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Two decades after the American Civil War, no name was more closely
associated with the nation's inventive and entrepreneurial spirit
than that of Thomas Edison. The restless changes of those years
were reflected in the life of America's foremost inventor. Having
cemented his reputation with his electric lighting system, Edison
had decided to withdraw partially from that field. At the start of
1885, newly widowed at mid-life with three young children, he
launched into a series of personal and professional migrations,
setting in motion chains of events that would influence his work
and fundamentally reshape his life. Edison's inventive activities
took off in new directions, flowing between practical projects
(such as wireless and high-capacity telegraph systems) and
futuristic ones (exploring forms of electromagnetic energy and the
convertibility of one to another). Inside of two years, he would
travel widely, marry the daughter of a prominent industrialist and
religious educator, leave New York City for a grand home in a
sylvan suburb, and construct a winter laboratory and second home in
Florida. Edison's family and interior life are remarkably visible
at this moment; his papers include the only known diary in which he
recorded personal thoughts and events. By 1887, the familiar
rhythms of his life began to reassert themselves in his new
settings; the family faded from view as he planned, built, and
occupied a New Jersey laboratory complex befitting his status. The
eighth volume of the series, New Beginnings includes 358 documents
(chosen from among thousands) that are the most revealing and
representative of Edison's work, life, and place in American
culture in these years. Illustrated with hundreds of Edison's
drawings, these documents are further illuminated by meticulous
research on a wide range of sources, including the most recently
digitized newspapers and journals of the day.
This richly illustrated volume explores Edison's inventive and
personal pursuits from 1888 to 1889, documenting his responses to
technological, organizational, and economic challenges. Thomas A.
Edison was received at the 1889 Paris Exposition Universelle-the
World's Fair-as a conquering hero. Extravagantly feted and besieged
by well-wishers, he was seen, like Gustave Eiffel's iron tower, as
a triumphal symbol of republicanism and material progress. The
visit was a high-water mark of his international fame. Out of the
limelight, Edison worked as hard as ever. On top of his work as an
inventor, entrepreneur, and manufacturer, he created a new role as
a director of research. At his peerless laboratory in Orange, New
Jersey, he directed assistants working in parallel on multiple
projects. These included the "perfected" phonograph; a major but
little-recognized effort to make musical recordings for sale; the
start of work on motion pictures; and improvements in the recovery
of low-grade iron ore. He also pursued a public "War of the
Currents" against electrical rival George Westinghouse. Keenly
attuned to manufacturing as a way to support the laboratory
financially and control his most iconic products, Edison created a
new cluster of factories. He kept his manufacturing rights to the
phonograph while selling the underlying patents to an outside
investor in a deal he would regret. When market pressures led to
the consolidation of Edison lighting interests, he sold his
factories to the new Edison General Electric Company. These changes
disrupted his longtime personal and professional relations even as
he planned an iron-mining project that would take him to the New
Jersey wilderness for long periods. The ninth volume of the series,
Competing Interests explores Edison's inventive and personal
pursuits from 1888 to 1889, documenting his responses to
technological, organizational, and economic challenges. The book
includes 331 documents and hundreds of Edison's drawings, which are
all revealing and representative of his life and work in these
years. Essays and notes based on meticulous research in a wide
range of sources, many only recently available, provide a rich
context for the documents.
In Ten Volumes. Volume 1, The Life Of Thomas Paine; Volume 2, Early
Essays, Common Sense, The Crisis; Volume 3, The Crisis, Patriotic
Papers; Volume 4, Political Pamphlets; Volume 5, Letters And
Dissertations; Volume 6, Rights Of Man; Volume 7, Rights Of Man,
Essays; Volume 8, The Age Of Reason; Volume 9, Theological
Discussions; Volume 10, Miscellany, Poetry, And Index.
The fifth volume of "The Papers of Thomas A. Edison" covers
Edison's invention and development of the first commercial
incandescent electric light and power system. In the process he
turned his famed Menlo Park laboratory into the first true research
and development facility. This also enabled him to develop a new
telephone for the British market in the midst of his herculean
efforts on electric lighting.
In the face of daunting technical challenges and skepticism from
leading scientists and engineers, Edison and his team of
experimenters and machinists found the solution to the decades-old
problem of creating a practical incandescent lamp. By focusing on
the characteristics of the entire system Edison reconceptualized
the requirements of a successful lamp design. While rivals worked
primarily on lamps, Edison developed other parts of a complete
system as well. This approach was most notable in his revolutionary
work on generator technology, one of the highlights of this volume.
Successful exhibitions of the system in December 1879 drew crowds
to Menlo Park to witness the softly glowing lamps. These spectacles
gratified his financial backers but Edison realized the importance
of following experimental demonstrations with the hard work of
commercial development. He needed to make each component work
effectively in daily use and to improve the designs so that they
were easy to use and inexpensive to manufacture. To create a
daytime market for electricity he also developed electric motors
for a variety of uses, including electric railways, for which he
built a small demonstration line at Menlo Park. To accomplish all
this Edison greatly enlarged his staff to as many as sixty
experimenters, machinists, carpenters, and office workers. He began
manufacturing lamps at a factory in Menlo Park. At the end of 1880,
Edison was ready to move his system into commercial production and
made plans to produce other components in New York. He also invited
New York officials to a demonstration in order to win their
approval for running underground lines in lower Manhattan where he
planned to put his first commercial central station. In March 1881,
he moved to the Edison Electric Light Company's headquarters on
Fifth Avenue and began the hard work of introducing the new
electric light and power technology.
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