The Portland daily press., 1896-06-20
ELECTRICAL DEVELOPMENT.
Enormous Growth of the Industry in
the United States.

tai Invested, MEN employed, and Other
Interesting Matter-what they Are Do
ing in England and on the Continent.
The electrical exposition just closed at
the Industrial Palace in this city says
the New York Times, W hich was visited
by thousands Of interested spectators dur
ing the four weeks of its existence, served
to draw forcibly to the mind the fact
that this youngest of mechanical indus
tries has already attained colossal proper
tions. Considering the many difficulties
that beset its path in the early days and
that have continued to hamper its devel-
opment ever since. the results achieved
are little short of miraculous.
The great majority of people not fainli-
lar with the growth of scientific knowl-
edge have the impression that all the
electrical inventions NOW in use, with
the exception of the telegraph, have been
made within the last twbnty years.
This. however, is not the case. If it
were, the path of the modern electrician
would have been strewn with roses where
as in many cases it has BEEN strewn with
thorns Electricity has been experiment
ed with to a very considerable extent for
more than hundred years, but during
the greater part of this time, even those
who were conducting the experiments,
and therefore knew the most about it.
were actually cropping in the dark. This
general public has always been i'll almost
total ignorance upon the subject. On
this account electricity has always been,
and still is to limited extent, a very
profitable field for oharlatens to ply their
vocation of fleeing the too-oonfding in
yestors.
About 1910 it became very generally
known that electricity would be used rs
a source of power. Many of the moro
enthusiastic SCIENTISTS of those days were
loud in their praises of it, claiming un-
he,itatingly that it would some day be
made to accomplish the most extraordin-
airy results-Tesulss that have not been
attained up to the present time. ana
never will be attained, simply because
they arc impossible. These men made
such statements in perfect good faith,
fully believing that they would live to
see them realized. Had they known as
much about the principles of the subject
as is known today, or known them even
few years after they made the state
ments, they would never have given voice
to such absurditiss. But quacks and
pretenders took advantage of what was
said by the wise men of the times, and
drained the pockets of many credulous
capitalists by boldly claiming that they
could accomplish the results that were
then supposed to be possible. This sort
Of deception was kept up Dy one fraud
after another for years, until the CAPT
taiists had become SO thoroughly disgust
ed and suspicious that they would no
longer take the bait. AS result of
the work of these impostors, electricity
received a black eye, and consequently,
when tie day Ct actual improvements
came, the achievements were for some
time looked upon with suspicion.
When the arc light began to be intro
duced, in the early seventies, great
many people said there WAS nothing in
it; that it was an old invention OF no
practical value. 1t is true that it was an
old invention, and, for that matter, so
was the incandescent light, the electric
motor, and the electric railway. But a II
these inventions had failed to become
practical before that tiIue, simply be-
cause there had never been means fol-
obtaining the electric current in large
quantities or at a cost that would render
the use of these devices at all economical.
The arc light in it's orudest form was
discovered about 1906 by Sir Humphrey
Dayy. The first electric motor was made
in 1889 by Pixu. The first ell ectric rail-
way was the invention of a Vermont
blacksmith, Thomas Davenport, and
was made about 1885. The first incnn-
descent lamp was made some time pre-
yious to 1910, but the first carbon fla
ment lamp appears to have been invented
by King in 1916. Thus we see that the
devices that today form the bases of one
of tine most prominent industries were
invented long ago. They failed to come
into use because they were invented
ahead of their time. II they had been
Q9V6lOp6O 10 DIS mig IL u Sttsbe Ol poII6ctlO q
then as they are now they still would not
have been used, because the cost of OBJ
tanning electricity in those Gays was SC
great as to render the use of electrical ap-
parasus prohibitory.
In 1867 the dynamo electric machine
was invented. and from that time on il
became possible to use Those devices
which had previously been impraoticable.
With the dynamo it became possible to
generate electric currents at reasona-
BILE expense, but, owing very largely to
the mistrust that had crept in to the pub
lie mind through the swindling actions
of impostors of former years, it was not
until about ten years after the invention
of this machine, OF in 1877, that any
Roadway began to be made. At that
time some of the more enterprising
showmen and storekeepers began to nse
arc lights for advertising purposes. But
they were even then rather expensive
luxury, as the best the inventors had
been able to do was to make machines
that Iioh a