invention of light bulb essay for class 4

Essay on How the Light Bulb Changed the World

Students are often asked to write an essay on How the Light Bulb Changed the World in their schools and colleges. And if you’re also looking for the same, we have created 100-word, 250-word, and 500-word essays on the topic.

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100 Words Essay on How the Light Bulb Changed the World

The invention of the light bulb.

The light bulb, invented by Thomas Edison in 1879, revolutionized the world. Before this, people relied on candles or gas lamps for light.

Impact on Daily Life

Light bulbs made it possible to work and read at night, increasing productivity and literacy. They also improved safety, as they are safer than candles.

Industrial Revolution

Light bulbs played a key role in the Industrial Revolution. Factories could operate 24/7, leading to increased production and economic growth.

Modern Society

Today, light bulbs are essential in homes, offices, and cities. They have truly changed the world, making life easier and brighter.

250 Words Essay on How the Light Bulb Changed the World

Impacts on productivity and economy.

Before the light bulb, productivity was largely dictated by daylight. The advent of artificial light extended the working hours, which in turn, dramatically boosted industrial productivity. It also spurred economic growth by creating new industries and jobs related to electricity and lighting.

Effects on Society and Culture

The light bulb also had profound social and cultural impacts. It led to the creation of nightlife, thus redefining social norms and cultural practices. It also democratized access to light, which was once a luxury available only to the affluent.

Contribution to Scientific Advancements

Moreover, the light bulb played a crucial role in scientific advancements. It enabled scientists to work at all hours, accelerating the pace of research and discovery. It also paved the way for the development of other electronic devices, shaping the technological landscape of the modern world.

Environmental Considerations

Despite its numerous benefits, the light bulb has also been associated with environmental issues. The excessive use of artificial light contributes to light pollution and energy consumption. Therefore, the shift towards more sustainable lighting solutions, such as LEDs, is a crucial step towards mitigating these impacts.

In conclusion, the light bulb, with its far-reaching implications on productivity, economy, society, culture, science, and environment, has indeed changed the world, demonstrating how a simple invention can have profound impacts on human civilization.

500 Words Essay on How the Light Bulb Changed the World

Introduction, the dawn of a new era: electrification.

The invention of the light bulb ushered in the era of electrification. Prior to this, people relied on natural light, candles, and oil lamps, which limited productivity to daylight hours. With the light bulb, activities could extend into the night, effectively extending the working day and boosting productivity. Furthermore, the light bulb’s invention led to the development of power grids, bringing electricity into homes and businesses, facilitating other inventions such as the radio, television, and computer.

Impacts on Social Structure

The light bulb also had profound effects on social structures. As cities began to illuminate, they became safer and more vibrant during the night. The concept of nightlife emerged, with restaurants, theaters, and social clubs thriving after dark. This shift not only changed the rhythm of life but also contributed to the advancement of culture and the arts. Moreover, the light bulb played a pivotal role in the emancipation of women. With better lighting, women could engage in reading, writing, and other forms of self-education, which played a role in the suffragette movement and the broader struggle for gender equality.

Transformation of Industries

Environmental implications.

However, the light bulb’s impact has not been entirely positive. Traditional incandescent light bulbs are energy-inefficient, converting only about 5% of the energy they consume into light, with the rest wasted as heat. This inefficiency contributes to increased energy demand and carbon emissions, exacerbating climate change. Recognizing this, scientists have developed more energy-efficient alternatives, such as LED and compact fluorescent bulbs.

In conclusion, the invention of the light bulb has deeply influenced the world, reshaping our daily lives, social structures, and industries. While it has brought about challenges, such as energy inefficiency and environmental concerns, it has also spurred innovation in the quest for more sustainable solutions. The light bulb serves as a reminder of the profound impacts that seemingly simple inventions can have on society, and the continuous need for innovation and improvement.

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Collection Inventing Entertainment: The Early Motion Pictures and Sound Recordings of the Edison Companies

Life of thomas alva edison.

One of the most famous and prolific inventors of all time, Thomas Alva Edison exerted a tremendous influence on modern life, contributing inventions such as the incandescent light bulb, the phonograph, and the motion picture camera, as well as improving the telegraph and telephone. In his 84 years, he acquired an astounding 1,093 patents. Aside from being an inventor, Edison also managed to become a successful manufacturer and businessman, marketing his inventions to the public. A myriad of business liaisons, partnerships, and corporations filled Edison's life, and legal battles over various patents and corporations were continuous. The following is only a brief sketch of an enormously active and complex life full of projects often occurring simultaneously. Several excellent biographies are readily available in local libraries to those who wish to learn more about the particulars of his life and many business ventures.

Edison's Early Years

Thomas A. Edison's forebears lived in New Jersey until their loyalty to the British crown during the American Revolution drove them to Nova Scotia, Canada. From there, later generations relocated to Ontario and fought the Americans in the War of 1812. Edison's mother, Nancy Elliott, was originally from New York until her family moved to Vienna, Canada, where she met Sam Edison, Jr., whom she later married. When Sam became involved in an unsuccessful insurrection in Ontario in the 1830s, he was forced to flee to the United States and in 1839 they made their home in Milan, Ohio.

Thomas Alva Edison was born to Sam and Nancy on February 11, 1847, in Milan, Ohio. Known as "Al" in his youth, Edison was the youngest of seven children, four of whom survived to adulthood. Edison tended to be in poor health when young.

To seek a better fortune, Sam Edison moved the family to Port Huron, Michigan, in 1854, where he worked in the lumber business.

Edison was a poor student. When a schoolmaster called Edison "addled," his furious mother took him out of the school and proceeded to teach him at home. Edison said many years later, "My mother was the making of me. She was so true, so sure of me, and I felt I had some one to live for, some one I must not disappoint." 1 At an early age, he showed a fascination for mechanical things and for chemical experiments.

In 1859, Edison took a job selling newspapers and candy on the Grand Trunk Railroad to Detroit. In the baggage car, he set up a laboratory for his chemistry experiments and a printing press, where he started the Grand Trunk Herald , the first newspaper published on a train. An accidental fire forced him to stop his experiments on board.

Around the age of twelve, Edison lost almost all his hearing. There are several theories as to what caused his hearing loss. Some attribute it to the aftereffects of scarlet fever which he had as a child. Others blame it on a conductor boxing his ears after Edison caused a fire in the baggage car, an incident which Edison claimed never happened. Edison himself blamed it on an incident in which he was grabbed by his ears and lifted to a train. He did not let his disability discourage him, however, and often treated it as an asset, since it made it easier for him to concentrate on his experiments and research. Undoubtedly, though, his deafness made him more solitary and shy in dealings with others.

Telegraph Work

In 1862, Edison rescued a three-year-old from a track where a boxcar was about to roll into him. The grateful father, J.U. MacKenzie, taught Edison railroad telegraphy as a reward. That winter, he took a job as a telegraph operator in Port Huron. In the meantime, he continued his scientific experiments on the side. Between 1863 and 1867, Edison migrated from city to city in the United States taking available telegraph jobs.

In 1868 Edison moved to Boston where he worked in the Western Union office and worked even more on his inventions. In January 1869 Edison resigned his job, intending to devote himself fulltime to inventing things. His first invention to receive a patent was the electric vote recorder, in June 1869. Daunted by politicians' reluctance to use the machine, he decided that in the future he would not waste time inventing things that no one wanted.

Edison moved to New York City in the middle of 1869. A friend, Franklin L. Pope, allowed Edison to sleep in a room at Samuel Laws' Gold Indicator Company where he was employed. When Edison managed to fix a broken machine there, he was hired to manage and improve the printer machines.

During the next period of his life, Edison became involved in multiple projects and partnerships dealing with the telegraph. In October 1869, Edison formed with Franklin L. Pope and James Ashley the organization Pope, Edison and Co. They advertised themselves as electrical engineers and constructors of electrical devices. Edison received several patents for improvements to the telegraph. The partnership merged with the Gold and Stock Telegraph Co. in 1870. Edison also established the Newark Telegraph Works in Newark, NJ, with William Unger to manufacture stock printers. He formed the American Telegraph Works to work on developing an automatic telegraph later in the year. In 1874 he began to work on a multiplex telegraphic system for Western Union, ultimately developing a quadruplex telegraph, which could send two messages simultaneously in both directions. When Edison sold his patent rights to the quadruplex to the rival Atlantic & Pacific Telegraph Co., a series of court battles followed in which Western Union won. Besides other telegraph inventions, he also developed an electric pen in 1875.

His personal life during this period also brought much change. Edison's mother died in 1871, and later that year, he married a former employee, Mary Stilwell, on Christmas Day. While Edison clearly loved his wife, their relationship was fraught with difficulties, primarily his preoccupation with work and her constant illnesses. Edison would often sleep in the lab and spent much of his time with his male colleagues. Nevertheless, their first child, Marion, was born in February 1873, followed by a son, Thomas, Jr., born on January 1876. Edison nicknamed the two "Dot" and "Dash," referring to telegraphic terms. A third child, William Leslie was born in October 1878.

Edison opened a new laboratory in Menlo Park, NJ, in 1876. This site later become known as an "invention factory," since they worked on several different inventions at any given time there. Edison would conduct numerous experiments to find answers to problems. He said, "I never quit until I get what I'm after. Negative results are just what I'm after. They are just as valuable to me as positive results." 2 Edison liked to work long hours and expected much from his employees.

In 1877, Edison worked on a telephone transmitter that greatly improved on Alexander Graham Bell's work with the telephone. His transmitter made it possible for voices to be transmitted at higer volume and with greater clarity over standard telephone lines.

Edison's experiments with the telephone and the telegraph led to his invention of the phonograph in 1877. It occurred to him that sound could be recorded as indentations on a rapidly-moving piece of paper. He eventually formulated a machine with a tinfoil-coated cylinder and a diaphragm and needle. When Edison spoke the words "Mary had a little lamb" into the mouthpiece, to his amazement the machine played the phrase back to him. The Edison Speaking Phonograph Company was established early in 1878 to market the machine, but the initial novelty value of the phonograph wore off, and Edison turned his attention elsewhere.

Edison focused on the electric light system in 1878, setting aside the phonograph for almost a decade. With the backing of financiers, The Edison Electric Light Co. was formed on November 15 to carry out experiments with electric lights and to control any patents resulting from them. In return for handing over his patents to the company, Edison received a large share of stock. Work continued into 1879, as the lab attempted not only to devise an incandescent bulb, but an entire electrical lighting system that could be supported in a city. A filament of carbonized thread proved to be the key to a long-lasting light bulb. Lamps were put in the laboratory, and many journeyed out to Menlo Park to see the new discovery. A special public exhibition at the lab was given for a multitude of amazed visitors on New Year's Eve.

Edison set up an electric light factory in East Newark in 1881, and then the following year moved his family and himself to New York and set up a laboratory there.

In order to prove its viability, the first commercial electric light system was installed on Pearl Street in the financial district of Lower Manhattan in 1882, bordering City Hall and two newspapers. Initially, only four hundred lamps were lit; a year later, there were 513 customers using 10,300 lamps. 3 Edison formed several companies to manufacture and operate the apparatus needed for the electrical lighting system: the Edison Electric Illuminating Company of New York, the Edison Machine Works, the Edison Electric Tube Company, and the Edison Lamp Works. This lighting system was also taken abroad to the Paris Lighting Exposition in 1881, the Crystal Palace in London in 1882, the coronation of the czar in Moscow, and led to the establishment of companies in several European countries.

The success of Edison's lighting system could not deter his competitors from developing their own, different methods. One result was a battle between the proponents of DC current, led by Edison, and AC current, led by George Westinghouse . Both sides attacked the limitations of each system. Edison, in particular, pointed to the use of AC current for electrocution as proof of its danger. DC current could not travel over as long a system as AC, but the AC generators were not as efficient as the ones for DC. By 1889, the invention of a device that combined an AC induction motor with a DC dynamo offered the best performance of all, and AC current became dominant. The Edison General Electric Co. merged with Thomson-Houston in 1892 to become General Electric Co., effectively removing Edison further from the electrical field of business.

An Improved Phonograph

Edison's wife, Mary, died on August 9, 1884, possibly from a brain tumor. Edison remarried to Mina Miller on February 24, 1886, and, with his wife, moved into a large mansion named Glenmont in West Orange, New Jersey. Edison's children from his first marriage were distanced from their father's new life, as Edison and Mina had their own family: Madeleine, born on 1888; Charles on 1890; and Theodore on 1898. Unlike Mary, who was sickly and often remained at home, and was also deferential to her husband's wishes, Mina was an active woman, devoting much time to community groups, social functions, and charities, as well as trying to improve her husband's often careless personal habits.

In 1887, Edison had built a new, larger laboratory in West Orange, New Jersey. The facility included a machine shop, phonograph and photograph departments, a library, and ancillary buildings for metallurgy, chemistry, woodworking, and galvanometer testings.

While Edison had neglected further work on the phonograph , others had moved forward to improve it. In particular, Chichester Bell and Charles Sumner Tainter developed an improved machine that used a wax cylinder and a floating stylus, which they called a graphophone. They sent representatives to Edison to discuss a possible partnership on the machine, but Edison refused to collaborate with them, feeling that the phonograph was his invention alone. With this competition, Edison was stirred into action and resumed his work on the phonograph in 1887. Edison eventually adopted methods similar to Bell and Tainter's in his own phonograph.

The phonograph was initially marketed as a business dictation machine. Entrepreneur Jesse H. Lippincott acquired control of most of the phonograph companies, including Edison's, and set up the North American Phonograph Co. in 1888. The business did not prove profitable, and when Lippincott fell ill, Edison took over the management. In 1894, the North American Phonograph Co. went into bankruptcy, a move which allowed Edison to buy back the rights to his invention. In 1896, Edison started the National Phonograph Co. with the intent of making phonographs for home amusement. Over the years, Edison made improvements to the phonograph and to the cylinders which were played on them, the early ones being made of wax. Edison introduced an unbreakable cylinder record, named the Blue Amberol, at roughly the same time he entered the disc phonograph market in 1912. The introduction of an Edison disc was in reaction to the overwhelming popularity of discs on the market in contrast to cylinders. Touted as being superior to the competition's records, the Edison discs were designed to be played only on Edison phonographs, and were cut laterally as opposed to vertically. The success of the Edison phonograph business, though, was always hampered by the company's reputation of choosing lower-quality recording acts. In the 1920s, competition from radio caused business to sour, and the Edison disc business ceased production in 1929.

Other Ventures: Ore-milling and Cement

Another Edison interest was an ore-milling process that would extract various metals from ore. In 1881, he formed the Edison Ore-Milling Co., but the venture proved fruitless as there was no market for it. In 1887, he returned to the project, thinking that his process could help the mostly depleted Eastern mines compete with the Western ones. In 1889, the New Jersey and Pennsylvania Concentrating Works was formed, and Edison became absorbed by its operations and began to spend much time away from home at the mines in Ogdensburg, New Jersey. Although he invested much money and time into this project, it proved unsuccessful when the market went down and additional sources of ore in the Midwest were found.

Edison also became involved in promoting the use of cement and formed the Edison Portland Cement Co. in 1899. He tried to promote widespread use of cement for the construction of low-cost homes and envisioned alternative uses for concrete in the manufacture of phonographs, furniture, refrigerators, and pianos. Unfortunately, Edison was ahead of his time with these ideas, as widespread use of concrete proved economically unfeasible at that time.

Motion Pictures

In 1888, Edison met Eadweard Muybridge at West Orange and viewed Muybridge's zoopraxiscope. This machine used a circular disc with still photographs of the successive phases of movement around the circumference to recreate the illusion of movement. Edison declined to work with Muybridge on the device and decided to work on his own motion picture camera at his laboratory. As Edison put it in a caveat written the same year, "I am experimenting upon an instrument which does for the eye what the phonograph does for the ear." 4

The task of inventing the machine fell to Edison's associate William K. L. Dickson. Dickson initially experimented with a cylinder-based device for recording images, before turning to a celluloid strip. In October of 1889, Dickson greeted Edison's return from Paris with a new device that projected pictures and contained sound. After more work, patent applications were made in 1891 for a motion picture camera, called a Kinetograph, and a Kinetoscope, a motion picture peephole viewer.

Kinetoscope parlors opened in New York and soon spread to other major cities during 1894. In 1893, a motion picture studio, later dubbed the Black Maria (the slang name for a police paddy wagon which the studio resembled), was opened at the West Orange complex. Short films were produced using variety acts of the day. Edison was reluctant to develop a motion picture projector, feeling that more profit was to be made with the peephole viewers.

When Dickson aided competitors on developing another peephole motion picture device and the eidoloscope projection system, later to develop into the Mutoscope, he was fired. Dickson went on to form the American Mutoscope Co. along with Harry Marvin, Herman Casler, and Elias Koopman. Edison subsequently adopted a projector developed by Thomas Armat and Charles Francis Jenkins and re-named it the Vitascope and marketed it under his name. The Vitascope premiered on April 23, 1896, to great acclaim.

Competition from other motion picture companies soon created heated legal battles between them and Edison over patents. Edison sued many companies for infringement. In 1909, the formation of the Motion Picture Patents Co. brought a degree of cooperation to the various companies who were given licenses in 1909, but in 1915, the courts found the company to be an unfair monopoly.

In 1913, Edison experimented with synchronizing sound to film. A Kinetophone was developed by his laboratory which synchronized sound on a phonograph cylinder to the picture on a screen. Although this initially brought interest, the system was far from perfect and disappeared by 1915. By 1918, Edison ended his involvement in the motion picture field.

Edison's Later Years

In 1911, Edison's companies were re-organized into Thomas A. Edison, Inc. As the organization became more diversified and structured, Edison became less involved in the day-to-day operations, although he still had some decision-making authority. The goals of the organization became more to maintain market viability than to produce new inventions frequently.

A fire broke out at the West Orange laboratory in 1914, destroying 13 buildings. Although the loss was great, Edison spearheaded the rebuilding of the lot.

When Europe became involved in World War I, Edison advised preparedness, and felt that technology would be the future of war. He was named head of the Naval Consulting Board in 1915, an attempt by the government to bring science into its defense program. Although mainly an advisory board, it was instrumental in the formation of a laboratory for the Navy which opened in 1923, although several of Edison's suggestions on the matter were disregarded. During the war, Edison spent much of his time doing naval research, in particular working on submarine detection, but he felt that the navy was not receptive to many of his inventions and suggestions.

In the 1920s, Edison's health became worse, and he began to spend more time at home with his wife. His relationship with his children was distant, although Charles was president of Thomas A. Edison, Inc. While Edison continued to experiment at home, he could not perform some experiments that he wanted to at his West Orange laboratory because the board would not approve them. One project that held his fascination during this period was the search for an alternative to rubber.

Henry Ford, an admirer and friend of Edison's, reconstructed Edison's invention factory as a museum at Greenfield Village, Michigan, which opened during the 50th anniversary of Edison's electric light in 1929. The main celebration for Light's Golden Jubilee, co-hosted by Ford and General Electric, took place in Dearborn along with a huge celebratory dinner in Edison's honor attended by notables such as President Hoover, John D. Rockefeller, Jr., George Eastman, Marie Curie, and Orville Wright. Edison's health, however, had declined to the point that he could not stay for the entire ceremony.

For his last two years, a series of ailments caused his health to decline even more until he lapsed into a coma on October 14, 1931. He died on October 18, 1931, at his estate, Glenmont, in West Orange, New Jersey.

• Martin V. Melosi, Thomas A. Edison and the Modernization of America , (Glenview, Illinois: Scott, Foresman/Little, Brown Higher Education, 1990) p. 8. [ Return to text ]
• Poster for Thomas A. Edison 150th Anniversary, 1847-1997, United States Department of the Interior, National Park Service, Edison National Historic Site, West Orange, New Jersey. [ Return to text ]
• Melosi, p. 73. [ Return to text ]
• Matthew Josephson, Edison: A Biography , (New York: John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 1959) p. 386. [ Return to text ]

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Thomas Edison: How the light bulb changed everything

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A new Hollywood movie opened over the weekend, called "The Current War." The movie tells the dramatic story of the cutthroat race between electricity titans Thomas Edison and George Westinghouse to determine whose electrical system would power the modern world.

The invention of the incandescent light bulb had an enormous effect on American society and historian Ernest Freeberg of the University of Tennessee wrote a book about it called "The Age of Edison: Electric Light and the Invention of Modern America."

He explores how and why the light bulb changed nearly everything about American life, economy, society, architecture, sports, entertainment and health.

Ernest Freeberg spoke at the Minnesota Historical Society’s “History Forum” on Feb. 14, 2015.

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Important Facts About Thomas Edison & the Invention of the Light Bulb

How Has the Incandescent Lightbulb Changed Over the Years?

Since the dawn of human history, moonlight, candles and lanterns provided the only illumination. During the first half of the 19th century, gas lighting developed and flourished. Unfortunately, gas produced a flickering light that burned down theaters and homes worldwide. Electric arc lighting, invented in 1809, was much safer but far too bright for use in a small area. A smaller light was needed, and in 1880 Thomas Edison patented the first commercially viable incandescent light bulb.

Thomas Edison

Born in Milan, Ohio February 11, 1847, Thomas Alva Edison credited his mother for the success of his ever-inquisitive mind, once saying, "My mother was the making of me. She understood me; she let me follow my bent." Edison worked as a newspaper carrier and telegrapher, but invention was his calling. From his childhood hobby of chemical experimentation to becoming a legendary inventor, he constantly tinkered with new and better ways of doing things. He patented his first invention, an electric voting machine, in 1868. From there he filed patents for the phonograph, motion picture camera, advances in telephone technology and over a thousand other inventions.

Light Bulb Pioneers

Thomas Edison did not invent the incandescent light bulb. Twenty three different light bulbs were developed before Edison's. The principle was to pass an electric current through a filament powerful enough to cause it to glow without combusting. Among the pre-Edison pioneers of electric lighting, Sir Humphrey Davy created the first electric arc lamp in 1809. Warren De la Rue designed the first incandescent light in 1820. La Rue's design depended on a platinum filament, far too expensive for any practical application. Over half a century of experimentation focused primarily on finding an inexpensive filament that could produce electric light for any useful length of time.

Edison's Experiments

Thomas Edison and his lab associates, called "Muckers," conducted thousands of experiments to develop the electric light bulb. To make it functional, each step required the invention of a new component, from vacuumed and sealed glass bulbs to switches, special types of wire and meters. Like previous efforts, the greatest challenge was coming up with a material that could serve as a long-lasting filament. After testing thousands of materials, including over 6,000 types of plant growths, they found the best substance was carbonized cotton thread.

The Final Product

Edison was able to produce over 13 continuous hours of light with the cotton thread filament, and filed his first light bulb patent on January 27, 1880. Later, he and his researchers found that the ideal filament substance was carbonized bamboo, which produced over 1,200 hours of continuous light. The first large-scale test of Edison's lights occurred September 4, 1882 when 25 buildings in New York City's financial district were illuminated.

"The electric light has caused me the greatest amount of study and has required the most elaborate experiments," Edison later wrote. "I was never myself discouraged, or inclined to be hopeless of success. I cannot say the same for all my associates."

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• The Franklin Institute: Edison's Lightbulb
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• Edison Muckers: Thomas Edison Lightbulb
• The Idea Finder: Light Bulb

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Thomas Alva Edison

Thomas Alva Edison, being one of the most creative inventors of all time, was considered a true gem in the world of inventions. He also spent a significant part of his life giving contributions to the world of designs that had an incredible influence on modern life. The creation of the incandescent light bulb, the phonograph, and the motion picture camera, as well as improving the workings of telegraph and the telephone, were some of his astonishing inventions. Thomas Alva Edison was also a successful businessman and innovator who managed to change the lifestyle of people through his essential innovations and improvements in a wide range of fields.

Table of Contents

About thomas alva edison, education, career and achievements, the invention of the light bulb, the phonograph.

• Edison’s Contribution in the Field of Electricity

Thomas Alva Edison was the phenomenal American inventor who holds the world-record of 1093 patents. Also, he created the world’s first industrial research laboratory. Edison was born on 11th February 1847, in Milan, Ohio – U.S.

Edison’s patents and numerous inventions contributed significantly to mass communications and telecommunications. Stock ticker, phonograph, the practical electric light bulb , motion picture camera, mechanical vote recorder and a battery for the electric car were some of his notable inventions.

He sold newspapers to passengers traveling along the Grand Trunk Railroad line during his early years. This led him to start his own newspaper named as the ‘Grand Trunk Herald’. The access to up-to-date information in this newspaper became quite a hit between the masses. Also, it was the first of the many more to come business ventures by Edison.

• Thomas Alva Edison always had a thrust of knowledge within him, and due to that, at an early age, he started reading a wide range of books and different subjects. 
• Edison’s higher education did not include any university or attending college; instead, he was primarily self-taught. 
• The absence of a well-defined curriculum led him to develop the skill of self-education and independent learning, which remained with him all his life.
• He began his career as an inventor when he moved to New York. 
• He devoted the decade of the 1870s to conducting experiments on the telephone, phonograph, electric railway, electric lighting, and other developing inventions. 
• His first round of fame was brought by the design of the phonograph in 1877, which took his status to greater heights. 
• He formed Edison Electric Light Company in 1878 in New York City.
• Achievement:
• He was felicitated with several awards and medals for his generous contribution to humankind. 
• Some of them include the Distinguished Service Medal by the U.S. Navy and Congressional Gold Medal by the U.S. Also, he was decorated with the  “Officer of the Legion of Honour”  by France. 
• He was welcomed into the New Jersey Hall of Fame and Entrepreneur Walk of Fame.

The greatest challenge faced by Thomas Alva Edison was to develop a practical luminous, electric light. He accomplished this using lower current electricity , an improved vacuum inside the globe and a small carbonized filament which is a stitched thread that burned for thirteen and a half hours. He was successful in producing a reliable, long-lasting source of light.

Did Edison really invent the light bulb?

The tinfoil Phonograph was Thomas Edison’s first greatest invention in 1877. It was the first machine to record and play a person’s voice. Edison recited the rhyme “Mary Had a Little Lamb” on a tin cylinder that captured the recording.

He also recommended other uses for the phonograph, such as letter writing and dictation, record music boxes, etc. Edison’s device phonograph played using cylinders rather than discs. It consisted of two needles, one for recording and one for playback.

Edison’s contribution in the field of electricity

A system of conductors , meters, current switches, etc. was designed by Edison as he knew that his light bulb invention would be ineffective without a proper method to deliver electricity. Edison improved the designs of generators, which led him to invent more efficient power output generators than the existing ones at that time. Hence, this was marked as the beginning of the electric age.

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Frequently Asked Questions

Name some of the incredible inventions of thomas alva edison..

Thomas Alva Edison is famous for his incredible inventions like the light bulb, phonograph and motion picture cameras.

How did Thomas Alva Edison invent the lightbulb?

Edison invented the light bulb by passing electricity through a thin platinum filament packed inside a glass vacuum bulb.

What is a filament?

A filament is a metallic thin wire or thread inside a bulb that lights up when electricity is passed through it.

What is a phonograph?

It is a form of gramophone using cylinders to record and reproduce sounds.

How many times did Thomas Alva Edison fail while inventing the light bulb?

Thomas Alva Edison made 1000 unsuccessful attempts before getting the final result.

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Home — Essay Samples — Science — Invention — History of Electricity: How the Light Bulb Changed the World

History of Electricity: How The Light Bulb Changed The World

• Categories: Invention Light

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Words: 1040 |

Published: Nov 16, 2018

Words: 1040 | Pages: 2 | 6 min read

Works Cited

• A Brief History of Lighting. (n.d.). Edison Tech Center.
• Gas lighting. (n.d.). Environmental Health and Safety.
• Kalinowski, A. (n.d.). The impact of the light bulb on society. Small Business. https://smallbusiness.chron.com/impact-light-bulb-society-4933.html
• Palermo, E. (2017, October 20). How Edison invented the light bulb — and lots of myths about himself. Live Science.
• The Practical Incandescent Light Bulb. (n.d.). The Franklin Institute. https://www.fi.edu/history-resources/practical-incandescent-light-bulb
• Adams, S. (2018, February 9). How LED light bulbs work. Digital Trends.
• Edison, T. A. (1879). United States Patent Office Patent No. 223,898: Electric Lamp.
• Jakle, J. A. (1999). The history of the American streetlight, 1789-1975. University of Texas Press.
• Schivelbusch, W. (1988). Disenchanted night: The industrialization of light in the nineteenth century. University of California Press.
• Wilson, R. (2019, March 7). 15 innovations that shaped the modern world. BBC. https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20190306-15-innovations-that-shaped-the-modern-world

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How Edison Invented the Light Bulb — And Lots of Myths About Himself

T he electric light wasn’t Thomas Edison’s first invention, nor was he the first to create an alternative to gaslight. Electric lights already existed on a streetlight scale when, on this day in 1879, Edison tested the one he’s famous for. Though he didn’t come up with the whole concept, his light bulb was the first that proved practical, and affordable, for home illumination. The trick had been choosing a filament that would be durable but inexpensive, and the team at Edison’s “invention factory” in Menlo Park, New Jersey, tested more than 6,000 possible materials before finding one that fit the bill: carbonized bamboo.

Edison bragged about the filament’s efficacy and economy to a New York Times reporter who toured the factory just after his successful test run:

“As there is no oxygen to burn,” said Mr. Edison, “you can readily see that this piece of carbon will last an ordinary life-time. It has the property of resisting the heat of the current of electricity, while at the same time it becomes incandescent, and gives out one of the most brilliant lights which the world has ever seen. The cost of preparing one of these little horse-shoes of carbon is about 1 cent, and the entire lamp will cost not more than 25 cents.”

While Edison considered the invention his “crowning triumph,” it joined the long list of contributions that made him a record-holder for sheer number of U.S. patents — 1,093 — until the 21st century. His creations included the movie camera and the microphone, the phonograph and the mimeograph, the stock ticker and even the “ stencil-pen ,” a precursor to the tattoo gun.

And although his accomplishments spoke for themselves, Edison was equally prolific, and ambitious, in inventing myths to boost his reputation as a larger-than-life innovator, as a 1979 TIME profile notes. As a result, his inventions weren’t just scientific discoveries, but also prevarications. For one thing, he often claimed to be entirely self-taught, having never attended a day of school.

“Untrue,” says TIME. “He had at least three years of formal education as a child — a stint that was not unusually short in the rural Ohio and Michigan of his youth. As a budding inventor, he also attended classes in chemistry at New York City’s Cooper Union after realizing that his self-taught knowledge of that science was inadequate.”

He also boasted of never needing more than three hours of sleep a night. That’s a half-truth, although the full story may be even more impressive: He managed to piece together a full night’s rest by napping artfully throughout the day. Per TIME:

When the Ford Motor Co. archives were opened in 1951, researchers found many pictures of Henry Ford and his pal Edison in laboratories, at meetings and on outings. In some of these photos, Ford seemed attentive and alert, but Edison could be seen asleep — on a bench, in a chair, on the grass. His secret weapon was the catnap, and he elevated it to an art. Recalled one of his associates: ‘His genius for sleep equaled his genius for invention. He could go to sleep any where, any time, on anything.’

Read TIME’s piece on the 100th birthday of the light bulb, here in the archives : The Quintessential Innovator

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How Edison Invented the Light Bulb

Thomas Edison didn’t “invent” electricity. But he did find a way to make electric lighting available to the masses. 

6:35 · Technology

In 1878, Edison accompanied a scientific expedition to Wyoming to view a total eclipse of the Sun. He also wanted to use his newly invented tasimeter to measure the heat from the Sun’s corona during the eclipse. Edison became inspired by talks with fellow scientists. He said that he would invent a safe, inexpensive electric light.

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Thomas Alva Edison Biography

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Thomas Alva Edison, who has been deemed one of the most remarkable inventors in history, created significant impacts on contemporary life. Edison’s work led to the invention of many things like the incandescent light bulb, the phonograph, and the motion picture camera, which revolutionized society. He also expanded the use of the telegraph and telephone systems. Apart from being a profoundly skilled practitioner and inventor, Edison was also a highly successful businessman who changed people’s lifestyles with his essential inventions and improvements in numerous spheres.

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Thomas Alva Edison Biography in English

Thomas Alva Edison is another American inventor that has a record of 1093 patents in the world. He also established the world’s first industrial research laboratory. Edison was born on February 11, 1847 to Milan Ohio, United States of America. He was born and raised in Milan, Port Huron, and Middlesex County in New Jersey.

Among the many patents and inventions made by the Edison were considered those useful in the fields of mass communications and telecommunications. For that, he has invented the stock ticker, phonograph, practical Electric Light Bulb, motion picture camera, mechanical vote recorder, and a battery of the electric car.

Edison at a young age sold newspapers to people inside trains that were plying the Grand trunks Railroad. This convinced him to establish a personal newspaper known as the ‘Grand Trunk Herald’. Newspaper was thus popular for bringing the latest news to the people; this incident marked the beginning of Edison’s career in business.

Also Check: List of Biographies

Thomas Alva Edison Education

Thomas Alva Edison can be said to have undergone a rather peculiar education compared to his peers. Here are some key points about Thomas Edison educational background-

• Edison did not attend school regularly for a few months. He attended the public school of Port Huron in Michigan but his teachers thought he was overactive and constantly fidgeted. As a result, most of his formal education lasted for approximately 12 weeks.
• The brief period that Edison spent in public school did not leave any positive impact in his life and hence his mother Nancy Elliott Edison ensured he got his education at home. She was a former school teacher and identified his distinct style of learning and his quriousity. She advised them to read as much books as they could and read about specific topics that interested them.
• In general Edison was a mainly self-taught individual. He was a bookworm and could be found for long hours in the library reading books of science and technology among other area of interest. His favorite subjects were mechanics and chemistry related subjects which provided a good ground for his future invention.
• There was a considerable amount of Edison’s applied learning from work experience. Among other things he sold newspapers and candies on trains at a young age. Then he equipped a small baggage car as a laboratory and started to conduct experiments. His work as a telegraph operator also raised his technical proficiency as well as his knowledge concerning electrical mechanisms that were later of much importance to him.

Thomas Edison education is an example of how practical approach to learning and self-education can enrich a person’s knowledge and be extremely valuable, especially for those who are interested in anything and can learn everything by themselves.

Thomas Alva Edison Inventions

Thomas Edison was a very creative person and a great inventor who developed many things that are very important for modern technologies and for the industry in general. Here are some of thomas edison inventions:

Phonograph (1877)

• The first device that was able to both record and reproduce sound was the phonograph. It could be argued that Edison’s invention changed the whole music industry and people’s attitude toward sound content.
• This invention gave rise to the music recording sector and subsequent Audio playback technologies.

Edison Incandescent Electric Lamp (Electric Light Bulb) (1879)

• Edison is not the inventor of the first light bulb but he was responsible for creating the first commercially viable incandescent light bulb which could burn for up to 1200 hours.
• Edison’s light bulb paved the way for numerous light bulbs to be used for lighting houses and factories instead of gas and oil lamps.

Carbon Microphone (1877-1878)

• The carbon microphone enhanced the sound quality and increased the distance over which voice signals could be conveyed through telephones. Many believed that it became an important element in the early telephone system.
• This invention significantly improved the general telephone communication and was employed in telephones for over a century.

Motion Picture Camera (Kinetoscope, 1891)

• The Kinetoscope is one of the first types of machines that were used to view movies. He invented the magic lantern which was the forerunner to the later film projector.
• The motion picture camera provides a stepping stone that would lead to the growth of cinema which is the film industry.

Alkaline Storage Battery (1901)

• Edison created a type of alkaline storage battery that was more powerful and long lasting, and was mostly used in cars, some other machinery that depended on electricity for movement.
• His contribution to the field was in the development of batteries which have now been improved and are still used in modern technology.

Thomas Alva Edison Career

Thomas Edison started his long career as an inventor in the new york city. During the 1870s, he was actively engaged in other experiments using different technologies that were being invented at the time such as the telephone, phonograph, electric railway, and electric lighting.

The phonograph was the first significant innovation created by the company and marked Edison’s first success in 1877 as well as bringing the inventor to fame. 1878 saw him form the Edison Electric Light Company in the New York City to give him a stronger footing as one of the great innovators of his times.

Thomas Alva Edison Achievements

He was honoured with many awards and medals because of his majör contributions to humanity. Of these, the U. S. Navy awarded him the Distinguished Service Medal, and the U. S. Congress awarded him the Congressional Gold Medal. He also received the award of the Officer of the Legion of Honour by France. He has also been included in the New Jersey Hall of Fame and the Entrepreneur Walk of Fame.

FAQs on Thomas Alva Edison Biography

What is thomas edison famous for.

Thomas Edison is famous for his numerous inventions, including the phonograph, the practical electric light bulb, and the motion picture camera, significantly impacting modern technology and industry.

How many times did Thomas fail the light bulb?

Thomas Edison reportedly failed around 1,000 times before successfully inventing the practical electric light bulb, illustrating his perseverance and dedication.

How old was Thomas Edison when he invented?

Thomas Edison was 22 years old when he patented his first invention, the electric vote recorder, in 1869.

What was Thomas Edison's first invention?

Thomas Edison's first patented invention was the electric vote recorder, designed to speed up the voting process in legislative bodies.

When did Thomas Edison die?

Thomas Edison died on October 18, 1931, at the age of 84.

Where was Thomas Edison born?

Thomas Edison was born in Milan, Ohio, USA, on February 11, 1847.

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The Impact of Light Bulbs on Society

What was the Impact of Light Bulbs on Society?

The invention of the incandescent light bulb is often seen as a major historical American milestone. This landmark product, first appearing in the late 1800s, helped revolutionize human society and spur further advancements. The societal impact of the light bulb is multi-tiered, but it can most succinctly be expressed in terms of work, leisure, and safety.

Thomas Edison’s invention of the electric light helped inspire inventors everywhere in the 19th century to create new, revolutionary products to help American society be better off. As a shift from oil lamps and gas lighting, the incandescent lamp or light bulb led to many further adaptations of light products, like LED bulbs and LED lighting in the future, less energy usage, educational tactics on lighting lumens and many more new technologies. This new artificial light source allowed compact fluorescent light bulbs to be made with carbon filaments and light-emitting diodes.

Edison’s light bulb allowed a whole Department of Energy to be created throughout the country as well, with uses of electric generators, electric light bulbs, halogen bulbs, vacuum pumps, fluorescent lamps, phonographs, and whole lighting systems to be used into the future. These original bulbs were especially important around the time of the World Wars when they were needed as sources of light in power plants and factories that needed general electric to operate and create war products.

Lighting technologies have surely changed since this original invention and history of the light bulb, especially as more new and improved products make their way into society like in New York City and other populated areas. Lights even have different categorizations for color needs, like swan, tesla and tungsten.

The invention of the light bulb was just one step in a multitude of changes that happened as a result of the light bulbs creation. While this invention led to energy-efficient lighting tactics in the time, it also led to major changes to society within the Industrial Revolution.

Working Hours

One of the most notable impacts of the light bulb was that it made longer work hours possible. While a longer work week often meant abuse of the working class, increased nighttime productivity helped spur industrial advancements. Workday activities were also changed within these new hours, as workers had more time to complete tasks on the job.

Workplace Safety

Increased luminescence in the workplace helped make it easier for laborers to see potential workplace hazards. While safety standards were admittedly poor in the late 1800s, the light bulb did help make moderate improvements.

Home Safety

Candles and oil-based lamps were dangerous fire hazards, leading to many yearly deaths. The light bulb made for a safer nighttime home environment. This invention allowed for lifespans to be increased due to the reduction of home hazards and emissions within previous light sources.

Leisure Hours

While many people found themselves working later, they also found that increased nighttime luminosity made it possible to enjoy leisure activities late into the night.

Leisure Activities

Prior to the light bulb, electricity was mainly used in industrial centers. With the light bulb, many homes installed electric outlets; the light bulb made it possible for electric radios, televisions and eventually video game systems to enter the home.

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The Genesis of Illumination

Replacing Gaslight: A Technological Revolution

The enduring legacy, a world shaped by light.

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• Library of Congress - Digital Collections - Life of Thomas Alva Edison
• Lemelson Center for the Study of Invention and Innovation - Thomas Edison's Inventive Life
• National Park Service - Biography of Thomas Edison
• National Academy of Sciences - Biographical Memoirs - "Thomas Alva Edison"
• Energy.gov - Top 8 Things You Didn’t Know About Thomas Alva Edison
• The Franklin Institute - Case Files: Thomas A. Edison
• Official Site of Edison Innovation Foundation
• The National Museum of American History - Lighting A Revolution - Lamp Inventors 1880-1940: Carbon Filament Incandescent
• American Chemical Society - Biography of Thomas Edison
• Thomas Edison - Children's Encyclopedia (Ages 8-11)
• Thomas Edison - Student Encyclopedia (Ages 11 and up)
• Table Of Contents

When was Thomas Edison born?

Thomas Alva Edison was born in Milan , Ohio , on February 11, 1847.

When did Thomas Edison die?

Thomas Edison died on October 18, 1931, in West Orange , New Jersey .

Thomas Edison unveiled the phonograph —which reproduced sounds by means of the vibration of a stylus following a groove on a rotating disc—in December 1877. The public’s amazement surrounding this invention was quickly followed by universal acclaim. Edison was projected into worldwide prominence and was dubbed the Wizard of Menlo Park.

How did Thomas Edison change the world?

Thomas Edison played a significant part in introducing the modern age of electricity . His inventions included the phonograph, the carbon-button transmitter for the telephone speaker and microphone , the incandescent lamp , the first commercial electric light and power system, an experimental electric railroad , and key elements of motion-picture equipment.

Thomas Edison (born February 11, 1847, Milan , Ohio , U.S.—died October 18, 1931, West Orange , New Jersey) was an American inventor who, singly or jointly, held a world-record 1,093 patents . In addition, he created the world’s first industrial research laboratory .

Edison was the quintessential American inventor in the era of Yankee ingenuity. He began his career in 1863, in the adolescence of the telegraph industry, when virtually the only source of electricity was primitive batteries putting out a low-voltage current . Before he died, in 1931, he had played a critical role in introducing the modern age of electricity . From his laboratories and workshops emanated the phonograph , the carbon-button transmitter for the telephone speaker and microphone , the incandescent lamp , a revolutionary generator of unprecedented efficiency , the first commercial electric light and power system, an experimental electric railroad , and key elements of motion-picture apparatus , as well as a host of other inventions.

Edison was the seventh and last child—the fourth surviving—of Samuel Edison, Jr., and Nancy Elliot Edison. At an early age he developed hearing problems, which have been variously attributed but were most likely due to a familial tendency to mastoiditis . Whatever the cause, Edison’s deafness strongly influenced his behaviour and career, providing the motivation for many of his inventions.

In 1854 Samuel Edison became the lighthouse keeper and carpenter on the Fort Gratiot military post near Port Huron , Michigan , where the family lived in a substantial home. Alva, as the inventor was known until his second marriage, entered school there and attended sporadically for five years. He was imaginative and inquisitive, but, because much instruction was by rote and he had difficulty hearing, he was bored and was labeled a misfit. To compensate, he became an avid and omnivorous reader. Edison’s lack of formal schooling was not unusual. At the time of the Civil War the average American had attended school a total of 434 days—little more than two years’ schooling by today’s standards.

In 1859 Edison quit school and began working as a trainboy on the railroad between Detroit and Port Huron. Four years earlier, the Michigan Central had initiated the commercial application of the telegraph by using it to control the movement of its trains, and the Civil War brought a vast expansion of transportation and communication . Edison took advantage of the opportunity to learn telegraphy and in 1863 became an apprentice telegrapher.

Messages received on the initial Morse telegraph were inscribed as a series of dots and dashes on a strip of paper that was decoded and read, so Edison’s partial deafness was no handicap. Receivers were increasingly being equipped with a sounding key, however, enabling telegraphers to “read” messages by the clicks. The transformation of telegraphy to an auditory art left Edison more and more disadvantaged during his six-year career as an itinerant telegrapher in the Midwest, the South, Canada , and New England . Amply supplied with ingenuity and insight, he devoted much of his energy toward improving the inchoate equipment and inventing devices to facilitate some of the tasks that his physical limitations made difficult. By January 1869 he had made enough progress with a duplex telegraph (a device capable of transmitting two messages simultaneously on one wire) and a printer , which converted electrical signals to letters, that he abandoned telegraphy for full-time invention and entrepreneurship.

Edison moved to New York City , where he initially went into partnership with Frank L. Pope, a noted electrical expert, to produce the Edison Universal Stock Printer and other printing telegraphs. Between 1870 and 1875 he worked out of Newark , New Jersey , and was involved in a variety of partnerships and complex transactions in the fiercely competitive and convoluted telegraph industry, which was dominated by the Western Union Telegraph Company . As an independent entrepreneur he was available to the highest bidder and played both sides against the middle. During this period he worked on improving an automatic telegraph system for Western Union’s rivals. The automatic telegraph, which recorded messages by means of a chemical reaction engendered by the electrical transmissions, proved of limited commercial success, but the work advanced Edison’s knowledge of chemistry and laid the basis for his development of the electric pen and mimeograph , both important devices in the early office machine industry, and indirectly led to the discovery of the phonograph . Under the aegis of Western Union he devised the quadruplex, capable of transmitting four messages simultaneously over one wire, but railroad baron and Wall Street financier Jay Gould , Western Union’s bitter rival, snatched the quadruplex from the telegraph company’s grasp in December 1874 by paying Edison more than $100,000 in cash, bonds, and stock, one of the larger payments for any invention up to that time. Years of litigation followed.

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The Importance of the Light Bulb

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Enabling modern society, driving technological advancements, impact on daily life, continued innovation and sustainability.

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