History of Thomas Edison's Light Bulb
The incandescent light bulb is one of the most common items found in a modern home. Its invention revolutionized lighting as well as the way people live, work, and play. With brilliant, clear light available for low cost, the world lit up in ways never previously imagined. Many had tried to make an electric light before Thomas Edison, but he was first to create a practical, long-burning light bulb. Does this Spark an idea?
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Before Edison
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The first successful attempt at creating an electric arc light came in 1809, using a battery and two charcoal strips. In 1850, a British inventor named Joseph Swan began experimenting with incandescent lights, using carbonized paper filaments. He obtained a United Kingdom patent in 1860 and another in 1878 for incandescent lamps that used a paper filament in a vacuum tube.
Practical Difficulties
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Electric arc lamps produced a light too bright for use in homes. Many inventors in the late 1870s tried, and failed, to develop a bulb that would produce a weaker but still usable light.
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Edison's Bulb
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Edison made his own light bulbs in a glass-blowing shed for his experiments. He and his associates tried more than 3,000 different theories for creating a high-resistance element that would significantly lower the amount of electrical power required. In January 1879, he finally succeeded in creating a high-resistance filament, using platinum, but it only burned for a few hours.
Finding the Perfect Filament
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In his attempts to improve the useful life of the bulb, Edison tested more than 6,000 types of plant materials along with every other filament he could think of, including tungsten, the most common component of modern filaments. Eventually, he tried a carbonized cotton thread, which burned for 15 hours. He continued to improve on that filament until, by late 1880, he had a marketable 16-watt bulb that would burn for 1,500 hours.
Competition
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From 1878 to 1892, intense competition among hundreds of companies, many of whom improved on Edison's bulb, eventually came down to two-- the Edison Electric Light Company, which merged with several others to become the Edison General Electric Company, and Westinghouse. In 1892, Edison left the company he founded, which became the General Electric Company which still makes light bulbs to this day.
Fun Fact
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In 1880, Wabash, Indiana, became the first city to be lit solely by electricity, using arc lamps built and installed by the Brush Electric Company. The entire city ran off one electric dynamo powered by the engine from a threshing machine.
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View all 6 Comments-
Great inspiration from a determined inventor.
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let there be light. we don't want energy saving bulbs.
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Actually what Thomas Edison did was to make the light bulb viable enough for people to use .The earlier designs were either too expensive or burnt out too quickly to be economically viable since most of the efficient designs before his creation used precious materials that it was too costly for public consumption.
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Actually what Thomas Edison did was to make the light bulb viable enough for people to use .The earlier designs were either too expensive or burnt out too quickly to be economically viable since most of the efficient designs before his creation used precious materials that it was too costly for public consumption.
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Actually what Thomas Edison did was to make the light bulb viable enough for people to use .The earlier designs were either too expensive or burnt out too quickly to be economically viable since most of the efficient designs before his creation used precious materials that it was too costly for public consumption.
