Edison's Electric Light : The Art of Invention

by Friedel, Robert D.

• ISBN13: 9780801894824
• ISBN10: 0801894824
• Edition: Revised
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2010-06-08
• Publisher: Johns Hopkins Univ Pr

Summary

In September 1878, Thomas Alva Edison brashly -- and prematurely -- proclaimed his breakthrough invention of a workable electric light. That announcement was followed by many months of intense experimentation that led to the successful completion of his Pearl Street station four years later. Edison was not alone -- nor was he first -- in developing an incandescent light bulb, but his was the most successful of all competing inventions. Drawing from the documents in the Edison archives, Robert Friedel and Paul Israel explain how this came to be. They explore the process of invention through the Menlo Park notes, discussing the full range of experiments, including the testing of a host of materials, the development of such crucial tools as the world's best vacuum pump, and the construction of the first large-scale electrical generators and power distribution systems. The result is a fascinating story of excitement, risk, and competition.Revised and updated from the original 1986 edition, this definitive study of the most famous invention of America's most famous inventor is completely keyed to the printed and electronic versions of the Edison Papers, inviting the reader to explore further the remarkable original sources.

Author Biography

Robert Friedel is a professor of the history and technology of science at the University of Maryland, College Park. His most recent book is A Culture of Improvement: Technology and the Western Millennium. Paul Israel is the director and general editor of the Thomas A. Edison Papers at Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey. He is the author of Edison: A Life of Invention and the coeditor of the multivolume The Papers of Thomas A. Edison, also published by Johns Hopkins.

Table of Contents

Preface to the Johns Hopkins Edition	p. vii
"A Big Bonanza"	p. 1
"The Throes of Invention"	p. 24
The Search for a Vacuum	p. 45
"Some Difficult Requirements"	p. 48
Carbon and the Incandescent Lamp	p. 67
The Triumph of Carbon	p. 69
Who Invented the Incandescent Lamp?	p. 91
Business and Science	p. 94
The Menlo Park Mystique	p. 118
A System Complete	p. 121
Promises Fulfilled	p. 155
Afterword	p. 189
A Note from the Authors with Acknowledgments	p. 201
Notes	p. 205
Recommended Additional Reading	p. 221
Index	p. 225
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