Thomas Edison

Thomas Edison was born on February 11, 1847, in Milan, Ohio, to Samuel Ogden Edison Jr. and Nancy Matthews Elliott, the youngest of seven children. Largely self-taught after limited formal schooling, Edison developed an early fascination with science and mechanics. By age 12, he was selling newspapers and candy on trains, later working as a telegraph operator across the Midwest. In 1869, he filed his first patent for an electric vote recorder in Newark, New Jersey. Edison's breakthrough came in the 1870s at his Menlo Park laboratory, where he invented the phonograph in 1877 and perfected the practical incandescent light bulb in 1879. He developed an entire electric power system, launching the Pearl Street Station in New York City in 1882. Edison held over 1,093 U.S. patents, covering innovations like the carbon-button transmitter for telephones, efficient generators, electric railroads, and motion-picture apparatus. As a businessman, Edison founded the Edison Electric Light Company, which evolved into Edison General Electric and merged to form General Electric in 1892. He engaged in the 'War of Currents,' championing direct current (DC) against Nikola Tesla and George Westinghouse's alternating current (AC). Edison died on October 18, 1931, at age 84, leaving a legacy of over 2,332 patents worldwide.