Everyone knows one of Thomas Edison’s greatest inventions was the light bulb. I taught that. Unfortunately, I was passing on a myth. As early as 1761, inventors knew that you could pass electricity through wire to make it incandescent. In 1800, French scientist Alessandro Volta created light from what became known as the Volta Pile. It used copper wire. In 1802, Englishman Humphrey Davy created electric arc light using electricity between two carbon rods. But it was too bright and burned out too quickly. It was used for street lighting in Paris. In 1840, Warren de la Rue created light using a coiled platinum filament in a vacuum tube. Not surprisingly, it was too expensive. One year later, Frederick Demoleyns created the bulb. He received the first patent for an incandescent lamp. In 1845, American John Starr received a patent for a bulb using a carbonized filament, but he did not manufacture it. In 1860, Joseph Swan got a U.K. patent for a lightbulb using a carbonized paper filament. However, the insufficient vacuum, lack of electricity and low life made his invention not practical. He kept working at it. By 1879, his house became the first home in history to be lit by a light bulb. He is also credited with the first public building lit by electricity and the first street. He had a stronger claim to being the inventor of the lightbulb than Edison and the courts agreed. He did end up partnering with Edison.
Edison deserves the credit for inventing the best filament. Actually, his assistants at Menlo Park deserve the credit for experimenting with thousands of possible filaments, including grass. These men were called his “muckers”. In 1879, they arrived at a carbon filament that lasted 14 ½ hours. Good, but not great. One year later, a carbonized bamboo filament lasted 1,200 hours. It was used to light the laboratory and the area around it, which became known as the “Village of Light”. That tourist attraction plus Edison’s skill at publicity caused the public to associate Edison with inventing the lightbulb. That myth continues today. So, teachers, teach your students that Edison PERFECTED the light bulb.
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2019/10/28/the-real-nature-of-thomas-edisons-genius
https://www.livescience.com/43424-who-invented-the-light-bulb.html
https://www.ripleys.com/weird-news/or-not-thomas-edison-light-bulb/
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