October 18, 1931. Only a few months after he made his last public speech, a speech that surely has a special meaning for us today. For in it he said, and this was really his final message, he said, I have lived a long time. I have seen history repeat itself again and again. Always America has come out strong and more prosperous. Be as brave as your fathers were before you. Have faith, go forward. Man Heflin and James Hilton will return in a moment. You know, during the past summer I had more and more occasions to discover just how much a carefully selected card can mean to those doing the remembering as well as remembering. And it seems to me that it's particularly satisfying when you can find the card that says just what you want to say, just the way you want to say it, as you always can with a hallmark card. I had just such an occasion today, a couple we'd known for years while celebrating their wedding anniversary. We wanted to say more than just congratulations, yet we didn't quite know how to say it. Until we found this hallmark card, which read, although this day belongs to you in quite a special way, you two are not the only ones remembering today because it really means a lot to those who know you too, to say congratulations on this day to both of you. When we signed the card, we almost felt it had been specially written for just this occasion to just this couple. That's where it is with hallmark cards. They say just what you want to say, even better than you can say it yourself. And that's one of the reasons why it's so easy to remember it would be difficult to forget, to look for the hallmark on the back. It says you cared enough to send the very best. Fan Heflin, it's been a great pleasure to have you with us again on Hallmark Playhouse with your splendid performance as Thomas Edison. You know, I always enjoy being on Hallmark Playhouse, Jimmy. After all, we did one of your own great stories last season and now this year you invite me to open your series with a most inspiring story. Your Hallmark Playhouse has set such high standards that an invitation to come over is always most attractive. I don't know how you do it, but you manage to get stories for Hallmark Playhouse that are like Hallmark cards. But I mean, they have the same warmth and understanding and sincerity. Well, thank you. That's high praise indeed. Now, won't you tell us about next week? I'll certainly be in your audience. Good. I think you like our next story on Hallmark Playhouse. It's The Big Build Up by Michael Foster, a delightful modern love story. And for our star, we are happy to have Dana Andrews. Our Hallmark Playhouse is every Thursday. Our direct producer is Bill Gay. Our music is composed and conducted by Lynn Murray. Our script tonight was adapted by Gene Holloway, and we are specially indebted tonight to Mr. Ward Harris of San Francisco for his generosity in lending us his record of Edison's voice. Until next Thursday, then, this is James Hilton saying, Good night. For Hallmark cards, there are so lonely in stores that have been carefully selected to give you expert and friendly service. Remember Hallmark cards when you will carry them out to send the very best. Dan Heplin is currently starring in the SP Eagle production, The Fowler. Mrs. Edison was played by Barbara Eiler and the voice of Herbert Hoover was portrayed by Ted DeCorsia. This is Frank Goss saying, Good night to you all until next week at the same time when James Hilton returns to present Dana Andrews in Michael Foster's The Big Build Up and the week following West of the Hill starring Elizabeth Taylor on the Hallmark Playhouse.