Thomas Alva Edison was born in Milan, Ohio, one hundred years ago. His is the story of an amazingly active and creative life. He never went to school and received all of his education from his mother, a former school teacher. When he was twelve, he got a job as a newsboy and candy butcher on a train running between Port Huron, Michigan and Detroit. In a corner of the baggage car he set up his first experimental laboratory.

Young Edison saved the life of the son of a station agent and the grateful father taught him telegraphy. This led him to Boston to work as a telegraph operator and then to New York. His passion for experiment continued and it was not long before he had invented a stock ticker for which he received forty thousand dollars.

He continued to work and experiment in other fields and in 1879 his invention of the incandescent electric lamp caused a sensation which made the world follow with keenest interest the "antics" of the young man in the chemical-stained linen duster and dilapidated slouch hat.

In all, over a thousand patents were issued to Thomas Edison, dealing with electric power distribution, the alkaline storage battery, the mimeograph, the electric pen, and microphone. He also discovered the basis for wireless telegraphy and radio, and developed new processes for cement production and the manufacture of chemicals and dyes, and the production of rubber from goldenrod.

From the book