Biography of Edison

Thomas Edison Born : 1847 - 1931

He was born in Milan, Ohio in America. When he was seven, his teacher lost patience with his persistent questioning and selfish behaviour and suggested that Thomas might be mentally unstable. (Today, he would probably have been labelled as having attention deficit syndrome and given Ritalin).

His mother was not happy with this and started teaching him from home instead of sending him to school. He managed to read everything in his local library including some really difficult books like Isaac Newton's "Principia", which is so difficult, not many adults have ever read it.

He started to lose his hearing about this time, and became almost totally deaf. He felt this helped him concentrate on his inventions, and when he was offered an operation to help him hear again later in life, he refused to have it done.

Thomas Edison died On Oct. 18th, 1931 in New Jersey at age 84. On the evening of the day that he was laid to rest, people all over the world dimmed their lights in his honour.

His Inventions

• One of the first things he invented was the telegraph repeater, which meant that telegraph stations no longer had to be manned, but he didn't patent this invention, and therefore he didn't get the credit for it.
• He also invented a vote counter, to speed up counting votes, but politicians liked the delay, so they could have a rest.
• His next big invention in 1887 was the electric light bulb and the research centre that he set up to make the lightbulb, grew into General Electric Company, which is still around today.
• He also invented the first dictophone, mimeograph, and practical storage battery. Soon after, he invented the "kenetiscope" and the first silent film in 1904, and then the first talking picture in 1911.
• By the time he died, he had patents for 1093 inventions.