 CHAPTER 26. Edison in Commerce and Manufacture An applicant for membership in the Engineers Club of Philadelphia is required to give a brief statement of the professional work he has done. Some years ago a certain application was made and contained the following terse and modest sentence. I have designed a concentrating plant and built a machine shop etc. etc. Thomas A. Edison Although in the foregoing pages, the reader has been made acquainted with the tremendous import of the actualities lying behind those etc. etc., the narrative up to this point has revealed Edison chiefly in the light of inventor, experimenter, and investigator. There have been some side glimpses of the industries he has set on foot and of their financial aspects, and a later chapter will endeavor to sum up the intrinsic value of Edison's work to the world. But there are some other interesting points that may be touched on now in regard to a few of Edison's financial and commercial ventures not generally known or appreciated. It is a popular idea founded on experience that an inventor is not usually a businessman. One of the exceptions proving the rule may perhaps be met in Edison, though all depends on the point of view. All his life he has made a great deal to do with finance and commerce, and as one looks at the magnitude of the vast industries he has helped to create, it would not be at all unreasonable to expect him to be among the multi-millionaires. That he is not is due to the absence of certain qualities, the lack of which Edison is himself the first to admit. Those qualities may not be amiable, but great wealth is hardly ever accumulated without them. If he had not been so intent on inventing, he would have made more of his great opportunities for getting rich. If this utter detachment from any love of money for its own sake has not already been illustrated in some of the incidents narrated, one or two stories are available to emphasize the point. They do not involve any want of the higher business acumen that goes to the proper conduct of affairs. It was said of Gladstone that he was the greatest Chancellor of the Exchequer England ever saw, but that as a retail merchant he would soon have ruined himself by his bookkeeping. Edison confesses that he has never made assent out of his patents in electric light and power, in fact that they have been an expense to him, and thus a free gift to the world. Footnote 18 Edison received some stock for the parent lighting company, but as the capital stock of that company was increased from time to time, his proportion grew smaller, and he ultimately used it to obtain ready money with which to create and finance the various shops in which were manufactured the various items of electric lighting apparatus necessary to exploit his system. Besides, he was obligated to raise additional large sums of money from other sources for this purpose. He thus became a manufacturer with capital raised by himself, and the stock that he received later on the formation of the General Electric Company was not for his electric light patents, but was in payment for his manufacturing establishments which had then grown to be of great commercial importance. End of Footnote This was true of the European patents as well as the American. I endeavored to sell my lighting patents in different countries of Europe, and made a contract with a couple of men. On account of their poor business capacity and lack of practicality, they conveyed under the patents all rights to different corporations, but in such a way, and with such confused wording of the contracts, that I never got a cent. One of the companies started was the German Edison, now the great Algemeine Elektritzgesellschaft. The English company I never got anything for, because a lawyer had originally advised Drexel, Morgan, and Co., as to the signing of a certain document, and said it was all right for me to sign. I signed, and never got a cent, because there was a clause in it which prevented me from ever getting anything. A certain easygoing belief in human nature, and even a certain carelessness of attitude towards business affairs, are here revealed. We have already pointed out two instances where in his dealings with the Western Union Company, he stipulated that payments of six thousand per year for seventeen years were to be made instead of a hundred thousand dollars in cash. Evidently forgetful of the fact that the annual sum so received was nothing more than legal interest, which could have been earned indefinitely if the capital had been only insisted upon. In later life Edison has been more circumspect, but throughout his early career he was constantly getting into some kind of scrape of one experience, he says. In the early days I was experimenting with metallic filaments for the incandescent light, and sent a certain man out to California in search of platinum. He found a considerable quantity in the sluice boxes of the Cherokee Valley Mining Company, but just then he found also that fruit gardening was the thing, and dropped the subject. He then came to me and said that if he could raise four thousand dollars he could go into some kind of orchard arrangement out there, and would give me half the profits. I was unwilling to do it, not having very much money just then, but his persistence was such that I raised the money and gave it to him. He went back to California and got into mining claims, and into fruit growing, and became one of the politicians of the coast, and, I believe, was on the staff of the governor of the state. A couple of years ago he wounded his daughter and shot himself because he had become ruined financially. I never heard from him after he got the money. Edison tells of another similar episode. I had two men working for me, one a German, the other a Jew. They wanted me to put up a little money to start them in a shop in New York to make repairs, etc. I put up eight hundred dollars, and was to get half of the profits, and each of them one quarter. I never got anything for it. A few years afterwards I went to see them and asked what they were doing, and said I would like to sell my interest, and they said, sell out what? Why, I said, my interest in the machinery. They said, you don't own this machinery. This is our machinery. You have no papers to show anything. You had better get out. I am inclined to think that the percentage of crooked people was smaller when I was young. This has been steadily rising, and has got up to a very respectable figure now. I hope it will never reach par. To which legubrious episode, so provocative of cynicism, Edison adds, when I was a young fellow the first thing I did when I went to a town was to put something into the savings bank and start an account. When I came to New York I put thirty dollars into a savings bank under the New York Sun office. After the money had been in about two weeks the bank busted. That was in 1870. In 1909 I got back six dollars and forty cents with a charge for one dollar seventy-five cents for law expenses. That shows the beauty of New York receiverships. It is hardly to be wondered at that Edison is rather frank and unsparing in some of his criticisms of shady modern business methods, and the mention of the following incident always provokes him to a fine scorn. I had an interview with one of the wealthiest men in New York. He wanted me to sell out my associates in the electric lighting business and offered me all I was going to get and a hundred thousand dollars besides. Of course I would not do it. I found out that the reason for this offer was that he had had trouble with Mr. Morgan and wanted to get even with him. Wall Street is, in fact, a frequent object of rather sarcastic reference, applying even to its regular and probably correct methods of banking. When I was running my ore mine, he says, and got up to the point of making shipments to John Fritz, I didn't have capital enough to carry the ore. So I went to J. P. Morgan and Company and said I wanted them to give me a letter to the city bank. I wanted to raise some money. I got a letter to Mr. Stillman and went over and told him I wanted to open an account and get some loans and discounts. He turned me down and would not do it. Well, I said, isn't it banking to help a man in this way? He said what you want is a partner. I felt very much crestfallen. I went over to a bank in Newark, the merchants, and told them what I wanted. They said certainly you can have the money. I made my deposit and they pulled me through all right. My idea of Wall Street banking has been very poor since that time. Merchant banking seems to be different. As a general thing, Edison has had no trouble with raising money when he needed it. The reason being that people have faith in him as soon as they come to know him. A little incident bears on this point. In the operating this connectivity works, Mr. Insull and I had a terrible burden. We had enormous orders and little money, and had great difficulty to meet our payrolls and buy supplies. At one time we had so many orders on hand we wanted two hundred thousand dollars worth of copper and didn't have a cent to buy it. We went down to the Ansonia Brass and Copper Company and told Mr. Cowles just how we stood. He said, I will see what I can do. Will you let my bookkeeper look at your books? We said come right up and look them over. He sent his man up and found we had the orders and were all right, although we didn't have the money. He said, I will let you have the copper and for years he trusted us for all the copper we wanted even if we didn't have the money to pay for it. It is not generally known that Edison, in addition to being a newsboy and a contributor to the technical press, has also been a backer and an angel for various publications. This is perhaps the right place at which to refer to the matter, as it belongs in the list of his financial or commercial enterprises. Edison sums up this chapter of his life very pithily. I was interested as a telegrapher in journalism and started the telegraph journal and got out about a dozen numbers when it was taken over by W. J. Johnston, who afterward founded the electrical world on it as an offshoot from the operator. I also started science and ran it for a year and a half. It cost me too much money to maintain and I sold it to Gardner Hubbard, the father-in-law of Alexander Graham Bell. He carried it along for years. Both these papers are still in prosperous existence, particularly the electrical world as the recognized exponent of electrical development in America, where now the public spends as much annually for electricity as it does for daily bread. From all that has been said above, it will be understood that Edison's real and remarkable capacity for business does not lie in ability to take care of himself, nor in the direction of routine office practices, nor even in ordinary administrative affairs. In short, he would and does regard it as a foolish waste of his time to give attention to the mere occupancy of a desk. His commercial strength manifests itself rather in the outlining of matters relating to organization and broad policy, with a sagacity arising from a shrewd perception and appreciation of general business requirements and conditions, to which should be added his intensely comprehensive grasp of manufacturing possibilities and details, and an unceasing vigilance in devising means of improving the quality of products and increasing the economy of their manufacture. Like other successful commanders, Edison also possesses the happy faculty of choosing suitable lieutenants to carry out his policies and to manage the industries he has created, such, for instance, as those in which this chapter has to deal, namely the phonograph, motion picture, primary battery, and storage battery enterprises. The Portland cement business has already been dealt with separately, and although the above remarks are appropriate to it also, Edison being its head and informing spirit, the following pages are intended to be devoted to those industries that are grounded around the laboratory at Orange, and that may be taken as typical of Edison's methods on the manufacturing side. Within a few months after establishing himself at the present laboratory in 1887, Edison entered upon one of those intensely active periods of work that have been so characteristic of his methods in commercializing his other inventions. In this case, his labors were directed toward improving the phonograph so as to put it into thoroughly practicable form, capable of ordinary use by the public at large. The net result of this work was the general type of machine of which the well-known phonograph of today is a refinement, evolved through many years of sustained experiment and improvement. After a considerable period of strenuous activity in the 80s, the phonograph and its wax records were developed to a sufficient degree of perfection to warrant him in making arrangements for their manufacture and commercial introduction. At this time, the surroundings of the Orange laboratory were distinctly rural in character. Immediately adjacent to the main building and the four smaller structures, constituting the laboratory plant, were grass meadows that stretched away for some considerable distance in all directions, and at its back door, so to speak, ducks paddled around and quacked in a pond undisturbed. Being now ready for manufacturing, but requiring more facilities, Edison increased his real estate holdings by purchasing a large tract of land lying contiguous to what he already owned. At one end of the newly acquired land, two unpretentious brick structures were erected, equipped with first-class machinery, and put into commission as shops for manufacturing phonographs and their record blanks. While the capacious hull forming the third story of the laboratory over the library was fitted up and used as a music room where records were made. Thus the modern Edison phonograph made its modest debut in 1888 in what was then called the improved form to distinguish it from the original style of machine he invented in 1877, in which the recording was made on a sheet of tin foil held in place upon a metallic cylinder. The improved form is the general type so well known for many years and sold at the present day vis the spring or electric motor driven machine with a cylindrical wax record, in fact the regulation Edison phonograph. It did not take a long time to find a market for the products of the newly established factory for a worldwide public interest in the machine had been created by the appearance of newspaper articles from time to time announcing the approaching completion by Edison of his improved phonograph. The original tin foil machine had been sufficient to illustrate the fact that the human voice and other sounds could be recorded and reproduced, but such a type of machine had sharp limitations in general use, hence the coming into being of a type that any ordinary person could handle was sufficient of itself to ensure a market. Thus demand for the new machines and wax records grew a pace as the corporations organized to handle the business extended their lines. An examination of the newspaper files of the year 1888, 1889, and 1890 will reveal the great excitement caused by the bringing out of the new phonograph and how frequently and successfully it was employed in public entertainments either for the whole or part of an evening. In this and other ways it became popularized to a still further extent. This led to the demand for a nickel in the slot machine, which when established became immensely popular over the whole country. In its earlier forms the improved phonograph was not capable of such general non-expert handling as is the machine of the present day, and consequently there was a constant endeavor on Edison's part to simplify the construction of the machine and its manner of operation. Experimentation was incessantly going on with this in view, and in the process of evolution changes were made here and there that resulted in a still greater measure of perfection. In various ways there was a continual slow and steady growth of the industry thus created, necessitating the erection of many additional buildings as the years passed by. During part of the last decade there was a lull caused mostly from the failure of corporate interests to carry out their contract relations with Edison, and he was thereby compelled to resort to legal proceedings at the end of which he bought in the outstanding contracts and assumed command of the business personally. Being thus freed from many irksome restrictions that had hung heavily upon him, Edison now proceeded to push the phonograph business under a broader policy than that which obtained under his previous contractual relations. With the ever-increasing simplification and efficiency of the machine and a broadening of its application the results of this policy were manifested in a still more rapid growth of the business that necessitated further additions to the manufacturing plant. And thus matters went on until the early part of the present decade, when the factory facilities were becoming so rapidly outgrown as to render radical changes necessary. It was in these circumstances that Edison's sagacity and breadth of business capacity came to the front. With characteristic boldness and foresight he planned the erection of the series of magnificent concrete buildings that now stand adjacent to and around the laboratory, and in which the manufacturing plant is at present housed. There was no narrowness in his views in designing these buildings, but on the contrary, great faith in the future. For his plans included not only the phonograph industry, but provided also for the coming development of motion pictures and of the primary and storage battery enterprises. In aggregate there are twelve structures including the administration building of which six are of imposing dimensions running from 200 feet long by 50 feet wide to 440 feet in length by 115 feet in width. All these larger buildings except one being five stories in height. They are constructed entirely of reinforced concrete with Edison cement including walls floors and stairways thus eliminating fire hazard to the utmost extent and ensuring a high degree of protection, cleanliness and sanitation. As fully three-fourths of the area of their exterior framework consists of windows and abundance of daylight is secured. These many advantages combined with lofty ceilings on every floor provide ideal conditions for the thousands of working people engaged in this immense plant. In addition to these twelve concrete structures there are a few smaller brick and wooden buildings on the grounds in which some special operations are conducted. These however are few in number and at some future time will be concentrated in one or more additional concrete buildings. It will afford a cleaner idea of the extent of the industries clustered immediately around the laboratory when it is stated that the combined floor space which is occupied by them in all these buildings is equivalent in the aggregate to over fourteen acres. It would be instructive but scarcely within the scope of the narrative to conduct the reader through this extensive plant and see its many interesting operations in detail. It must suffice however to note that it's complete and ample equipment with modern machinery of every kind applicable to the work. It's numerous and some of them wonderfully ingenious methods, processes, machines and tools specially designed or invented for the manufacturer of special parts and supplemental appliances for the phonograph or other Edison products. And also to note the interesting variety of trades represented in the different departments in which are included chemists, electricians, electrical mechanicians, machinists, mechanics, pattern makers, carpenters, cabinet makers, varnishers, japaners, tool makers, lapidaries, wax experts, phonographic developers and printers, opticians, electroplaters, furnace men and others together with factory experimenters and a host of general employees who by careful training have become specialists and experts in numerous branches of these industries. Edison's plans for this manufacturing plant were sufficiently well outlined to provide ample capacity for the natural growth of the business and although that capacity, so far as phonographs is concerned, has actually reached an output of over 6,000 complete phonographs per week and upward of 300,000 molded records per day with a payroll embracing over 3,500 employees including office force and amounting to about $45,000 per week the limits of production have not yet been reached. The constant outpouring of products in such large quantities bespeaks the unremitting activities of an extensive and busy selling organization to provide for their marketing and distribution. This important department, the national phonograph company, in all its branches from president to office boy includes about 200 employees on its office payroll and makes its headquarters in the administration building which is one of the large concrete structures above referred to. The policy of the company is to dispose of its wares through regular trade channels rather than to deal direct with the public trusting to local activities as stimulated by a liberal policy of national advertising. Thus there has been gradually built up a very extensive business until at the present time an enormous output of phonographs and records is distributed to retail customers in the United States and Canada through the medium of about 150 jobbers and over 13,000 dealers. The Edison phonograph industry thus organized is helped by frequent conventions of this large commercial force. Besides this the national phonograph company maintains a special staff for carrying on the business with foreign countries. While the aggregate transactions of this department are not as extensive as those for the United States and Canada, they are of considerable volume as the foreign office distributes in bulk a very large number of phonographs and records to selling companies and agencies in Europe, Asia, Australia, Japan and indeed to all the countries of the civilized world. Like England's drumbeat the voice of the Edison phonograph is heard around the world in undying strains throughout the 24 hours. Footnote 19. It may be of interest to the reader to note some parts of the globe to which shipments of phonographs and records are made. Samoan Islands, Falkland Islands, Siam, Korea, Crete Island, Paraguay, Chile, Canary Islands, Egypt, British East Africa, Cape Colony, Portuguese East Africa, Liberia, Java Strait settlements, Madagascar, Fanning Islands, New Zealand, French Indochina, Morocco, Ecuador, Brazil, Madeira, South Africa, Azores, Manchuria, Ceylon, Sierra Leone. End of footnote 19. In addition to the main manufacturing plant at Orange, another important adjunct must not be forgotten and that is the recording department in New York City where the master records are made under the superintendents of experts who have studied the intricacies of the art with Edison himself. This department occupies an upper story in a lofty building and in its various rooms may be seen and heard many prominent musicians, vocalists, speakers, and vaudeville artists studiously and busily engaged in making the original records, which are afterwards sent to Orange and which, if approved by the expert committee, are passed on to the proper department for reproduction in large quantities. When we consider the subject of motion pictures, we find a similarity in general business methods for while the projecting machines and copies of picture films are made in quantity at the Orange works, just as phonographs and duplicate records are so made, the original picture or film, like the master record, is made elsewhere. There is this difference, however, that, from the particular nature of the work, practically all master records are made at one convenient place, while the essential interest in some motion pictures lies in the fact that they are taken in various parts of the world, often under exceptional circumstances. The silent drama, however, calls also for many representations which employ conventional acting, staging, and the varied appliances of stage craft. Hence Edison saw early the necessity of providing a place especially devised and arranged for the production of dramatic performances in pantomime. It is a far cry from the crude structures of early days. The Black Maria of 1891 swung around on its pivot in the Orange laboratory yard to the well-appointed Edison theaters, or pantomime studios, in New York City. The largest of these is located in the suburban borough of the Bronx and consists of a three-story and basement building of reinforced concrete, in which are the offices, dressing rooms, wardrobe, and property rooms, library, and developing department. Contiguous to this building and connected to it is the theater proper, a large lofty structure whose sides and roof are of glass and whose floor space is sufficiently ample for six different sets of scenery at one time, with plenty of room left for a profusion of accessories such as tables, chairs, pianos, bunch lights, search lights, cameras, and a host of various paraphernalia pertaining to stage effects. The second Edison theater or studio is located not far from the shopping district in New York City. In all essential features, except size and capacity, it is a duplicate of the one in the Bronx, of which it is a supplement. To a visitor coming on the floor of such a theater for the first time, there is a sense of confusion in beholding the heterogeneous sets of scenery and the motley assemblage of characters represented in the various plays in the process of taking or rehearsal. While each set constitutes virtually a separate stage, they are all on the same floor without wings or proscenium arches and separated only by a few feet. Thus, for instance, a Japanese house interior may be seen cheek by jowl with an ordinary prison cell flanked by a mining camp, which in turn stands next to a drying room set, and in each set of appropriate characters in pantomimic motion. The action is incessant for in any dramatic representation intended for the motion picture film every second counts. The production of several completed plays per week necessitates the employment of a considerable staff of people of miscellaneous trades and abilities. At each of these two studios there is employed a number of stage directors, scene painters, carpenters, property men, photographers, costumers, electricians, clerks, and general assistants, besides a capable stock company of actors and actresses whose generous numbers are frequently augmented by the addition of a special star or by a number of extra performers such as rough riders or other specialists. It may be occasionally that the extinguishes of the occasion require the work of a performing horse, dog, or other animal. No matter what the object required may be, whether animate or inanimate, if it is necessary for the play, it is found and pressed into service. These two studios, while separated from the main plant, are under the same general management, and their original negative films are forwarded as made to the Orange Works, where the large copying department is located in one of the concrete buildings. Here, after the film has been passed a bond by a committee, a considerable number of positive copies are made by ingenious processes, and after each one is separately tested or run off in one or other of the three motion picture theaters in the building, they are shipped out to film exchanges in every part of the country. How extensive this business has become may be appreciated when it is stated that at the Orange Plant there are produced at this time over eight million feet of motion picture film per year, and Edison's company is only one of many producers. Another of the industries at the Orange Works is the manufacture of projecting kinetoscopes by means of which the motion pictures are shown. While this of itself is also a business of considerable magnitude in its aggregate yearly transactions, it calls for no special comment in regard to commercial production, except to note that a core of experimenters is constantly employed, refining and perfecting details of the machine. Its basic features of operation, as conceived by Edison, remain unchanged. On coming to consider the Edison battery enterprises, we must pre-force extend the territorial view to include a special chemical manufacturing plant, which is in reality a branch of the laboratory and the Orange Works, although actually situated about three miles away. Both the primary and the storage battery employ certain chemical products as essential parts of their elements, and indeed owe their very existence to the peculiar preparation and quality of such products, as exemplified by Edison's years of experimentation and research. Hence the establishment of his own chemical works at Silver Lake, where, under his personal supervision, the manufacturer of these products is carried on in charge of specially trained experts, at the present writing, the plant covers about seven acres of ground, but there is ample room for expansion, as Edison, with wise forethought, secured over forty acres of land, so as to be prepared for developments. Not only is the Silver Lake Works used for the manufacturer of the chemical substances employed in the batteries, but it is the plant at which the Edison primary battery is wholly assembled and made up for distribution to customers. This in itself is a business of no small magnitude, having grown steadily on its merits year by year, until it has now arrived at a point where its sales run into the hundreds of thousands of cells per annum, furnished largely to the steam railroads of the country for their signal service. As to the storage battery, the plant at Silver Lake is responsible only for the production of the chemical compounds, nickel hydrate and iron oxide, which enter into its construction. All the mechanical parts, the nickel plating, the manufacturer of nickel flake, the assembling and testing, are carried on at the Orange Works in two of the large concrete buildings above referred to. A visit to this part of the plant reveals an amazing fertility of resourcefulness and ingenuity in the devising of the special machines and appliances employed in constructing the mechanical parts of these cells, for it is practically impossible to fashion them by means of machinery and tools to be found in the open market, nonwithstanding the immense variety that may be there obtained. Since Edison completed his final series of investigations on his storage battery and brought it to its present state of perfection, the commercial values have increased by leaps and bounds. The battery, as it was originally put out some years ago, made for itself an enviable reputation. But with its improved form, there has come a vast increase of business. Although the largest of the concrete buildings, where its manufacturer is carried on, is over 400 feet long and four stories in height, it has already become necessary to plan extensions and enlargements of the plant in order to provide for the production of batteries to fill the present demands. It was not until the summer of 1909 that Edison was willing to pronounce the final verdict of satisfaction with regard to this improved form of storage battery. But subsequent commercial results have justified his judgment, and it is not too much to predict that in all probability the business will assume gigantic proportions within a very few years. At the present time, 1910, the Edison storage battery enterprise is in its early stages of growth, and its status may be compared with that of the electric light system about the year 1881. There is one more industry, though of comparatively small extent, that is included in the activities of the orange works, namely the manufacture and sale of the Bates numbering machine. This is a well-known article of commerce used in mercantile establishments for the stamping of consecutive duplicate and manifold numbers on checks and other documents. It is not an invention of Edison, but the organization owning it, together with the patent rights, were acquired by him some years ago, and he has since continued and enlarged the business both in scope and volume, besides, of course, improving and perfecting the apparatus itself. These machines are known everywhere throughout the country, and while the annual sales are of comparatively moderate amount in comparison with the totals of the other Edison industries at orange, they represent in the aggregate a comfortable and encouraging business. In this brief outline review of the flourishing and extensive commercial enterprises centered around the orange laboratory, the facts, it is believed, contain a complete refutation of the idea that an inventor cannot be a businessman. They also bear abundant evidence of the compatibility of these two widely convergent gifts existing even to a high degree in the same person. A striking example of the correctness of this proposition is afforded in the present case when it is borne in mind that these various industries above described, whose annual sales run into many millions of dollars, owe not only their very creation, except the Bates machine, and existence to Edison's inventive originality and commercial initiative, but also their continued growth and prosperity to his incessant activities in dealing with their multifarious business problems. In publishing a portrait of Edison this year, one of the popular magazines placed under it this caption, were the age called upon to pay Thomas A. Edison all it owes to him, the age would have to make an assignment. The present chapter will have thrown some light on the idiosyncrasies of Edison as financier and as manufacturer, and it will have shown that while the claim thus suggested might be quite good, it will certainly never be pressed or collected. End of Chapter 26 Chapter 27 of Edison, His Life and Inventions This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, visit LibriVox.org. Edison and His Inventions By Frank Louis Dyer and Thomas Comerford Martin Chapter 27 The Value of Edison's Inventions to the World If the world were to take an account of stock, so to speak, and proceed in orderly fashion, to marshal its tangible assets in relation to dollars and cents, the natural resources of our globe from center to circumference would head the list. Next would come inventors, whose value to the world as an asset could be readily estimated from an increase of its wealth, resulting from the actual transformations of these resources into items of convenience and comfort through the exercise of their inventive ingenuity. Inventors of practical devices may be broadly divided into two classes. First, those who may be said to have made two blades of grass grow were only one grew before. And second, great inventors who have made grass grow plentifully on hitherto unproductive ground. The vast majority of practical inventors belong to and remain in the first of these divisions, but there have been and probably always will be a less number who, by reason of their greater achievements, are entitled to be included in both classes. Of these latter, Thomas Alva Edison is one, but in the pages of history he stands conspicuously preeminent, a commanding towering figure even among giants. The activities of Edison have been of such great range and his conquests in the domains of practical arts so extensive and varied that it is somewhat difficult to estimate with any satisfactory degree of accuracy the money value of his inventions to the world of today, even after making due allowance for the work of other great inventors and the propulsive effect of large amounts of capital thrown into the enterprises which took root, wholly or in part through the production of his genius and energies. This difficulty will be apparent, for instance, when we consider his telegraph and telephone inventions. These were absorbed in enterprises already existing and were the means of assisting their rapid growth and expansion, particularly the telephone industry. Again, in considering the fact that Edison was one of the first in the field to design and perfect a practical and operative electric railway, the main features of which are used in all electric roads of today, we are confronted with the problem as to what proportion of their colossal investment and earnings should be ascribed to him. Difficulties are multiplied when we pause for a moment to think of Edison's influence on collateral branches of business. In the public mind he is credited with the invention of the incandescent electric light, the phonograph, and other widely known devices. But how few realize his actual influence on other trades that are not generally thought of in connection with these things. For instance, let us note what a prominent engine builder, the late Gardiner C. Sims, has said. Watt, Corliss, and Porter brought forth steam engines to a high state of proficiency. Yet it remained for Mr. Edison to force better proportions, workmanship, designs, use of metals, regulation, the solving of the complex problems of high speed and endurance, and the successful development of the shaft governor. Mr. Edison is preeminent in the realm of engineering. The phenomenal growth of the copper industry was due to a rapid and ever increasing demand owing to the exploitation of the telephone, electric light, electric motor, and electric railway industries. Without these there might never have been the romance of coppers and the rise and fall of countless fortunes. And although one cannot estimate in definite figures the extent of Edison's influence in the enormous increase of copper production, it is to be remembered that his basic inventions constitute a most important factor in the demand for the metal. Besides, one must also give him the credit, as already noted, for having recognized the necessity for a pure quality of copper, for electric conductors, and for his persistence in having compelled the manufacturers of that period to introduce new and additional methods of refinement, so as to bring about that result, which is now a sine qua non. Still considering his influence on other staples and collateral trades, let us enumerate briefly and in a general manner some of the more important and additional ones that have been not merely stimulated, but in many cases the business in sales have been directly increased and new arts established through the inventions of this one man, namely iron, steel, brass, zinc, nickel, platinum, five dollars per ounce in 1878, now twenty six dollars an ounce, rubber, oils, wax, bi-tumen, various chemical compounds, belting, boilers, injectors, structural steel, iron, tubing, glass, silk, cotton, porcelain, fine woods, slate, marble, electrical, measuring instruments, miscellaneous machinery, coal, wire, paper, building materials, sapphires, and many others. The question before us is to what extent has Edison added to the wealth of the world by his inventions and his energy and perseverance. It will be noted from the foregoing that no categorical answer can be offered to such a question, but sufficient material can be gathered from a statistical from a statistical review of the commercial arts directly influenced to afford an approximate idea of the increase in national wealth that has been affected by or has come into being through the practical application of his ideas. First of all, as to the inventions capable of fairly definite estimate, let us mention the incandescent electric light and systems of distribution of electric light, heat, and power, which may justly be considered as the crowning inventions of Edison's life. Until October 21st, 1879, there was nothing in existence resembling our modern incandescent lamp. On that date, as we have seen in a previous chapter, Edison's labors culminated in his invention of a practical incandescent electric lamp, embodying absolutely all the essentials of the lamp of today, thus opening to the world the doors of a new art and industry. Today, there are in the United States more than 41 million of these lamps connected to existing central station circuits in active operation. Such circuits necessarily imply the existence of central stations with their equipment. Until the beginning of 1882, there were only a few arc lighting stations in existence for the limited distribution of current. At the present time, there are over 6,000 central stations in this country for the distribution of electric current for light, heat, and power, with capital obligations amounting to not less than one billion dollars. Besides the above named 41 million incandescent lamps connected to their mains, there are about 500,000 arc lamps and 150,000 motors using 750,000 horsepower, besides countless fan motors and electric heating and cooking appliances. When it is stated that the gross earnings of these central stations approximate the sum of 225 million dollars yearly, the significant import of the statistics of an art that came so largely from Edison's laboratory about 30 years ago will undoubtedly be apparent. But the above are not by any means all the facts relating to incandescent electric lighting in the United States. For, in addition to electrical stations, there are upward of 100,000 isolated or private plants in mills, factories, steamships, hotels, theaters, etc., owned by the persons or concerns who operate them. These plants represent an approximate investment of 500 million dollars and the connection of not less than 25 million incandescent lamps or their equivalent. Then there are the factories where these incandescent lamps are made, about 40 in number, representing a total investment that may be approximated at 25 million dollars. It is true that many of these factories are operated by other than the interest which came into control of the Edison patents, the General Electric Company, but the 150 million incandescent electric lamps now annually made are broadly covered in principle by Edison's fundamental ideas and patents. It will be noted that these figures are all in round numbers, but they are believed to be well within the mark being primarily founded upon the special reports of the Census Bureau issued in 1902 and 1907, with the natural increase from that time computed by experts who are in position to obtain the facts. It would be manifestly impossible to give exact figures of such a gigantic and swiftly moving industry whose totals increase from week to week. The reader will naturally be disposed to ask whether it is intended to claim that Edison has brought about all this magnificent growth of the electric lighting art. The answer to this is decidedly in the negative, for the fact is that he laid some of the foundations and erected a building there on, and in the natural progressive order of things, other inventors of more or less fame have laid substructures, or added a wing here in a story there, until the resultant great structure has attained such proportions as to evoke the admiration of the beholder, but the old foundation and the fundamental building still remain to support other parts. In other words, Edison created the incandescent electric lamp and invented certain broad and fundamental systems of distribution of current, with all the essential devices of detail necessary for successful operation. These formed a foundation. He also spent great sums of money and devoted several years of patient labor in the early practical exploitation of the dynamo and central station and isolated plants, often under adverse and depressing circumstances, with a dogged determination that outlived an opposition steadily threatening defeat. These efforts resulted in the firm commercial establishment of modern electric lighting. It is true that many important inventions of others have a distinguished place in the art, as it is exploited today, but the fact remains that the broad essentials, such as the incandescent lamp, systems of distribution, and some important details are not only universally used, but are as necessary today for successful commercial practice as they were when Edison invented them many years ago. The electric railway next claims our consideration, but we are immediately confronted by a difficulty which seems insurmountable when we attempt to formulate any definite estimate of the value and influence of Edison's pioneer work and inventions. There is one incontrovertible fact, namely that he was the first man to devise, construct, and operate from a central station a practicable life-size electric railroad, which was capable of transporting and did transport passengers and freight at variable speeds over varying grades and under complete control of the operator. These are the essential elements in all electric railroading of the present day, but while Edison's original broad ideas are embodied in present practice, the perfection of the modern electric railway is greatly due to the labors and inventions of a large number of other well-known inventors. There was no reason why Edison could not have continued the commercial development of the electric railway after he had helped to show its practicability in 1880, 1881, and 1882, just as he had completed his lighting system. Had it not been that his financial allies of the period lacked faith in the possibilities of electric railroads, and therefore declined to furnish the money necessary for the purpose of carrying on the work. With these facts in mind, we shall ask the reader to assign to Edison a due proportion of credit for his pioneer and basic work in relation to the prodigious development of electric railroading that has since taken place. The statistics of 1908 for American Street and elevated railways show that within 25 years the electric railway industry has grown to embrace 38,812 miles of track on streets and for elevated railways operated under the ownership of 1,238 separate companies whose total capitalization amounted to the enormous sum of 4,123,834,598 dollars. In the equipments owned by such companies there are included 68,636 electric cars and 17,568 trailers and others making a total of 86,204 of such vehicles. These cars and equipments earned over 425 million dollars in 1907 in giving the public transportation at a cost mostly transfers of a little over three cents per passenger for whom a 15 mile ride would be possible. It is the cheapest transportation in the world. Some mention should also be made of the great electrical works of the country in which the dynamos, motors, and other varied paraphernalia are made for electric lighting, electric railway, and other purposes. The largest of these works which is undoubtedly that of the general electric company at Schenectady, New York, a continuation and enormous enlargement of the shops which Edison established there in 1886. This plant at the present time embraces over 275 acres of which 60 acres are covered by 50 large and over 100 small buildings besides which the company also owns other large plants elsewhere representing a total investment approximating the sum of 34,850,000 dollars up to 1908. The productions of the general electric company alone average annual sales of nearly 75 million dollars but they do not comprise the total of the country's manufacturers in these lines. Turning our attention now to the telephone, we again meet a condition that calls for thoughtful consideration before we can properly appreciate how much the growth of this industry owes to Edison's inventive genius. In another place there has already been told the story of the story of the telephone from which we have seen that to Alexander Graham Bell is due the broad idea of transmission of speech by means of an electrical circuit also that he invented appropriate instruments and devices through which he accomplished this result although not to that extent which gave promise of any great commercial practicability for the telephone as it then existed. While the art was in this inefficient condition Edison went to work on the subject and in due time as we have already learned invented and brought out the carbon transmitter which is universally acknowledged to have been the needed device that gave to the telephone the element of commercial practicability and has since led to its phenomenally rapid adoption and worldwide use. It matters not that others were working in the same direction. Edison was legally adjudicated to have been the first to succeed in point of time and his inventions were put into actual use and may be found in principle in every one of the 7 million telephones which are estimated to be employed in the country at the present day. Basing the statements upon facts shown by the census reports of 1902 and 1907 and adding there to the growth of the industry's sense that time we find on a conservative estimate that at this writing the investment has been not less than $800 million in now existing telephone systems while no fewer than 10 billion 500 million talks went over the lines during the year 1908. These figures relate only to telephone systems and do not include any details regarding the great manufacturing establishments engaged in the construction of telephone apparatus of which there is a production amounting to at least 15 million per annum. Leaving the telephone let us now turn our attention to the telegraph and endeavor to show as best we can some idea of the measure to which it has been affected by Edison's inventions. Although as we have seen in a previous part of this book his earliest fame arose from his great practical work in telegraphic inventions and improvements, there is no way in which any definite computation can be made of the value of his contributions in the art except perhaps in the case of his quadruplex through which alone it is estimated that there has been saved from 15 million to 20 million in cost of line construction in this country. If this were the only thing that he had ever accomplished it would entitle him to consideration as an inventor of note. The quadruplex however has other material advantages but how far they and the natural growth of the business have contributed to the investment and earnings of the telegraph companies is beyond practical computation. It would perhaps be interesting to speculate upon what might have been the growth of the telegraph and the resultant benefit to the community had Edison's automatic telegraph inventions been allowed to take their legitimate place in the art but we shall not allow ourselves to indulge in flights of fancy as the value of this chapter rests not upon conjecture but only upon actual fact nor shall we attempt to offer any statistics regarding Edison's numerous inventions relating to telegraphs and kindred devices such as stock tickers relays magnets reatomes repeaters printing telegraphs messenger calls etc on which he was so busily occupied as an inventor and manufacturer during the 10 years that began with January 1869 the principles of many of these devices are still used in the arts but have become so incorporated in other devices as to be inseparable and cannot now be dealt with separately to know what they mean however it might be noted that New York City alone has 3 000 stock tickers consuming 50 000 miles of record tape every year turning now to other important arts and industries which have been created by Edison's inventions and in which he is at this time taking an active personal interest let us visit Orange New Jersey when his present laboratory was nearing completion in 1887 he wrote to Mr. J. Hood Wright a partner in the firm of Drexel Morgan and Company quote my ambition is to build up a great industrial works in the Orange Valley starting in a small way and gradually working up close quote in this plant which represents an investment approximating the sum of four million dollars are grouped a number of industrial enterprises of which Edison is either the sole or controlling owner and the guiding spirit these enterprises are the national phonograph company the Edison business phonograph company the Edison phonograph works the Edison manufacturing company the Edison storage battery company and the Bates manufacturing company the importance of these industries will be apparent when it is stated that at this plant the maximum payroll shows the employment of over 4 200 persons with annual earnings in salaries and wages of more than two million seven hundred and fifty thousand dollars in considering the phonograph in its commercial aspect and endeavoring to arrive at some idea of the world's estimate of the value of this invention we feel the ground more firm under our feet for Edison has in later years controlled its manufacture and sale it will be remembered that the phonograph lay dormant commercially speaking for about 10 years after it came into being and then later invention reduced it to a device capable of more popular utility a few years of rather unsatisfactory commercial experience brought about a reorganization through which Edison resumed possession of the business it has since been continued under his general direction and ownership and he has made a great many additional inventions tending to improve the machine in all its parts the uses made of the phonograph up to this time have been of four kinds generally speaking first and principally for amusement second for instruction in languages third for business in the dictation of correspondence and fourth for sentimental reasons in preserving the voices of friends no separate figures are available to show the extent of its employment in the second and fourth classes as they are probably included in machines coming under the first subdivision under this head we find that there have been upward of 1,310,000 phonographs sold during the last 20 years with and for which there have been made and sold no fewer than 97,845,000 records of a musical or other character phonograph records are now being manufactured at orange at the rate of 75,000 a day the annual sale of phonographs and records being approximately seven million dollars including business phonographs this does not include blank records of which large numbers have also been supplied to the public the adoption of the business phonograph has not been characterized by the unanimity that obtained in the case of the one used merely for amusement as its use involves some changes in methods that businessmen are slow to adopt until they realize the resulting convenience and economy although it is only a few years since the business phonograph has begun to make some headway it is not difficult to appreciate that Edison's prediction in 1878 as to the value of such an appliance is being realized when we find that up to this time the sales run up to 12,695 in number at the present time the annual sales of the business phonographs and supplies cylinders etc are not less than 350,000 dollars we must not forget that the basic patent of Edison on the phonograph has long since expired thus throwing open to the world the wonderful art of reproducing human speech and other sounds the world was not slow to take advantage of the fact hence there are in the field numerous other concerns in the same business it is conservatively estimated by those who know the trade and are in a position to form an opinion that the figures above represent only about one half of the entire business of the country in phonographs records cylinders and supplies taking next his inventions that pertain to a more recently established but rapidly expanding branch of business that provides for the amusement of the public popularly known as motion pictures we also find a general recognition of value created referring the reader to a previous chapter for a discussion of Edison standing as a pioneer inventor in this art let us glance at the commercial proportions of this young but lusty business whose ramifications extend to all but the most remote and primitive hamlets of our country the manufacturer of the projecting machines and accessories together with the reproduction of films is carrying on at the orange valley plant and from the inception of the motion picture business to the present time there have been made upward of sixteen thousand projecting machines and many millions of feet of films carrying small photographs of moving objects although the motion picture business as a commercial enterprise is still in its youth it is of sufficient moment to call for the annual production of thousands of machines and many million feet of films in Edison shops having a sale value of not less than seven hundred and fifty thousand dollars to produce the originals from which these Edison films are made there have been established two studios the largest of which is in the Bronx New York City in this as well as in the phonograph business there are many other manufacturers in the field indeed the annual product of the Edison manufacturing company in this line is only a fractional part of the total that is absorbed by the eight thousand or more motion picture theaters and exhibitions that are in operation in the United States at the present time and which represent an investment of some forty five million dollars licensees under Edison patents in this country alone produce upward of sixty million feet of films annually containing more than a billion and a half separate photographs to what extent the motion picture business may grow in the not remote future it is impossible to conjecture for it has taken a place in the front rank of rapidly increasing enterprises the manufacturing sale of the Edison La Land primary battery conducted by the Edison manufacturing company at the Orange Valley plant is a business of no mean importance beginning about twenty years ago with a battery that without polarizing would furnish large currents specially adapted for gas engine ignition and other important purposes the business has steadily grown in magnitude until the present output amounts to about a hundred and twenty five thousand cells annually the total number of cells put into the hands of the public up to date being approximately one million five hundred thousand it will be readily conceded that to most men this alone would be an enterprise of a lifetime and sufficient in itself to satisfy a moderate ambition but although it has yielded a considerable profit to Edison and gives employment to many people it is only one of the many smaller enterprises that owe in existence to his inventive ability and commercial activity so it also is in regard to the mimeograph whose forerunner the electric pen was born of Edison's brain in 1877 he had been long impressed by the desirability of the rapid production of copies of written documents and as we have seen by a previous chapter he invented the electric pen for this purpose only to improve upon it later with a more desirable device which he called the mimeograph that is in use in various forms at this time although the electric pen had a large sale and use in its time the statistics relating to it are not available the mimeograph however is and has been for many years a standard office appliance and is entitled to consideration as the total number put into use up to this time is approximately 180 thousand valued at three million five hundred thousand dollars while the annual output is in the neighborhood of 9000 machines sold for about 150 thousand dollars besides the vast quantity of special paper and supplies which its use entails in the production of the many millions of facsimile letters and documents the extent of production and sale of supplies for the mimeograph may be appreciated when it is stated that they bring annually an equivalent of three times the amount realized from sales of machines the manufacturing sale of the mimeograph does not come within the enterprises conducted under Edison's personal direction as he sold out the whole thing some years ago to Mr. A. B. Dick of Chicago in making a somewhat radical change of subject from duplicating machines to cement we find ourselves in a field in which Edison has made a most decided impression the reader has already learned that his entry into this field was in a manner accidental although logically in line with pronounced convictions of many years standing and following up the fund of knowledge gained in the magnetic or milling business from being a newcomer in the cement business his corporation in five years has grown to be the fifth largest producer in the United States with a still increasing capacity from the inception of this business there has been a steady and rapid development resulting in the production of a grand total of over 7,300,000 barrels of cement up to the present date having a value of about six million dollars exclusive of package at the time of this writing the rate of production is over 8,000 barrels of cement per day or say 2,500,000 barrels per year having an approximate selling value of a little less than two million dollars with prospects of increasing in the near future to a daily output of 10,000 barrels this enterprise is carried on by a corporation called the Edison Portland cement company in which he is very largely interested and of which he is the active head and guiding spirit had not Edison suspended the manufacture and sale of his storage battery a few years ago because he was not satisfied with it there might have been given here some noteworthy figures of an extensive business for the company's book show an astonishing number of orders that were received during the time of the shutdown he was implored for batteries but in spite of the fact that good results had been obtained from the 18,000 or 20,000 cells sold some years ago he adhered firmly to his determination to perfect them to a still higher standard before resuming and continuing their manufacturer as a regular commodity as we have noted in a previous chapter however deliveries of the perfected type were begun in the summer of 1909 and since that time the business has continued to grow in the measure indicated by the earlier experience thus far we have concerned ourselves chiefly with those figures which exhibit the extent of investment in production but there is another and humanly important side that presents itself for consideration namely the employment of a vast industrial army of men and women who earn a living through their connection with some of the arts and industries to which our narrative has direct reference to this the reader's attention will now be drawn the following figures are based upon the special reports of the census bureau 1902 and 1907 with additions computed upon the increase that has subsequently taken place in the totals following is included the compensation paid to salary officials and clerks details relating to telegraph systems are omitted taking the electric light into consideration first we find that in the central stations of the united states there are not less than an average of 50,000 persons employed requiring an aggregate yearly payroll of over 40 million dollars this does not include the 100,000 or more isolated electric light plants scattered throughout the land many of these are quite large and at least one third of them require one additional helper thus adding say 33,000 employees to the number already mentioned if we assume as low a wage as ten dollars per week for each of these helpers we must add to the foregoing an additional sum of over 17 million dollars paid annually for wages almost entirely in the isolated incandescent electric lighting field central stations and isolated plants consume over 100 million incandescent electric lamps annually and in the production of these there are engaged about 40 factories on whose payrolls appear an average of 14,000 employees earning an aggregate yearly sum of eight million dollars following the incandescent lamp we must not forget an industry exclusively arising from it and absolutely dependent upon it namely that of making fixtures for such lamps the manufacturer of which gives employment to upward of 6000 persons who annually receive at least three million seven hundred fifty thousand dollars in compensation the detailed devices of the incandescent electric lighting system also contribute a large quota to the country's wealth in the millions of dollars paid out in salaries and wages to many thousands of persons who were engaged in their manufacture the electric railways of our country show even larger figures than the lighting stations and plants as they employ on the average over 250,000 persons whose annual compensation amounts to not less than 155 million dollars in the manufacture of about 50 million dollars worth of dynamos and motors annually for central station equipment isolated plants electric railways and other purposes the manufacturers of the country employ an average of not less than 30,000 people whose yearly payroll amounts to no less to some than 20 million dollars the growth of the telephone systems of the united states also furnishes us with statistics of an analogous nature for we find that the average number of employees engaged in this industry is at least 140,000 whose annual earnings aggregate a minimum of 75 million dollars besides which the manufacturers of telephone apparatus employ over 12,000 persons to whom is paid annually about five million five hundred thousand dollars no attempt is made to include figures of collateral industries such for instance as copper which is very closely allied with the electrical arts and the great bulk of which is refined electrically the 8,000 or so motion picture theaters of the country employ no fewer than 40,000 people whose aggregate annual income amounts to not less than 37 million dollars coming out to the orange valley plant we take a drop from these figures to the comparatively modest ones which give us an average of 3,600 employees and calling for an annual payroll of about 2,250,000 dollars it must be remembered however that the sums mentioned above represent industries operated by great aggregations of capital while the orange valley plant as well as the Edison Portland cement company with an average daily number of 530 employees and over 400,000 dollars annual payroll represent in a large measure industries that are more in the nature of closely held enterprises and practically under the direction of one mind the table herewith given summarizes the figures that have been presented and affords an idea of the totals affected by the genius of this one man it is well known that many other men and many other inventions have been needed for the perfection of these arts but it is equally true that as already noted some of these industries are directly the creation of Edison which in every one of the rest his impress has been deep and significant before he began inventing only two of them were known at all as arts telegraphy and the manufacture of cement moreover these figures deal only with the United States and take no account of the development of many of the Edison inventions in Europe or of their adoption throughout the world at large let it suffice that in America alone the work of Edison has been one of the most potent factors in bringing into existence new industries now capitalized at nearly 7 billion dollars earning annually over 1 billion dollars and giving employment to an army of more than 600,000 people a single diamond prismatically flashing from its many facets the beauties of reflected light comes well within the limits of comprehension of the human mind and appeals to appreciation by the finer sensibilities but in viewing an exhibition of thousands of these beautiful gems the eye and brain are simply bewildered with the richness of a display which tends to confuse the intellect until the function of analysis comes into play and leads to more adequate apprehension so in presenting the mass of statistics contained in this chapter we fear that the result may have been the bewilderment of the reader to some extent nevertheless in writing a biography of Edison the main object is to present the facts as they are and leave it to the intelligent reader to classify apply and analyze them in such manner as appeals most forcibly to his intellectual processes if in the foregoing pages there has appeared to be a tendency to attribute to Edison the entire credit for the growth to which many of the above named great enterprises have in these latter days attained we must especially disclaim any intention of giving rise to such a deduction no one who has carefully followed the course of this narrative can deny however that Edison is the father of some of the arts and industries that have been mentioned and that as to some of the others it was the magic of his touch that helped make them practicable not only to his work and ingenuity is due the present magnitude of these arts and industries but it is attributable also to the splendid work and numerous contributions of such other great inventors such as brush bell Elihu Thompson Weston Sprague and many others as well as to the financiers and investors who in the past 30 years have furnished the vast sums of money that were necessary to exploit and push forward these enterprises the reader may have noticed in a perusal of this chapter the lack of autobiographical quotations such as have appeared in other parts of this narrative Edison's modesty has allowed us but one remark on the subject this was made by him to one of the writers a short time ago when after an interesting indulgence in reminiscences of old times and early inventions he leaned back in his chair and with a broad smile on his face said reflectively say I have been mixed up in a whole lot of things haven't I end of chapter 27 of Edison his life and inventions read by Dennis Sayers for LibriVox in Modesto California summer 2008