American Men of Mind Part 22

Again success seemed in sight, but soon the lamps began acting queerly again. Worn out with fatigue and disappointment, Edison took to his bed.

Ultimate failure was freely predicted, and the price of gas stock rose again. In five months, the inventor had aged five years, but he was not yet ready to give up the fight. And at last it was won, and the incandescent lamp placed on the market. It has not displaced gas, as some people thought it would, but it is the basis of a business which made the inventor sufficiently rich to realize his great ambition of building himself the finest laboratory in the world; where the most expert iron-workers, wood-workers, gla.s.s-blowers, metal-spinners, machinists and chemists in the world find employment. Every known metal, every chemical, every kind of gla.s.s, stone, earth, wood, fibre, paper, skin, cloth, may be found in its store-rooms, ready for instant use. The library contains one of the finest collections of scientific books and periodicals to be found anywhere. These are the tools, and with them Edison is constantly at work upon a great variety of problems.

The first thing he turned his hand to after his installation in his new laboratory was the phonograph. The patient thought and experiment, extending over many years, lavished on this wonderful invention are almost unbelievable. The idea had come to him years before, when he had worked out an instrument that would not only record telegrams by indenting a strip of paper with the dots and dashes of the Morse code, but would also repeat the message any number of times by running the indented strip of paper through it.

"Naturally enough," said Edison, in telling the story, "the idea occurred to me that if the indentations on paper could be made to give off again the click of the instrument, why could not the vibrations of a diaphragm be recorded and similarly reproduced? I rigged up an instrument hastily and pulled a strip of paper through it, at the same time shouting 'Hallo!' Then the paper was pulled through again, and listening breathlessly, I heard a distinct sound, which a strong imagination might have translated into the original 'Hallo!' That was enough to lead me to a further experiment. I made a drawing of a model, and took it to Mr. Kruesi, at that time engaged on piece-work for me. I told him it was a talking-machine. He grinned, thinking it a joke; but he set to work and soon had the model ready. I arranged some tin-foil on it and spoke into the machine. Kruesi looked on, still grinning. But when I arranged the machine for transmission and we both heard a distinct sound from it, he nearly fell down in his fright. I must admit that I was a little scared myself." The words which he had spoken into the machine and which were the first ever to be reproduced mechanically, was the old Mother Goose quatrain, starting, "Mary had a Little Lamb."

From that rude beginning came the phonograph, with which Edison has never ceased to experiment. He has made improvements in it from year to year, until it has reached its present high state of efficiency--a state, however, which Edison hopes to improve still further. In addition to the two great inventions of the phonograph and incandescent lamp, which we have dwelt upon here, many more stand to his credit. In fact, he has been the greatest client the patent office ever had, nearly one thousand patents having been issued in his name. At the age of sixty-three, he shows no sign of falling off in either mental or physical energy, and no doubt more than one invention has yet to come from Llewellyn Park before he quits his great laboratory forever.

No one can ever guess at the future of electrical invention. The recent marvelous development of the wireless telegraph, by which the impalpable ether is harnessed to man's service, is an indication of the wonders which may be expected in the future. It was our own Joseph Henry who, in 1842, discovered the electric wave--the "induction" upon which wireless telegraphy depends. He discovered that when he produced an electric spark an inch long in a room at the top of his house, electrical action was instantly set up in another wire circuit in the cellar. After some study, he saw and announced that the electric spark started some sort of action in the ether, which pa.s.sed through floors and ceilings and all other intervening objects, and caused induction in the wires in the cellar. But wireless telegraphy was made a commercial possibility not by any great scientist, but by a young Italian named Marconi. Already experiments with wireless telephony are going forward, and another half century may see all the labor of the world performed by this wonderful and mysterious force which we call electricity.

From earliest times, man has longed to navigate the air. He has watched with envy the free flight of birds, and has tried to imitate it, usually with disastrous results. The balloon, of course, enabled him to rise in the air, but once there, he was at the mercy of every wind. More recently, balloons fitted with motors and steering gear have been devised, which are to some extent dirigible; but the real problem has been to fly as birds do without any such artificial aid as balloons provide.

Experiments to solve this problem were begun several years ago by Professor S. P. Langley, of the Smithsonian Inst.i.tution, under government supervision, and pointed the way to other investigators. He proved, theoretically, that air-flight was possible, provided sufficient velocity could be obtained. He showed that a heavier-than-air machine would sustain itself in the air if it could only be driven fast enough.

You have all skipped flat stones across the water. Well, that is exactly the principle of the flying machine. As long as the stone went fast enough, it skipped along the top of the water, which sustained it and even threw it up into the air again. When its speed slackened, it sank.

So the boy on skates can skim safely across thin ice which would not bear his weight for an instant if he tried to stand upon it.

So, theoretically, it was possible to fly, but to reduce theory to practice was a very different thing. Professor Langley tried for years and failed. He built a great machine, which plunged beneath the waters of the Potomac a minute after it was launched. All over the world, inventors were struggling with the problem, but nowhere with any great degree of success. It remained for two brothers, in a little workshop at Dayton, Ohio, to produce the first machine which would really fly.

Orville and Wilbur Wright were poor boys, the sons of a clergyman, and apparently in no way distinguished from ordinary boys, except by a taste for mechanics. They had a little workshop, and one day in 1905, they brought out a strange looking machine from it, and announced that it was a flying-machine. The people of Dayton smiled skeptically, and a.s.sembled to witness the demonstration with the thought that there would probably soon be need for an ambulance. The gasoline motor with which the machine was equipped, was started, one of the brothers climbed aboard and grasped the levers, the other dropped a weight which started the machine down a long incline. For a moment, it slid along, then its great forward planes caught the air current and it soared gracefully up into the air.

That was a great moment in human history, so great that the crowd looking on scarcely realized its import. They watched the machine with bated breath, and saw it steered around in a circle, showing that it could go against the wind as well as with it. For thirty-eight minutes it remained in the air, making a circular flight of over twenty-four miles. Then it was gently landed and the exhibition was over. Great crowds flocked to Dayton, after that, expecting to see further exhibitions, but they were disappointed. The machine had been taken back to the shop, and the young inventors announced that they were making some changes in it. No one was admitted to the shop, nor were any other flights made.

One day the inventors also disappeared, and months later it was discovered that they had built themselves a little shop on a deserted stretch of the sandy North Carolina coast, and that they were carrying on their experiments there, secure from observation. Enterprising reporters tried to interview them and failed; but, ambushed afar off, they one day saw the great machine soaring proudly in a wide circle above the sands. A photographer even got a distant photograph of it.

There could be no doubt that the Wright brothers had solved the problem of flight.

But not for two years more were they ready for public exhibitions. Then, in 1908, they appeared at Fort Myer, Virginia, ready to take part in the contest set by the United States government. No one who was present on that first day will ever forget his sensations as the great winged creature rose gracefully from the ground and circled about in the air overhead. Again and again flights were made, sometimes with an extra pa.s.senger; great speed was attained and the machine was under perfect control. But an unfortunate accident put a stop to the trials, for one day a propellor-blade broke while the machine was in mid-air, and it struck the ground before it could be righted. The pa.s.senger, a member of the United States Signal Corps, was instantly killed and Orville Wright was seriously injured.

Meanwhile, the other brother, Wilbur, had gone to Europe, where, first in France, and afterwards in Italy and England, he created a tremendous sensation by his spectacular flights. They were uniformly successful.

Not an accident marred them. The governments of Europe were quick to secure the right to manufacture the aeroplane; kings and princes vied with each other in honoring the young inventor, and when he returned to the United States, city, state, and nation combined in a great reception to him and to his brother.

As these lines are being written, in August, 1909, another series of flights has been concluded at Fort Myer. They were successful in every way in fulfilling the government tests, and the Wrights' machine was purchased by the government for $30,000. Everywhere air-s.h.i.+p flights are being made successfully, and it is only a question of time until the aeroplane becomes a common means of conveyance. Wilbur Wright declares that it is already safer than the automobile, and it would seem that there is in store for man a new and exquisite sensation, that of flight.

Surely, America has cause to be proud of her inventors!

SUMMARY

FULTON, ROBERT. Born at Little Britain, Pennsylvania, 1765; went to London, 1786, to study painting under Benjamin West; abandoned painting, 1793; returned to America, 1806; first successful trip in steamboat, the Clermont, August 11, 1807; died at New York City, February 24, 1815.

WHITNEY, ELI. Born at Westborough, Ma.s.sachusetts, December 8, 1765; graduated at Yale, 1792; went to Georgia as teacher and invented cotton-gin, 1792-93; died at New Haven, Connecticut, January 8, 1825.

MORSE, SAMUEL FINLEY BREESE. Born at Charlestown, Ma.s.sachusetts, April 27, 1791; graduated at Yale, 1810; studied art under Benjamin West in London, and opened studio in New York City, 1823; first president National Academy of Design, 1826-42; designed electric telegraph, 1832; applied for patent, 1837; first line completed between Baltimore and Was.h.i.+ngton, 1844; died at New York City, April 2, 1872.

GOODYEAR, CHARLES. Born at New Haven, Connecticut, December 29, 1800; began experiments with rubber, 1834; secured patent, 1844; died at New York City, July 1, 1860.

ERICSSON, JOHN. Born in parish of Fernebo, Wermland, Sweden, July 31, 1803; went to England, 1826; came to America, 1839; constructed caloric engine, 1833; applied screw to steam navigation, 1836-41; invented turreted ironclad Monitor, 1862; died at New York City, March 8, 1889.

DAHLGREN, JOHN ADOLPH. Born at Philadelphia, November 13, 1809; lieutenant in navy, 1837; a.s.signed to ordnance duty at Was.h.i.+ngton, 1847; commander, 1855; rear-admiral, 1863; took important part in naval operations during Civil War; died at Was.h.i.+ngton, July 12, 1870.

MCCORMICK, CYRUS HALL. Born at Walnut Grove, West Virginia, February 15, 1809; invented mechanical reaper, 1831; died at Chicago, May 13, 1884.

HOWE, ELIAS. Born at Spencer, Ma.s.sachusetts, July 9, 1819; invented sewing-machine, 1844; died at Brooklyn, New York, October 3, 1867.

CORLISS, GEORGE HENRY. Born at Easton, New York, July 2, 1817; invented Corliss engine, 1849; died at Providence, Rhode Island, February 21, 1888.

SHOLES, CHRISTOPHER LATHAM. Born at Mooresburg, Pennsylvania, February 14, 1819; state senator, Wisconsin, 1848, 1856-58; held many positions of trust in Milwaukee, 1869-78; patented typewriter, 1868.

BELL, ALEXANDER GRAHAM. Born at Edinburgh, Scotland, March 3, 1847; came to Canada, 1870, and to Boston, 1871; invented telephone, 1876; graphophone, 1883.

BRUSH, CHARLES FRANCIS. Born at Euclid, Ohio, March 17, 1849; graduated University of Michigan, 1869; invented modern arc electric lighting; founder Brush Electric Company.

WESTINGHOUSE, GEORGE. Born at Central Bridge, Schoharie County, New York, October 6, 1846; invented rotary engine at age of fifteen; in Union army, 1863-64; invented air brake, 1868; also inventions in railway signals, steam and gas engines, turbines, and electric machinery.

EDISON, THOMAS ALVA. Born at Milan, Ohio, February 11, 1847; established workshop at Menlo Park, New Jersey, 1876; invented megaphone, phonograph, aerophone, incandescent electric lamp, kinetoscope, and many other things.

WRIGHT, ORVILLE. Born at Dayton, Ohio, 1871.

WRIGHT, WILBUR. Born at Dayton, Ohio, 1869.