The farmer and mechanic. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1877-1885, 1882-06-07

Washington, May %, 1897 me
Tom Edison, the electrician, on Pennsyl
vania avenue the other day. He had rul
down from New York to look after hi
patents, which are so numerous that tn
examiners OF the patent Office have Sc
ASIDE a certain portion of the room 70
his exclusive benefit. He looks well ane
10 just as awkward and ungainly as eve
There has been a great deal of nonscns,
written about Edison, as there always il
about every man who springs into fam,
with a bound. | think be was the mos,
unprepo.sessing boy | ever saw. Hi
appearance not only indicated the last
stages of that terrible decay known al
shabby genteel," but it went further.
One might have been pardoned fol
thinking him q tramp. l have known
him to wear a shirt two weeks without
change. Then he was never known to
spend cent and that got him into bad
odor; so finally poor Edison became a
sort Of social pariah. He got his meal,
q, the che az restaurants and lodged in
an attic. He received a salary of $40 a
month but what he did with it none of
Us could imagine. He never seemed to
have a copper and always wanted to bor-
row q quartar or SO to keep him along
until pay day. We boys thought him
misery and disliked him accordingly.
Asses that we we're! We couldn't rea-
lie that he breathed a different 2tmos-
phere from Us, and lived in an ideal
world of his " creation. Meet him
" here you would, he was always fgur-
ing industriously with pencil and paper
or gazing into vacancy with q far away
look in his dreamy eyes. He dressed
shabbily because in the world where he
lived appearances went for naught and
he had no money to spend in fashionable
dissipation for the reason that it was all
spent in experiment Is.
have said that he went 20 Boston.
There he met such men as Moses G.. Far
mer and other electricians of note, who
saw in the rapid unfolding of Lis genius
the young giant who would revolutionize
the whole system of telegraphy. and he
dad it. By means of his quadruplex in
sirument, which quadruples the working
capacity of a wire, he has enabled the
Western Union telegraph company to
meet the growing demands Of the conu-
try and at the same time to furnish better
and cheaper service by reason OF less
construction and all the expenses per-
tanning thereto. The company pays
Edison a yearly salary of S., 600 for the
option of having the first bid at any new
invention. But the privilege ends there.
If they wish to purchase they must out
bid all others.
Edison private secretary, 5. Ia. Grif-
fin, himself an old operator, once told
me how Ed" came to get married. 1t
was after he had grown rich and had
founded the small town on the Jersey
Central road known as Menlo Park. You
must know that Edison is one of the
sh,est and most bashful men living.
why don't you get marrieds' asked a
friend one day. You live alone in that
great barn of a house and your servants
steal more than they earn. Get a wife,
man, and make some poor girl happy"
Edison blushed, and while confessing he
had never thought of it. acknowledged
that the suggestion was a good one.
"But who shall | marrys" he queried
in dism2y. The friend informed him
that there were a dozen girls in his en-
pioy, any one OF whom would make him
u splendid wife. True, they were neither
the glass of fashion nor the mould of
form. but they were good honest girls,
and that after all was the main consider
alton. Well, to make a long story short,
Edison looked them all over carefully
and after selecting one, he put the ques-
ton to her plumply. 1t was his way Of
doing business, but it %astonishea the
young lady all the same. She asked time
to consider. Edison gave her a week.
When the time expired she consented.
They decided to visit the new England
states and Canada on their bridal tour.
As the carriage containing the bride and
groom drove to the railway station, it
passed Edison's laboratory. Excuse
me a few minutes" said he. II over
looked something l must attend to be
fore the train arrives" The train came
and went and 50 did several others, bat
no Edison. Finally the bride, who
understood her husbands peculiarities
and who was wlthal a good deal of a
philosopher, drove back to the house.
She didn't see Edison again for forty
eight hours. He had locked himself in
his study and in celebrating some idea
that had suddenly occurred to him be-
came obliviors e bride, honeymoon and
every thing else.