The Wizard of Menlo Park (46 page)

It seems I had:
Dyer and Martin,
Edison,
381–382.

they were pleased to discover:
Ibid., 382. On another occasion, Edison described what must have been the same incident with slightly different details—one week, rather than two weeks, passed—and drew the following lesson: “That’s the way to settle difficulties—give the people no chance to talk.” See “Edison Compares the Swiss People to the Japanese,”
NYW,
26 August 1911.

no more demands:
Edison took pleasure in circumventing the power of organized labor. A few years before this incident, when lightbulb production had depended upon the esoteric skills that only members of the Glass Blowers Trade Guild possessed, Edison had protested when the guild demanded that he reinstate the son of a local guild official, who had been fired for sleeping on the job. Edison had to give in, but he set out to obtain revenge: He put some of his lab workers to work on a secret project to develop machinery for lightbulb production that could be operated by unskilled hands. The project succeeded, and Edison no longer had to deal with the Glass Blowers Trade Guild. See Paul Kasakove, untitled reminiscences, typescript, n.d., ENHS, 12.

The Machine Works was so cramped:
Dyer and Martin,
Edison,
381.

a piece of property:
“Driven Away by Strikes,”
NYT,
24 June 1886.

The new position:
Insull,
Memoirs,
48–49.

he reorganized the office:
Samuel Insull to TAE, 5 November 1887,
PTAED,
D8736AEL.

After his first year:
Insull,
Memoirs,
51.

he berated Alfred Tate:
Samuel Insull to A. O. Tate, 4 June 1887,
PTAED,
D8736ACI.

When he noticed:
Samuel Insull to A. O. Tate, 2 September 1887,
PTAED,
D8719ABE.

In his second year:
Samuel Insull to A. O. Tate, 5 July 1888,
PTAED,
D8835ADJ.

“The large and rapid calls”:
Samuel Insull to A. O. Tate, 7 January 1888,
PTAED,
D8835AAI.

furious at new charges:
Samuel Insull to A. O. Tate, 5 July 1888,
PTAED,
D8835ADJ.

Under Insull’s management:
Insull,
Memoirs,
49.

Looking back:
Quoted in McDonald,
Insull,
27–28.

A frustrated sales agent:
W. J. Jenks to John H. Vail, 12 November 1887,
PTAED,
D8732ABP.

Edison’s longtime lieutenant:
Edward Johnson to TAE, 9 December 1887,
PTAED,
D8732ABU.

“If our patents”:
TAE to George Bliss, n.d., handwritten on back of Bliss to TAE, 12 May 1888,
PTAED,
D8805ACU.

A sample story:
“Killed By an Electric Shock,”
NYT,
7 October 1887.

When a manager:
“Killed By an Electric Shock,”
NYT,
6 December 1887.

In another incident:
“Struck Dead in a Second,”
NYT,
21 January 1887.

In April 1888:
“Death Courses Overhead,”
NYW,
17 April 1888.

An alert person:
“Street Perils,”
NYW,
16 April 1888.

The lethal potential of electricity:
The report also recommended that after execution and postmortem the body be buried in the prison cemetery, closing off the opportunity for the deceased’s friends to obtain the body and indulge in “the most drunken and beastly orgies” that traditionally followed hangings.
Report of the Commission to Investigate and Report the Most Humane and Practical Method of Carrying into Effect the Sentence of Death in Capital Cases
(Albany, N.Y.: Troy Press, 1888), 88–90.

Edison personally favored:
TAE to A. P. Southwick, 19 December 1887,
PTAED,
LB026116.

One associate suggested:
Eugene Lewis to Sherburne Eaton, 1 June 1889,
PTAED,
D8933ABD.

The
New York Times:
Untitled editorial,
NYT,
11 July 1889.

In Edison’s view:
TAE to Edward Johnson, “Notes on Distribution of Alternating Current,” 1886,
PTAED,
ME004.

no competition stood in its way:
In New Orleans, where Westinghouse, in combination with Brush, dramatically undercut Edison’s prices, Edison’s field manager told his supervisor that “they are robbing our business pretty badly, and are able to run away into districts that we at present cannot touch.” Edison’s direct-current system remained restricted to a tightly circumscribed area around the generating plant, a fact that Westinghouse’s agents happily pointed out to customers. Edison’s New Orleans manager pleaded with the home office to pay attention and to “fight them with their own weapons,” that is, with alternating current. “If we don’t wake up pretty soon to this fact, we shall suffer in the future for our negligence.” W. S. Andrews to John Vail, 12 May 1887,
PTAED,
D8732AAR.

In June 1888:
George Westinghouse Jr. to TAE, 7 June 1888,
PTAED,
D8828ABV.

Edison turned down:
TAE to George Westinghouse Jr., 12 June 1888,
PTAED,
LB026270.

He would later say:
TAE to E. D. Adams, 2 February 1889, quoted in Harold Passer,
The Electrical Manufacturers, 1875–1900
(Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1953), 174.

Stray dogs were used:
Mark Essig,
Edison and the Electric Chair: A Story of Light and Death
(New York: Walker, 2003), 143.

Edison told the
Brooklyn Citizen:
“Edison’s New Ideas,”
Brooklyn Citizen,
4 November 1888,
PTAED,
SM038071d.

Edison’s bounty offer:
Essig,
Edison and the Electric Chair,
143.

The very day:
TAE to Henry Bergh, 13 July 1888,
PTAED,
LB026273.

Henry Bergh:
Henry Bergh to TAE, 14 July 1888,
PTAED,
D8828ACI.

It had been his letter:
TAE to A. P. Southwick, 19 December 1887,
PTAED,
LB026116.

had persuaded one member:
Essig,
Edison and the Electric Chair,
118.

a new attorney who volunteered:
Ibid., 173.

What would happen:
“Edison Says It Will Kill,”
NYS,
[24 July 1889],
PTAED,
MBSB62484A;
Kemmler v. Durston
hearing, 23 July 1889,
PTAED,
QE003A0623.

George Westinghouse stepped forward:
George Westinghouse, “No Special Danger,” letter to the editor,
NYT,
13 December 1888; Harold P. Brown, “The Comparative Danger to Life of the Alternating and Continuous Electrical Currents,” 1889,
PTAED,
QE003A1016A. Brown reproduced Westinghouse’s widely circulated letter in order to rebut it, point by point.

On 11 October 1889:
“Met Death in the Wires,”
NYT,
12 October 1889.

among the witnesses:
One of the witnesses, Charles Thompson, who was a superintendent of the Brooklyn American District Telegraph Company, collapsed with “apoplexy” the next day and was in critical condition. The
New York Times
said he had been in excellent condition and “had witnessed the frightful death of Feeks, and the sight made him veryill.” “Excited by Feeks’s Death,”
NYT,
13 October 1889.

the fatal current could not be traced:
A coroner’s jury that was convened heard testimony from representatives of many companies, each pointing the finger of blame at someone else. “How Feeks Met His Death,”
NYT,
22 October 1889.

Edison did not add his support:
“Death in the Wires,”
Wilmington News,
14 October 1889,
PTAED,
SC89179B.

In October 1889, he urged:
“Edison’s Remedy,”
New York Evening Sun,
14 October 1889,
PTAED,
SC89182A.

When George Westinghouse read:
Sherburne Eaton to TAE, 7 October 1889,
PTAED,
D8954ADC.

Westinghouse decided to speak:
“Mr. Westinghouse Talks,”
NYT,
24 October 1889.

“If all things involving”:
Ibid.

seized an opportunity:
TAE, “Dangers of Electric Lighting,”
North American Review,
November 1889, 628. Edison put the disquieting image of nitroglycerin to work once again: “If a nitro-glycerin factory were being operated in the city of New York and the people desired to remove the danger, no one would suggest putting it underground.”

sixty-four people were killed:
George Westinghouse, “A Reply to Mr. Edison,”
North American Review,
December 1889, 661.

Don’t underestimate the power:
Ibid., 657.

Westinghouse also dredged up:
Ibid., 655.

Those customers who had a choice:
Ibid., 664.

As historian Mark Essig:
Essig,
Edison and the Electric Chair,
290. Essig mentions a medical-journal article from the early twentieth century to illustrate his point that Edison’s fears about electric shocks for a long while appeared to have been borne out: “A Case of Death from the Electric Current While Handling the Telephone.”

In his official biography:
Dyer and Martin,
Edison,
382.

the value of the shares:
Insull,
Memoirs,
53.

an opportunity to cash out:
“Mr. Edison Is Satisfied,”
NYT,
21 February 1892.

He wrote Villard afterward:
TAE to Henry Villard, 8 February 1890,
PTAED,
LB037198.

Iron-ore mining:
“An Iron Mine Reopened,”
NYT,
2 December 1889.

Insull wrote a colleague:
Samuel Insull to Alfred Tate, 30 July 1889,
PTAED,
LB031451, 6.

“my usefulness”:
“Mr. Edison’s Reply to Thomson-Houston Memoranda of March 23rd, 1889,” 1 April 1889,
PTAED,
HM89AAI, 6.

Edison had assumed that his laboratory:
TAE to Henry Villard, 8 February 1890,
PTAED,
LB037198.

Insull, not bothering to hide his anger:
Samuel Insull to Thomas Alva Edison, 16 July 1890,
PTAED,
D9033AAN.

Edison did not like:
Alfred Tate to Samuel Insull, 18 July 1890,
PTAED,
LB042394.

Only the warden:
“Far Worse Than Hanging,”
NYT,
7 August 1890.

One of the first individuals:
Westinghouse is not mentioned by name. The telegram was sent “to the electric-light company which has been carrying on all the opposition to electrical executions, because it was its dynamos that were being used.” “Far Worse Than Hanging.”

When asked for his reaction:
“Westinghouse Is Satisfied,”
NYT,
7 August 1890.

Shibuya Jugiro:
Many contemporaneous and secondary English-language sources mistook Shibuya’s personal name, Jugiro, for his surname.

the electric chair got another chance:
Essig,
Edison and the Electric Chair,
258–259, 263, 285.

Edison’s claim:
“As Revolting as Hanging,”
NYW,
24 June 1888.

the sales leader:
In 1891, the last year before the merger, Edison General Electric had annual sales of $10.9 million; Thomson-Houston, $10.3 million; and Westinghouse, $5 million. The difference in cost structures among the three companies can be readily seen by comparing payroll costs. Edison General Electric had 6,000 employees; Thomson-Houston, 4,000; and Westinghouse, 1,300. Passer,
Electrical Manufacturers,
150.

historian Forrest McDonald:
McDonald,
Insull,
46.

Samuel Insull appreciated:
Insull,
Memoirs,
56.

When the press asked him:
“Mr. Edison Is Satisfied.”

“I have always regretted”:
Tate,
Edison’s Open Door,
261.

Edison could say:
“Mr. Edison Is Satisfied.”

Years later, Insull said:
Insull,
Memoirs,
56.

When Edison’s own children:
Madeleine Sloane, Oral History, 1 December 1972, ENHS, Interview #1, 31; Matthew Josephson quotes correspondence he had with Charles Edison on the same point. See Josephson,
Edison,
365n.

narrowly escaped bankruptcy:
J. P. Morgan led a syndicate of bankers that supplied the cash that got the company through the worst of the crisis. Passer,
Electrical Manufacturers,
328.

CHAPTER 9. FUN

“I’m going to do something”:
Tate,
Edison’s Open Door,
278. Tate’s account is a reconstruction written many years later, and it does not provide reliable information about when it took place. The author said this conversation took place several months after the Edison General Electric merger with Thomson-Houston, but at that point Edison was already well along in building his ore-processing plant at the Ogden mine. It must have taken place earlier, perhaps shortly after the consolidation that resulted in the formation of Edison General Electric.

a laboratory notebook recorded:
Charles Mott, Journal, 25 March 1880,
PTAED,
N053:17.

bought the Ogden iron mine:
“An Iron Mine Reopened,”
NYT,
2 December 1889.

it was cheaper:
Charles Edison, Oral History, 14 April 1953, ENHS.

a five-ton chunk:
“The Edison Concentrating Works,”
Iron Age,
28 October 1897.

In the winter:
Charles Edison, Oral History, 14 April 1953, ENHS.

In the summer:
TAE to Mina Edison, 9 August 1895,
PTAED,
B037AAY.

Ambient dust:
TAE to Mina Edison, 11 August 1895,
PTAED,
B037AAZ.

It lasted five years:
Dyer and Martin,
Edison,
501.

“Darling Sweetest”:
TAE to Mina Edison, 12 August 1895,
PTAED,
B037ABA. Edison wrote “cuteist” in the original, but love letters should be spared the academic apparatus of “
sic
” superimposed.