Thomas Edison Loved Books as much as he loved Inventing

“I read anything that helps the imagination.”

Whether it is 1847 or 2019, we can all appreciate National Book Lover’s Day. Did you know Thomas Edison had a book collection of up to 30 thousand books in his home alone? That doesn’t even include the ones he took out from other libraries – which is reportedly entire town libraries when he was traveling often in his teenage years! Imagine what he would do with a kindle today.

**Thomas Edison’s West Orange corporate library, located at the Thomas Edison National Historical Park, has 3 floors full of books!**

TThomas Edison’s love for books started when he was young. His mother, who was also his homeschool teacher, encouraged him to read across the panorama of literature – not just what he liked but everything. He once said, “Oh, I read everything! not merely scientific works, but anything that helps the imagination.”

One of Edison’s favorite authors was Thomas Paine, the American Revolution literary patriot. As he got older, he also enjoyed reading the works and accomplishments of his technology hero, Michael Faraday.

Edison may have been one of the first to implement corporate libraries, so inventive employees had the latest and greatest information right at their fingertips. He pioneered this at his Menlo Park lab and later expanded it in his West Orange labs – known today as the Thomas Edison National Historical Park.

**Books lining the walls of Thomas Edison’s living room of his Glenmont estate. Many of the books on one side of this room are technical compendiums for Edison’s evening inventive marathons.**

LConsidering his love for books, Edison would have been honored to have books about him written today. If you are a fellow book lover, today is the perfect day to pick up an excellent biographies about Edison and learn more about his life. Here are some of our favorites:

Lenny Degraaf; ”Edison and the Rise of Innovation”
Baldwin, Neil; “Edison, Inventing the Century”
Conot, Robert; “Thomas A. Edison-A Streak of Luck”
Israel, Paul; “Edison-A Life of Invention”
Josephson, Mathew; “Edison”

RLeft: Intel-Edison module now available world-wide for developers. Right: The “Tommy” award given by the Edison Innovation Foundation.

Thomas Edison Brings Innovation to Western Films

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Extra, Extra! Bandits had the bright idea to rob a train and now have a posse in hot pursuit.

There is gunfire, people tied up, and even shot. A fireman is thrown from the moving train. Audiences cowered in fear, as the posse was in hot pursuit, cornering the bandits in a secluded wooded area and dealing out justice.

The Great Train Robbery of 1903 was the first action & Western film in history.

TThis is the gist of the 1903, 12 minute epic drama, The Great Train Robbery, filmed in Milltown, NJ. Film historians generally consider this Edison Manufacturing Studio’s film to be the first American action film and the first Western film. It could have been inspired by a 1900 train robbery perpetrated by the famous Butch Cassidy.

The Great Train Robbery surprised viewers so much that they reportedly had the audience ducking behind the seat in front of them, or even running from the theater. In a scene at the end of the film, the camera focuses on the bandit leader, played by Justus D. Barnes, who then empties his hog-legged .45 revolver directly into the camera.

How’s this for realism?! The scene from The Great Train Robbery that scared people out of theaters, 1903.

However, that wasn’t the only wild part of this Western. The man behind the camera and directing was Edwin S. Porter, whose prolific career would eventually include over 250 films made him the most influential filmmaker in the United States.

Porter was one of the first to use a variety of innovative film techniques in this $150 budgeted classic film including location shooting, minor camera moving, and pan shots. The jump-cuts that he used in editing the film were a new and sophisticated way of showing two events happening at the same time but in different places, making the plot more interesting than it once was.

Action and special effects made The Great Train Robbery thrilling for people in 1903.

BIf this film reminds you of your old Saturday morning Western skits, you wouldn’t be wrong. The innovation of the film set the tone for action-packed Western Movies for years to come. The iconic scene of gunshots making someone dance was born in this film. Furthermore, even media historian, James Chapman, believed that the straight at the camera gun shooting may have inspired the gun barrel sequence of the James Bond films!

Thomas Edison said, “Many of life’s failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up.”

Left: Intel-Edison module now available world-wide for developers. Right: The “Tommy” award given by the Edison Innovation Foundation.

Thomas Edison Brought Frankenstein to Life First

Mary Shelley painted the picture, but Edison made it move!

Virtually everyone knows the story about Frankenstein and most have viewed some movie adaptation of it, whether scary, animated, or a parody. Many associate the very funny version of Frankenstein with the late Gene Wilder’s madcap antics as Dr. Frankenstein. However, very few people realize the first adaptation to film of Mary Shelley’s 1818 Gothic classic was done in 1910 at the Edison Movie Studio in the Bronx, New York, but Thomas Edison’s movie production company.

For about 40 years the film was considered lost, with only some pictures and paraphernalia still existing; until a Wisconsin movie collector disclosed his treasure. The real value of the film was realized in the 1970s, whereupon the film was preserved onto a 35 MM format. In 2014, the Library of Congress preserved the movie.

Filmed over a 3 day period, the now historically significant 14 minute film was directed by L. Searle Dawley and originally released on March 18, 1910. The unbilled cast included Augustus Phillips as Dr. Frankenstein, Charles Ogle as the Monster, and Mary Fuller as the doctor’s fiancée.

You should take note that in the very early days of motion pictures, audiences were very important to the industry’s formative growth. This film was considered a liberal adaptation of Shelley’s novel, with the potentially repulsive aspects of the story toned down and the psychological aspects of it emphasized instead.

**The Frankenstein Beast Confronts Himself in a Mirror**

Okay, so you twisted our arms….here are some clips of the subsequent “Young Frankenstein” movie from Gene Wilder that you might recognize more. Enjoy, and remember who started the horror movie trend — old Tom Edison himself!

Thomas Edison said, “Anything that won’t sell, I don’t want to invent. Its sale is proof of utility, and utility is success.”

These Thomas Edison Movie Studios were the First in the World

Where Budding Directors and Producers Got Their Start In Movies

Edison’s movie production activities ran from 1893 to 1918, during which Edison Studios made approximately 1200 movies, 54 feature length and the rest shorts. From New Jersey to New York, Edison Studios was home to some of the first movies filmed at a few historical locations:

The Black Maria, a studio Edison invented to film all day long in West Orange, NJ, 1893-1901.
Edison’s Manhattan Studio in NYC a rooftop glass-enclosed studio that operated from 1901 to 1906.
Edison’s Bronx Studio in Bedford Park, NYC opened in 1907 and operated until 1918.

Here in these studios, America’s first directors began the development of the artistic craft and profession we know so well today. Each studio further refined and improved the movie-making process, which included introducing special effects and new techniques as well.

**Edison’s Bronx Movie Studio, where the early film industry got its start.**

The Black Maria is possibly the most notable of the Edison Studios, being the world’s first film production studio. The 1954 reproduction of the Black Maria below is housed at the Thomas Edison National Historical Park in West Orange today.

**A Reproduction of the Black Maria at the Thomas Edison National Historical Park**

Using natural sunlight to film, the roof of the Black Maria was cranked open to admit the light; and the entire studio rotated on wheels 15 degrees every hour to track the sun. Edison once remarked about the often cramped conditions in which they made movies in this studio saying, “It was a ghastly affair, but it worked.”

Edison and his assistants would experiment with film and sound for hours in this building, pictured in the drawing below. Notice there is a phonograph used to record the sound. Edison was able to synchronize motion and sound as early as 1895, only a few years after opening the Black Maria. This would not be witnessed by mass Hollywood audiences until the late 1920s!

**A drawing of a movie being made in the Black Maria, the first movie studio in the world.**

Curious to see how they came out? Check out some of Edison’s Studios most notable films here.

We all know about Hollywood and what movies are selling out in the theaters today. However, did you know where it all began? To learn more about Thomas Edison and the film industry, check the blog again soon!