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Essay on Thomas Alva Edison (1847-1931)
Thomas Alva Edison was born on February 11, 1847 in Milan, Ohio. With only three months of formal education he became one of the greatest inventors and industrial leaders in history. Edison obtained 1,093 United States patents, the most issued to any individual.
"Thomas Edison was more responsible than any one else for creating the modern world we know today.... No one did more too shape the physical character of modern civilization. Accordingly, he was the most influential figure of the millennium."(Beals, 1999)
The brick cottage, in which Thomas Alva Edison was born, still stands in Milan, Ohio. Its humble size and simple design serve as a constant reminder that in America, a humble beginning does not hamper the rise to success.
Even as a boy of pre-school age, "Al" Edison was extraordinarily inquisitive; he wanted to find out things for himself. The story is told of how he tried - unsuccessfully - to solve the mystery of hatching eggs by sitting on them himself, in his brother-in-law's barn. Among other tales of his youth in Milan are his narrow escape from drowning in the barge canal that ran alongside the Edison home, and his public spanking in the town square after he accidentally had set fire to his father's barn.
Surprisingly, little "Al" Edison did not learn to talk until he was almost four years old. Immediately thereafter, he began pleading with everyone he met to explain the workings of just about everything he encountered. If they said they didn't know, he would look them straight in the eye, with his deeply set and vibrant blue-green eyes, and ask them "Why?"
When he was seven years old, his family moved again; this time to Port Huron, Michigan. But, unlike their earlier migrations by wagon, the trip was made by railroad train and lake schooner.....
