Speech On Thomas Edison's Life

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Thomas Edison was born on February 11, 1847 in Milan, Ohio. Thomas grew up in Port Huron, Michigan. He was the seventh and last child of Samuel Edison Jr. and Nancy Elliot. When Edison was young he had many learning disabilities. Only after three months his education ended because of his teacher thought of it impossible to teach him with such a short attention span. After those three months Edison’s mother decided to teach him. Edison developed hearing complications from a very young age. The cause of his bad hearing was allegedly because of many untreated middle-ear infections. Historians also noted that a “small bout of Scarlet Fever(The sickness that may have caused Helen Keller to lose her sight and hearing)” may have also made him partially…show more content…
This hearing loss caused him some difficulty in school. In addition, he lost more of his hearing, becoming technically deaf, in his early teens. The cause is not definitely known. It could have been a result of early childhood illness or the result of a "boxing" of his ears by a rail conductor, possibly a myth. Edison became totally deaf in his left ear, and approximately 80% deaf in his right ear. He once said that the worst thing about his condition was that he was unable to enjoy the beautiful sounds of singing birds. He loved birds so much, he later collected a birdhouse containing over 5,000 birds. One day while he was on the train, the stationmaster's very young son happened to wander onto the tracks in front of an oncoming boxcar. Tom leaped to action. Luckily,as they tumbled away from its oncoming wheels, they ended up being only slightly injured. As a reward for his heroism ,the child's grateful father taught him use Morse code and the telegraph. In the "age of telegraphy," this was comparable to being introduced to learning how to use a state-of-the-art…show more content…
However, as the technology advanced, receivers were increasingly equipped with a sounding key, enabling telegraphers to "read" message by the sound of the clicks. This left Edison disadvantaged, with fewer and fewer opportunities for employment. Achievements In 1869, Edison moved to New York City and developed his first invention, an improved stock ticker, the Universal Stock Printer, which synchronized several stock tickers' transactions. The Gold and Stock Telegraph Company was so impressed, they paid him $40,000 for the rights. Edison was only 22 years old. In 1871 Edison built a workshop and laboratory in Newark, New Jersey. Newark, at the time had a well-known community of machinists and inventors. In 1874 Edison had his first big financial success with his quadruplex telegraph system. This was a way of sending more than one message in one direction over a single wire,in this case, two messages in opposite directions simultaneously. Telegraph companies were eager for such a scheme because it let them send more messages over fewer wires, increasing their profits while cutting their
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