The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1880-01-17 00:00:00

MR. EDISON AND HIS LABOURS
DESCRIBED.

In addition to the above, The Times of Wednesday gave
the following, from their Corretpondent at Philadelphia :

DEC. 30.
There is a strong probability that the dying year,
1879, may be looked upon by those who come after us
as having among its chief events Edison's discovery of
an electric substitute for illuminating gas. That he
has found it personal observation has convinced me,
and I have BO telegraphed you. The method of find-
ing it was an accident, though at the time he and his
assistants were making a most thorough scientific
search, This crowning glory Edison has added
to his quadruplex system of telegraphy, his
electric pen, his telephone improvements, hic
phonograph, and some others; and his shops
at Menlo-park have become a Mecca for the
curious in science and the stock speculator, all de-
siring to learn what his latest achievement is. Menlo'
park is a little station in New Jersey, on the Penns y I-
vania Railroad, twenty-four miles west of New York.
Edison has had his laboratory and workshop located
there for about four years, the place being selected
because it was far enough away from the great cities to
keep out the crowd. Probably 200 people, all told, make
up the population of the village, nearly all Edison's
workmen and their familiee. Hegets an income of 40,C00
dole. to LO,OOO dole. a 3 ear from his various inventions,
and he spends it all, the most of it for machinery and
wages, and the balance in charity. If his income
were tenfold it would go all the same. Edison is
a true scientist; he has no room in his brain for
business talent; and as he cannot say "No" any
ingenious excuse will get from him his money. Of
later years, however, he has had attached and
most devoted friends, who have looked after his
Interests and carefully watched over his affairs. I
never saw a better or more cordial relation
between master and men than exists at Menlo'
park. There is no discipline enforced or any
apparent time-table for work, yet with all hands it
seems a labour of love, and if you pick out from the
orowd the grimiest and mos.t woebegone of the whole
party of overworked alchemists it will be Edison him-
self. His appearence is just the opposite of what you
would suppose ought to be that of a scientific dis-
coverer and electrician. He looks like a short, stoutish
abourer just awakened from a sleep, whose mind is
occupied with more important matters than his toilet.
Re is partially dpaf, and very modest. Yet when he
finds that his visitor really sympathizes with him, and
is not a "professional expert' whose object is only
to criticize, he warms up into one of the most
entertaining men I ever met. Ha baton electrical

" experts " and "interviewing reporters," and has a
standing reward of 50 dole. to start the Menlo•park
graveyard with its first corpse, which he hopes may be
either the one or the other. He has not the slightest
. . . _ . ..

trace of that self-assertion which is often the a-ccom.

p- animent of succe—ss, and he looks as if he had really
worked half his life out in searching for this electric

light, and was ready to sink into acfremature grave.
He hunted it for fifteen mcnthp, an during all that
period got neither regular meals nor sleep. In fact,
the whole establishment at Menlo-park had that look.

It appears to have been the system there, as with the
alchemists of old, to do most of the work at night,
and it seems the regular habit of Edison and his
chief subordinates to work straight through the
24 hours without stopping until tired nature compels
there to drop down in any handy place and go to
sleep. He had done this when I visited him. We got
there about noon on Saturday, December 27. His wife
said she had not seen him since the morning of the day
before, and I subsequently learnt that he had been at
work all night and was then sleeping on a lounge in
his office, where he had laid down exhausted about
daylight. He came out a little later, having heard
we had come, and he went about with us for several
hours, the servants trying to persuade him, .but al-
most ineffectually, to eat something. He was too
full of his great discovery to rest or to eat, and if
enthusiasm can deserve success Edison richly metits it.

The results of the visit to Menlo park I have
already fully telegraphed you, but the cable could not
convey a description of this remarkable man, whose
confidence in his success was an great that he was not

afraid to allow us for nearly nine hours to examine

_
everything to our thorough satisfaction. He knew he
had found the means of giving the light, and that no
examination would disclose any deception, There
were three of us—Mr. Henry Bentley, the peesident of
the Philadelphia Local Telegraph Company, an asso-
ciate editor of the Philadelphia Public Ledger, and
myself—and we combined sufficient knowledge and
experience not to be imposed upon. We went
there hoping that Edison had succeeded, but
nevertheless sceptics, and we came away thorough
believers. His lamps where burning when we
arrived, and they burnt continuously until cur depar-
tare, excepting from half.past 4 to half.past 5 p.m.,
when about an hour's time was taken in putting in a,
new generator to do the work, which he had just
finished and desired to try. During the daylight we
could see the lamps burning, supplied by the first
generator, and perceived that the little carbon loop or
horseshoe giving the light remained intact. After
dark, when the second generator went to work, we
saw for three hours the lamps successfully burning as
a complete substitute for gas for every purpose for
which illumination was necessary at Menlo.park. The
gas jets were idle, being put out of use by the steadter
and more genial glow of the electric light, We ate our
supper by it in the little restaurant that has been
established at the Park, and I sat down in Edison's
office under two of his lamps attached to a gas bracket
and wrote the rough draft of the telegram sent to The
Times. In this room a telegraph operator worked in
a corner with an Edison lamp in a moveable table
stand illuminating his work. Downstairs his book-
keeper was paying off the hands by the aid of two more
electric lights on a gas bracket. Out in the roadway
in front of the building two street lamps were set up
with the Edison light in full operation. In his work-
shop the engineer was running his engine and a couple
of men watching the operation of the new generator
by the light of more Edison lamps, while in the
laboratory some fifteen of them were giving light
for various operations, and downstairs a young man
sat at the regulator and, watching another light, by the
aid of the galvanometer, kept the flame steady, just as
the regulator is worked constantly in the gas-house to
adjust the gas pressure, so that it will compensate for
turning lights on or off throughout the town. It
was between beven and eight o'clock on a dark
winter evening, and the electric light had put into
disuse both the gas jets and the petroleum lamps
that were in profusion around. I visited four
dwellings in the village and saw the Edison lamps
doing the work of illumination for all house-
hold purposes in each of them. In Edison's own
house, where he had at least a dozen of them, we
remained over half an hour, and I never shall forget
the glee with which Edison listened to the reading of
a newspaper slip, wherein an ambitious " expert " of.
feted to forfeit 100 dole, for every lamp that Edison
could keep burning over twenty minutes. The slip was
read by the light of lamps that had been burning most
of the time for at least three days, and by our personal
inspection for over twenty minutes. One could hardly
blame the unjustly badgered discoverer if he secured
that " expert's " corpse to start his graveyard with at
Menlo.park.

Knowing Edison's capabilities, in the summer of
1818 a company of capitalists set him at work to find
the electric light. He was to make it a complete
substitute for illuminating gas, to be used, measured,
and treated as nearly as might be in the same way.
They formed a corporation with 300,000 dols.
capital, in 100 dols. shares, the money to be ex-
pended in experimenting, and thus supported by
some of the shrewdest business men in New York,
Edison began his search. He made his generator,
his regulator, his meter, and his complete electric
si stern, bat he lacked the actual medium of emit-
ting the light. Nothing could be got that was
satisfactory. Platinum seemed the best, but it was
too costly, and its light too dim. Months were spent
in hunting for better supplies of platinum, and in
endeavouring to make it a successful illuminator
The laboratory is stuffed full with relics of this most
trying and unsuccessful ordeal, almost every known
chemical and every specimen of the metal from all
parts of the world being used in the search. The
prospect looked very blue, and as the over worked
and disappointed investigators become more cada-
verous, the shares sank in the markets. The 100 dela,
declined to 30 dols., when one day Edison having used
p;a00 of paper for a, light carol/J(l.ly +k.
fragments between his fingers, and suddenly thought
he would try it as a specimen of carbon. It made a far
better light than all the platinum, and had the advan-
tage of being cheaper. He discarded the platinum, and
went to work at perfecting the burnt paper, resulting
in his present little elongated horseshoe of baked card-
board placed in a vacuum within a small glass globe.
His lamp costs about 25c., of which Bc. is expended on
two little platinum clamps, which fasten the ends of
the cardboard to the wires conveying the electric
current. Just what it cost to supply the current could
be readily calculated, by estimating the cost of run-
ning the steam-engine furnishing the power for the
electric generator, and the cost of materials. The
capitalists who back Edison are very mysterious about
this but they acknowledge the cost to be very small—
much less than that of gas—and that no matter how
low gas was put, they could underbid. Edison says
that his plant will not be proportionately half as costly
as gasworks, and his formula of cost is that, if one
pound of coal will produce gas enough to run one
lamp for one hour, three pounds of coal will produce
electricity enough to run eight lamps (and, in favour-
able circumstances, ten lamps) one hour. My impres-
sion from all that I could learn was that, if furnished
in any quantity, an amount of electric light equivalent
to 1,00011. of gas could be produced for about 10 1.,
and possibly as low as 7d. Edison ran about sixty
lights on Saturday night, in different places at Menlo.
pack, each equal to 16-candle gas jet, but as steady as
the best argand burner I ever saw, and all burning at
the same time. They were all attached to a single
circuit, but each lamp could be turned on or off inde-
pendently. Two of the lamps had been in operation
ten days, the others were newer, being attached to the
circuit as fast as made. While accidents had hap-
pened to several lamps, it is noteworthy that the little
carbon horse-shoe was as durable as any part of the
lamp, and that all the accidents that did occur came
from outside sources, which broke the glass. During
all the time I was there nothing happened to any of
the lamps, though we tried all kinds of risky ex-
periments with them. He has not got the facilities
for making the lamps very rapidly, but he expects
to have 800 made in two weeks, which will be up to
the full capacity of his 80-horse power steam-engine,
and these he will put to use for every illuminating
purpose at Menlo. park. The truth is the fact of his
discovery, made about one month ago, got out before
he was actually ready for exhibition, and as the stock,
which had been down to 30 dole-, jumped by rapid
stages up to 3 500 dols per share, they all got so
excited at Menlopark that lamp-making was interfered
with. Now, having recovered their senses, they
are holding on at 5,000 dole. per share, and mak-
ing lamps with renewed activity, while as soon
as Mtnlo•park is supplied, the light is to go into
practical operation in New York city.
While I have no doubt that Edison has made a
complete satisfactory electric substitute for gas,
and that a man of his wonderful genius is sure to
improve it, yet its introduction must be a work of
long time and protracted difficulties. The occupa-
tion of the gas man has not yet gone, and for all
nt
si
hs
elsi light
efruar furnishes
ag very
ii
the
purposes of supplying heat gas is yet supreme, as
ell
e electrich ea t.
Bf
ourtc eine Cue sr:
easy to run a lamp when used for power being
equivalent to about cne-tenth of a horsepower.
Edison was running small pumps and sewing
machines with this power, and it can be made use-
ful for many small industries. The sewing machine
could at will be put on or off simply by attaching its
wires and detaching the lamp. This opens a wide
field for the daytime use of the electric current, and,
so far as cost is concerned, it would not be more than
id. for 20 hours' running of an ordinary sewing machine.
It has certainly in all its phases been a great discovery,
and it will make world-wide the fame of the modest
and somewhat uncouth, yet hard-working man of 33,
whom our exuberant American journalists are just
now fond of describing as the "Wizard of Menlo-
park."