The anti-monopolist. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1874-1878, 1878-04-25
EDISON.
More About the Wond erful inventor and
His Inventions.

two of us. to see Edison and his won
derful inventions and make some
discoveries and sketches for the
Graphic. Menlo Park is not park.
Ii is not city. 1t is not town. 1t
is not in any way related to Mungo
Park, the great Scotch-African. AL
though it is on the Pennsylvania rail
road Gust beyond Railway. it Is not
even a stopping place, except when
the station-agent flags the train to
take on waiting passengers 1t is
composed wholly of Edison's labora-
tory and half-a-doZen houses where
his employees live. 1t is, in short,
Edisohia, and nothing else.
Just north of the track is a long.
plain, white wooden building, full of
windows and two stories high; this is
the laboratory of the Jersey Columbus
whose name has suddenly become
famous. Many telegraph wires are
festooned from it. The first floor is
occupied by scribes and bOokkeepers
in one end, and at the other some ten
or twelve skillful workers in iron,
who, at anvil and forge, lathe and
drill, are nosily engaged in making
patterns and models for the genius of
the establishment. His iron ideas,
in tangled shapes, are scattered and
piled everywhere; turning-lathes are
thickly set on the floor, and the room
is filled with the screech of the tor
tured metal.
Upstairs we climb-to room the
size of the building, with twenty
windows on sides and ends. It is
walled with shelves and bottles, like
an apothecary shop--thousands of all
sizes and colOrs. In the corner is a
cabinet organ. On benches and tables
are batteries of all descriptions,
microscopes, magnifying glasses,
crucibles, retorts, an ash-cOvered
forge, and all the apparatus of a
chemist. at table sit two earnest
men each holding alternately tomouth
and ear the mouthpiece of a tele-
phone.
"Well what are you up to to-day -
asks ana acquaintance who has saunter-
ed in.
eve have got the Chicago telephone
repeater in the circuit at last, and we
are now talking through 800 miles of
wire, viz st. Louis, Cincinnati, Louis
vile, Washington and Philadelphia
the parahOla of the west. 1t dOeSn' t
work will yet. This is the largest
circuit ever attempted, and it would
not be possible without Edison S re-
peating machine"
In the middle of the room is man
about five feet ten inches high, with
a thin face, high cheek bones, and a
long, lean neck. He would not be
picked out in Il crowd as man of
more than ordinary intelligence, and
he is the person whom buncO-steerer
would be likely to take into his con-
tidence. Time he evidently considers
too valuable to waste on personal
decoration, for his boots have not
been blackened this week, and. al
though he is ostenlsbly whiskerless.
his beard has had about five days
growth. His hair is of a chestnut
brown, and judge he cuts it himself,
for it stands up in an anxious way all
over his head, with a striking ten
dency forward, and at the crown it
Stiffly radiateS like the thOrry top
of il pineapple. There is a quid of
tobacco in his cheek. His mouth is
sensitive. the blue veins show on his
hands, and the fingers flutter as if
each had an intelligent purpose; but
the only feature that would inn
mediately attract the attention of Il
stranger as worth second look in his
keen, deep, eager gray eye, which
reveals the intensity of the man.
This is Thomas Alva Edison.
"You have turned out good many
inventions. Mr.. Edison!"
eyes, he answers" with percep-
tible Western twang in his speech,
I've made some machines; but this
is my baby" patting the speaking
photograph and taking 4 chair before
it, land expect it to grow up to be
a big fellow and support me in my
old age"
Edison showed us his dismantled
aerophone. 'Some of it started for
Europe last week" said he. land l
can't show Won how it sounds. But
here, you see. is the same tympanum
that we use in the telephone and
Photographic, we speak against this.
and its vibrations. instead of pricking
a sheet of tiu-foil. opens and closes a
valve in the steam-pipe, and thus
gives to the whistle the artlculations
of the human voice. 1t is much SIM
pier than the monograph, and its
audible speech can be heard four
miles. or even more. Twill guarantee
that it shall read the Declaration of
Independence SO that every word will
be distinctly heard by every citizen
of Manhattan Island. 1t will call out
all the stations on q railroad, and the
locomotive will go through the
country talking whatever the en-
gineer thinks it necessary to say.
Steamers can converse at sea. Light
houses can warn ships in a storm.
Fire districts can be shouted; also
information whether a fire is spread
ing or is being mastered"
II will have on exhibition at Paris.
said Edison, s'eight telephones, be-
sides my phonog, aph and aerophone. :"
ITO what uses do you expect the
phonograph will be putt he was
asked. Several" he replied.
81 For debating it will take the
place Of shorthand reporters, as thus: