Thomas Edison and the Process of Invention Thomas Alva Edison
was born on February 11, 1847, in Milan, Ohio. Working with the
telegraph in his late teens and early twenties started Edison on
the road to invention. Early innovations, such as the automatic
telegraph, the quadruplex, and the Edison Universal Stock
Printer allowed Edison to focus his efforts on inventing. He
eventually opened up his own laboratories in Newark, New Jersey
and later West Orange, New Jersey. It was at these locations
that Edison and his assistants developed such technologies as
the Electric Pen, incandescent electric light bulb, the
phonograph and the kinetograph, the first motion picture camera.
He even built Pearl Street Central Power Station in New York
City, which was the first electric power station. Throughout
this site, you will examine issues dealing with why Edison
opened his laboratories in New Jersey, how his inventions
changed society and were accepted by society, how the process of
invention was revolutionized by Edison