Edison developed the phonograph (1877), the first practical incandescent lamp (1879) and the world's first central electrical power station (1879). At 24, he had his own company making stock market telegraph printers; in 1876 he established 'an invention factory' at Menlo Park, New Jersey and one at West Orange, New Jersey in 1887; in the same year he formed the Edison Electric Light Company; in 1880 he founded the Edison Electric Illuminating Company; in 1883 Edison and Swan United Light Co was set up after a merger with Swan United Electric Light Co.; Edison's Kinetoscope was first unveiled in May 1893; in 1894 the Edison Manufacturing Company was set up to make films for the Kinetoscope; in 1908 Edison, Biograph, Vitagraph, Essanay and Pathe formed the Motion Picture Patents Company; in 1915 the MPPC was declared illegal and dissolved; film was only a small area of Edison's interests which included electricity.
Related Objects
One of Fleming's first thermionic diode valves, 1889
One of Fleming's first thermionic diode valves, 1889
One of Fleming's first thermionic diode valves, 1889
Stock Exchange automatic telegraph, 1872-1880
Edison carbon button transmitter No. 32, 1878
Edison's electric carbon filament lamp
Very early Edison carbon filament lamp.
Photograph of an original photograph of Edison
Print, portrait: Thomas Alva Edison
