5 Million Pages of Thomas Edison

Telegraphy, Light Bulbs, Phonograph, Motion Picture Camera, Power Stations

Thomas A. Edison (1847-1931) did not go to college and at 19 was a telegraph operator. The quadruplex telegraph was Edison's first big financial success. With the proceeds of the sale of this invention to Western Union he built an industrial research lab in 1876 at Menlo Park in Middlesex County, New Jersey. Over his life he registered 1,093 patents.¹

The Thomas A. Edison Papers Project at Rutgers University is 5 million pages of documents that chronicle the life and achievements of Thomas Alva Edison.² The Edison Papers team has produced a series of richly interactive publications.

The nature and impact of Edison’s creativity as seen in experimental notes and drawings, correspondence, legal and business records, and artifacts provides detailed insight into how Edison and his associates developed and deployed new technologies. In specific examples dealing with Edison's work in telephony and with motion pictures, the documents illustrate the role of analogy and previous experience in Edison's approach to technological problems. ³

1. Stross, Randall, and Randall E. Stross. The Wizard of Menlo Park: How Thomas Alva Edison Invented the Modern World. New York, NY, 2008.

2. Jeffrey, Thomas E. “The Thomas A. Edison Papers: Publishing the Records of an American Genius.” Journal of the Rutgers University Libraries 47, no. 1 (June 1985): 23–38.

3. Jenkins, R. V., & Nier, K. A. (1984). A Record for Invention: Thomas Edison and His Papers. IEEE Transactions on Education, Education, IEEE Transactions on, IEEE Trans. Educ, 27(4), 191–196.