Thomas Edison: 10 lesser-known facts about the great scientist1

Read on to find out some amazing facts about "America's greatest inventor" Thomas Alva Edison.

One of the most prolific and successful inventors ever lived, Thomas Edison is known as the person who single handedly revolutionized the field of electricity. He was also a great businessman and established the first industrial research laboratory in the world. He devoted his entire life into the scientific fields such as electric power generation, sound recording, motion pictures etc. and his major inventions include electric light bulb, automatic telegraph, phonograph, motion picture camera, carbon telephone transmitter, alkaline storage battery etc.

1. In his childhood, Edison was diagnosed with scarlet fever which almost left him deaf. He could not talk until he became 4 years old. He suffered from hearing disorder for the rest of his life but thought that this helped him to concentrate more in his works.
2. Edison did not have much formal education in his childhood. He was a curious and unrestful boy and so, his teachers could not control him at school. He left school at the age of seven and then, his mother Nancy Mathews Elliott started teaching him at home. This helped him to develop self-learning skills and read a lot of books on different topics.
3. He began his career as a telegraph operator at the age of 16. This helped him to learn a lot about electricity and telecommunications.
4. Edison was a theatre enthusiastic. He used to read Shakespeare's plays and dream of becoming an actor. But soon, he changed his mind as he was an extremely shy person.
5. He worked for 'The Associated Press' for a few weeks but could not continue due to his hearing problems.
6. The Electrographic Vote-Recorder machine was his first patented invention (in 1869). However, the machine remained unused as the politicians did not like it.
7. The tin foil phonograph was Edison's first invention in his laboratory in Menlo Park.
8. Along with the light bulb, he designed an entire system that provided electricity to many houses in America.
9. While Thomas Edison is known as the inventor of light bulb, a British inventor named Warren De La Rue had made a light bulb much before him (in 1840). However, it did not gain much popularity due to its several drawbacks.
10. It is said that he offered 50,000 dollars to Nikola Tesla to develop a device for him. And when Tesla completed the task, Edison refused to pay him by saying that it was a joke. Tesla then quit the job and the duo then went on to have a permanent clash between them.

Thomas Edison was truly an unmatchable personality. He made a world record by holding over 1000 patents to his name.