Thomas Edison and Modern America : An Introduction with Documents

by Collins, Theresa M.; Gitelman, Lisa

• ISBN13: 9780312294762
• ISBN10: 031229476X
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2002-06-29
• Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan

Summary

Thomas A. Edison remains rooted in the popular imagination primarily as the inventor of the practical electric light, but he also continues to function in the lexicons of advertising and politics as a symbol of American individualism, ingenuity, and know-how. Introduced here with a broad range of primary sources for discussion, the American inventor emerges as a prolific mind, a tireless worker, and an inveterate self-promoter. Examples of Edison's own experimental notes, his personal correspondence, as well as press accounts provide an opportunity to explore the themes of modernization and the American ideology of progress. The volume includes an extended introduction, headnotes to the documents, illustrations, a chronology, discussion questions, a bibliography, and an index.

Author Biography

Theresa M. Collins teaches International History at Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey. The author of Locating Otto Kahn: The Banker-Patron in Modern Time (2002), and a co-editor of the Thomas A. Edison Papers, her work is focused on business history, modernity, and cosmopolitan culture.

Lisa Gitelman teaches Media Studies at Catholic University and is a former co-editor of the Thomas A. Edison Papers. Her work includes Scripts, Grooves, and Writing Machines: Representing Technology in the Edison Era (1999) and the edited collection New Media, 1740-1915 (2002).

Table of Contents

Foreword	v
Preface	vii
List of Illustrations	xiv
Introduction: Edison, Invention, and Modernity	1	(1)
Changing Times	2	(2)
Thomas Alva Edison	4	(22)
Not Just an Idea	26	(5)
Contexts for Technological Change	31	(3)
A Note about the Text	34	(3)
An American Character	37	(26)
Edison's Early Years, as He Remembered Them, 1908-1909	38	(8)
Satirical Remarks from Edison's Only Diary, 1885	46	(3)
Edison as Suitor, 1885	49	(1)
The Site of Invention: Edison's Draft Letter to James Hood Wright, 1887	50	(2)
A ``Private Idea Book,'' 1888	52	(2)
Theodore Dreiser Interviews Edison for Success Magazine, 1898	54	(5)
``The Tomorrows of Electricity and Invention''	59	(4)
Thomas A. Edison
The Fantastic Phonograph	63	(17)
Invention of the Phonograph, as Recalled by Edison's Assistant	64	(2)
Charles Batchelor
The Phonograph Causes a Stir, March-June 1878	66	(14)
New York Times, March 25, 1878	67	(1)
New York Times, April 20, 1878	67	(2)
North American Review, June 1878	69	(6)
New York Clipper, March 16, 1878	75	(2)
Popular Science Monthly, April 1878	77	(1)
New York Daily Graphic, May 9, 1878	78	(1)
Weekly (New Jersey) Fredonian, June 18, 1878	78	(2)
Electric Light and Power	80	(48)
Edison's Sparks of Interest Noted in the New York Sun	80	(5)
New York Sun, September 10, 1878	81	(2)
New York Sun, September 16, 1878	83	(2)
Money Matters, Original Correspondence, October-December 1878	85	(6)
Edison to Theodore Puskas, October 5, 1878	85	(1)
Telegram from George Gouraud in London, to Edison, October 7, 1878	86	(1)
Edison Reply to Gouraud, October 8, 1878	86	(1)
J. P. Morgan to Walter Burns, October 30, 1878	86	(1)
Stockton Griffin to Grosvenor Lowrey, November 1, 1878	87	(1)
Grosvenor Lowrey to Edison, December 10, 1878	88	(3)
Experimental Notes, January 1879	91	(1)
Francis Upton, Letters Home, November 1878-April 1879	92	(4)
Experimental Notes, October 1879	96	(3)
Francis Upton, Letters Home, October-November 1879	99	(2)
Experimental Notes, December 1879-January 1880	101	(1)
Francis Upton, Letters Home, December 1879-January 1880	102	(2)
New York Herald, December 21, 1879	104	(8)
A Fan Letter, February 1880	112	(1)
Boehm v. Edison: Two Versions of Invention at Menlo Park, August-October 1881	113	(4)
Draft Report for Investors, September 1881	117	(8)
Notice from the Edison Company for Isolated Lighting, November 1885	125	(3)
Modern Living	128	(67)
Phonographs and the Function of Recorded Sound in Transition	129	(1)
Talking Dolls: News Items and Anecdotes (1890-1892)	129	(3)
Scientific American, April 26, 1890	129	(1)
Philadelphia Times, January 2, 1891	130	(1)
New York Morning Advertiser, March 14, 1892	131	(1)
Nickel-in-the-Slot Phonographs: News Items, Promotion, and Anecdotes (1890-1892)	132	(5)
New York Journal, November 9, 1890	132	(1)
Phonogram, Published by the North American Phonograph Company, 1891	133	(3)
St. Louis Chronicle, February 14, 1891	136	(1)
Phonogram, Published by the North American Phonograph Company, 1891	137	(1)
The Phonograph at Home: National Phonograph Company Advertisements and Notices (1905-1908)	137	(4)
Electrocution: Original Correspondence and News Items, 1887-1888, 1905	141	(1)
A. P. Southwick to Edison, November 8, 1887	142	(1)
A. P. Southwick to Edison, December 5, 1887	142	(1)
Edison to A. P. Southwick, December 19, 1887	143	(1)
New York Herald, November 1888	143	(2)
New York American, February 10, 1905	145	(1)
X-Rays: Original Correspondence and News Items, 1896-1897, 1904	146	(1)
Telegram from Edison to A. E. Kennelley, January 27, 1896	146	(1)
Jerome Carty to Edison, February 12, 1896	146	(1)
W. B. Hill to Edison, February 17, 1896	147	(1)
New York World, August 15, 1897	148	(1)
Schenectady Union, October 5, 1904	149	(2)
Storage Batteries: Press Notices and a Letter, 1899, 1902, 1912	151	(1)
New York Dry Good Economist, September 16, 1899	151	(1)
North American Reivew, July 1902	152	(1)
Edison to Irving Bloomingdale, April 16, 1912	153	(1)
Concrete Houses: News Items and Original Correspondence, 1901, 1907-1909	154	(1)
Insurance Engineering, Interview with Edison, June 1901	155	(1)
New York Herald, November 9, 1907	156	(2)
Henry Phipps to Edison, November 13, 1907	158	(1)
Edison to Henry Phipps, November 15, 1907	158	(1)
Henry Phipps to Edison, November 22, 1907	158	(1)
Grand Rapids (Michigan) Evening Press, July 9, 1909	159	(2)
Motion Pictures	161	(1)
From History of the Kinetograph, Kinetoscope, and Kineto-phonograph, 1895	161	(5)
Program for Projected Films (n.d.)	166	(1)
Media and Politics	167	(1)
Films Advertised to the Trade, 1901-1902	168	(2)
McKinley's Last Appearance	170	(1)
Ten Edison Records	171	(3)
William Jennings Bryan
Ten Edison Records	174	(3)
William Howard Taft
Mass Media and Their Markets	177	(1)
Edison's Policy for Making Records and Related Correspondence, 1912, 1914-1915	178	(4)
Policy Statement, May 11, 1912	178	(1)
Edison to Santa Fe Watch Company, November 11, 1914	179	(1)
Edison to Harger & Blish, February 8, 1915	180	(2)
Edison to F. R. Humphries, June 28, 1915	182	(1)
Five Edison Films of the Progressive Era, 1912	182	(6)
APPENDIXES
A Thomas A. Edison Chronology (1847-1931)	188	(2)
Questions for Consideration	190	(2)
Selected Bibliography	192	(3)
Index	195