Thomas Edison Biography

In 1887, Thomas Edison built an industrial research laboratory in West Orange, New Jersey, which was primary research laboratory for the Edison lighting companies. Edison did spend most of his time in the primary laboratory where he was supervising the development of the lighting technology and power systems. He perfected the phonograph and developed the motion picture camera and the alkaline storage battery.

Over the next 10 years, Thomas became an inventor transitioning to an industrialist and a business manager. The laboratory in West Orange was way too big and difficult for one man to manage and so Edison realized that he was not as successful as he was before in his earlier role. Thomas Edison saw that much of the future development and the perfection of his inventions were very organized and carried out by a group of mathematicians and scientists. He worked in close unstructured environments with much of help by assistants and was outspoken about his contempt for academia and corporate operations.

During the year 1890, Edison built a magnetic iron-ore processing plant in northern New Jersey that became a commercial failure. Later on, he was able to salvage the process into a better method of which he made cement. On April 23, 1896, Thomas Edison was announced to be the very first person to project a motion picture. Where he held the World's first motion screening at Koster & Bial’s Music Hall in New York City. As the automobile industry began to expand, Thomas worked on developing a suitable storage battery that could give power to an electric car. Though the gasoline-powered engine won, Edison still decided to design a battery for the self-starter on the Model T for friend and admirer Henry Ford 1912. The system was used big-time in the auto industry for decades (10 years +) Throughout WWI, The U.S government asked the inventor Thomas Edison to head the Naval Consulting Board. The Naval Consulting Board tested inventions submitted for military use.

Thomas worked on a couple of projects even the submarine detectors and gun location techniques. Because of his moral indignation towards violence, he said very clearly that he would work on the defensive weapons. He later noted “I am proud of the fact that i never invented weapons to kill” At the year of 1920, Thomas Edison was in his 80’s. Himself and his second wife named Mina did spend most of their time at the winter retreat in Fort Myers, Florida. In Florida, his friendship with Henry Ford grew and so he kept on going with working on more projects which ranged from electric trains to finding a domestic source for a natural rubber.

Patents

During Thomas’ lifetime, he has received 1,093 U.S patents and the filed an additional 500 to 600 that were unsuccessful or was abandoned. He executed his very first pantent for his Electrographic Vote-recorder on October 13, 1868 when he was just 21 years old. Edison’s last patent was for an apparatus for holding objects during the making of electroplating.