chapter25.txt

CHAPTER XXV







THE LABORATORY AT ORANGE AND THE STAFF







A LIVING interrogation-point and a born investigator



from childhood, Edison has never been without



a laboratory of some kind for upward of half a



century.







In youthful years, as already described in this book,



he became ardently interested in chemistry, and even



at the early age of twelve felt the necessity for a



special nook of his own, where he could satisfy his



unconvinced mind of the correctness or inaccuracy



of statements and experiments contained in the few



technical books then at his command.







Ordinarily he was like other normal lads of his age



--full of boyish, hearty enjoyments--but withal possessed



of an unquenchable spirit of inquiry and an



insatiable desire for knowledge. Being blessed with



a wise and discerning mother, his aspirations were



encouraged; and he was allowed a corner in her



cellar. It is fair to offer tribute here to her bravery



as well as to her wisdom, for at times she was in mortal



terror lest the precocious experimenter below



should, in his inexperience, make some awful



combination that would explode and bring down the



house in ruins on himself and the rest of the family.







Fortunately no such catastrophe happened, but



young Edison worked away in his embryonic laboratory,



satisfying his soul and incidentally depleting



his limited pocket-money to the vanishing-point. It



was, indeed, owing to this latter circumstance that in



a year or two his aspirations necessitated an increase



of revenue; and a consequent determination to earn



some money for himself led to his first real commercial



enterprise as "candy butcher" on the Grand Trunk



Railroad, already mentioned in a previous chapter.



It has also been related how his precious laboratory



was transferred to the train; how he and it were



subsequently expelled; and how it was re-established in



his home, where he continued studies and experiments



until the beginning of his career as a telegraph



operator.







The nomadic life of the next few years did not



lessen his devotion to study; but it stood seriously



in the way of satisfying the ever-present craving for



a laboratory. The lack of such a place never prevented



experimentation, however, as long as he had



a dollar in his pocket and some available "hole in



the wall." With the turning of the tide of fortune



that suddenly carried him, in New York in 1869, from



poverty to the opulence of $300 a month, he drew



nearer to a realization of his cherished ambition in



having money, place, and some time (stolen from



sleep) for more serious experimenting. Thus matters



continued until, at about the age of twenty-two,



Edison's inventions had brought him a relatively



large sum of money, and he became a very busy



manufacturer, and lessee of a large shop in Newark,



New Jersey.







Now, for the first time since leaving that boyish



laboratory in the old home at Port Huron, Edison



had a place of his own to work in, to think in; but



no one in any way acquainted with Newark as a



swarming centre of miscellaneous and multitudinous



industries would recommend it as a cloistered retreat



for brooding reverie and introspection, favorable to



creative effort. Some people revel in surroundings



of hustle and bustle, and find therein no hindrance



to great accomplishment. The electrical genius of



Newark is Edward Weston, who has thriven amid its



turmoil and there has developed his beautiful



instruments of precision; just as Brush worked out his



arc-lighting system in Cleveland; or even as Faraday,



surrounded by the din and roar of London, laid the



intellectual foundations of the whole modern science



of dynamic electricity. But Edison, though deaf,



could not make too hurried a retreat from Newark



to Menlo Park, where, as if to justify his change of



base, vital inventions soon came thick and fast, year



after year. The story of Menlo has been told in



another chapter, but the point was not emphasized



that Edison then, as later, tried hard to drop



manufacturing. He would infinitely rather be philosopher



than producer; but somehow the necessity of



manufacturing is constantly thrust back upon him by a



profound--perhaps finical--sense of dissatisfaction



with what other people make for him. The world



never saw a man more deeply and desperately convinced



that nothing in it approaches perfection. Edison



is the doctrine of evolution incarnate, applied to



mechanics. As to the removal from Newark, he may



be allowed to tell his own story: "I had a shop at



Newark in which I manufactured stock tickers and



such things. When I moved to Menlo Park I took



out only the machinery that would be necessary for



experimental purposes and left the manufacturing



machinery in the place. It consisted of many milling



machines and other tools for duplicating. I rented



this to a man who had formerly been my bookkeeper,



and who thought he could make money out of



manufacturing. There was about $10,000 worth of



machinery. He was to pay me $2000 a year for the



rent of the machinery and keep it in good order.



After I moved to Menlo Park, I was very busy with



the telephone and phonograph, and I paid no attention



to this little arrangement. About three years



afterward, it occurred to me that I had not heard at



all from the man who had rented this machinery, so



I thought I would go over to Newark and see how



things were going. When I got there, I found that



instead of being a machine shop it was a hotel! I



have since been utterly unable to find out what be



came of the man or the machinery." Such incidents



tend to justify Edison in his rather cynical remark



that he has always been able to improve machinery



much quicker than men. All the way up he has had



discouraging experiences. "One day while I was



carrying on my work in Newark, a Wall Street broker



came from the city and said he was tired of the



`Street,' and wanted to go into something real. He



said he had plenty of money. He wanted some kind



of a job to keep his mind off Wall Street. So we gave



him a job as a `mucker' in chemical experiments.



The second night he was there he could not stand the



long hours and fell asleep on a sofa. One of the boys



took a bottle of bromine and opened it under the



sofa. It floated up and produced a violent effect on



the mucous membrane. The broker was taken with



such a fit of coughing he burst a blood-vessel, and



the man who let the bromine out got away and never



came back. I suppose he thought there was going



to be a death. But the broker lived, and left the



next day; and I have never seen him since, either."



Edison tells also of another foolhardy laboratory



trick of the same kind: "Some of my assistants in



those days were very green in the business, as I did



not care whether they had had any experience or



not. I generally tried to turn them loose. One day



I got a new man, and told him to conduct a certain



experiment. He got a quart of ether and started to



boil it over a naked flame. Of course it caught fire.



The flame was about four feet in diameter and eleven



feet high. We had to call out the fire department;



and they came down and put a stream through the



window. That let all the fumes and chemicals out



and overcame the firemen; and there was the devil to



pay. Another time we experimented with a tub full of



soapy water, and put hydrogen into it to make large



bubbles. One of the boys, who was washing bottles in



the place, had read in some book that hydrogen was



explosive, so he proceeded to blow the tub up. There



was about four inches of soap in the bottom of the



tub, fourteen inches high; and he filled it with soap



bubbles up to the brim. Then he took a bamboo



fish-pole, put a piece of paper at the end, and



touched it off. It blew every window out of the



place."







Always a shrewd, observant, and kindly critic of



character, Edison tells many anecdotes of the men



who gathered around him in various capacities at



that quiet corner of New Jersey--Menlo Park--and



later at Orange, in the Llewellyn Park laboratory;



and these serve to supplement the main narrative by



throwing vivid side-lights on the whole scene. Here,



for example, is a picture drawn by Edison of a



laboratory interlude--just a bit Rabelaisian: "When



experimenting at Menlo Park we had all the way from



forty to fifty men. They worked all the time. Each



man was allowed from four to six hours' sleep. We



had a man who kept tally, and when the time came



for one to sleep, he was notified. At midnight we



had lunch brought in and served at a long table at



which the experimenters sat down. I also had an



organ which I procured from Hilbourne Roosevelt--



uncle of the ex-President--and we had a man play



this organ while we ate our lunch. During the summer-



time, after we had made something which was



successful, I used to engage a brick-sloop at Perth



Amboy and take the whole crowd down to the fishing-



banks on the Atlantic for two days. On one occasion



we got outside Sandy Hook on the banks and anchored.



A breeze came up, the sea became rough,



and a large number of the men were sick. There was



straw in the bottom of the boat...