The daily sentinel., 1908-02-11
Today
He's g.
THE WIZARD
Of the Age Of Electricity has
a Birthday Tells How to
Live a Long and Useful Life.

Orange, N. j., Feb. 11.-Thomas
Alva Edison, the wizard of the age of
electricity, today observed his 61st
birthday. Although he has achieved
financial independence through his
hundreds of inventions, the aged
wizard is still busily engaged on
many projects which will be of the
greatest benefit to humanity. OF
late he has spent a considerable por-
tion of his time in investigating the
possibilities latent in concrete as
hoGse-bulding material, and has per-
fected machinery whereby such
houses may be nodded quickly and
in an economical manner. Several
other ideas are revolving in the fer
tile brain of the wizard and if his
life is spared for another decade it is
likely that he will again startle the
world with some revolutionary pro-
duct of his genius.
Mr.. Edison was born at Milan, o.,
February II, 1S47. He began his
business career at the age of IL as a
newsboy. When still a youth he be-
came a telegrapher and 1t was while
engaged in this occupation that he
became interested in the marvels of
electricity and commenced the career
as an inventor which has made his
The wizard attributes his long life
and the preservation of the activity
of his mental processes to the regu-
larity of his habits. He retires at
midnight and arises at $40, eats but
little and works almost necessarily
in his laboratory from s in the morn
ing until in the evening. Recently
the wizard formulated some regula-
tions for long and useful life that
may be of value to some of his fellow
Americans:
Let ME impress one all important
thing upon your mind-that is, that
you observe most rigidly the rule of
hygiene regarding careful and mod
crate eating. Fully so per cent of
the illness of mankind comes from
eating improper food or too much
food. People are inclined to over
indulge themselves in this respect
when they are spending their holi-
days. 1 have always been a light
eater, and l fully appreciate the fact
that sole purpose of food is to pre-
serve the chemical energies and keep
the human machine going.
where there Is no drain on the
system the minimum amount of food
will do. Even the Italian laborers
are able to preserve their muscular
tissue on a small amount of bread
and cheese, and they certainly work
hard.
"Then why is it necessary for the
business man to eat great quantities
of food when there Is no drain on
his system? Many business men eat
enough food to supply regiment.
They are clogging up their boilers by
doing so and will live to regret it.
Another important rule to OBJ
serve is this: Get out of bed as soon
as you open your eyes in the
morning. Don't lie in bed and wait
to see if you cannot go to sleep again.
That is foolish thing to do. Jump
out of bed and do something. any
thing. Be active and alert, get your
the activities of life the first thing |
and you will soon see that your brain |
works better.
"There Is absolutely no reason why |
we should sleep, except that our pre-
historic ancestors got into the habit |
of sleeping. and We have never brok-
en- ourselves of 1t. There is no need |
of sleep now. We can turn the dark |
ness of night into the light of day by
our electric lights, so why should |
people sleep? l believe that if we had
perpetual sunlight We would, in a
few generations, get over this bad
habit of sleeping.
"Sleep dulls the intellect. If peo-
pie would not sleep SO long we would |
develop into stronger and more In
tellectual race. 1t Is well known that |
the ant, one of the most intelligent of |
insects, does not sleep"