CBS Interactive (formerly CBS Digital Media Group) is an American company and is a division of the CBS Corporation. It is an online content network for information and entertainment. Its websites cover news, sports, entertainment, technology and business.^[1] It is headed by Jim Lanzone.^[2]

CBS Interactive coordinates with CBS Network Sales to bring together ad sales operations, as well as the Corporation's television, sports, and news groups, who will continue to be involved in program development.

History[link]

On May 30, 2007, CBS Interactive acquired Last.fm for £140m (US$280m).^[3]

On June 30, 2008, CNET Networks' was acquired by CBS and the assets were merged into CBS Interactive, including Metacritic, GameSpot, TV.com, and Movietome.^[4]

On March 15, 2012, it was announced that CBS Interactive acquired video game-based website Giant Bomb and comic book-based website Comic Vine from Whiskey Media, who sold off their other remaining websites to BermanBraun. This occasion marked the return of video game journalist Jeff Gerstmann to the CBS Interactive division of video game websites, which includes GameSpot and GameFAQs, and has Gerstmann once again working directly with his some of his former peers at GameSpot under the same building at the CBS Interactive headquarters.^[5][6]

On April 17, 2012, it was announced that Major League Gaming and CBS Interactive would be entering a partnership alongside TwitchTV to be the exclusive online broadcaster of their Pro Circuit competitions, as well as for advertising representation.^[7][8]

Websites[link]

CNET[link]

CNET is CNET Networks' online portal, providing access to reviews, news, downloads, price comparisons and CNET TV as well as web search powered by search.com. CNET is divided into five major sections: reviews, news and blogs (News.com), downloads, and How To.

CNET Shopper[link]

CNET Shopper.com is a site claiming to find the lowest prices on items from online retailers. While generally reliable, there have been notable errors in pricing information on occasion including a camera worth over a thousand dollars being advertised for only a few dollars.

CNET UK[link]

In addition to the CNET site which is aimed at North American audiences, there are regional CNET sites including CNET Australia (for Australia), CNET UK (for the United Kingdom) and CNET Asia (for Asia). Content on regional sites is a mix of mostly locally produced content from regional offices of CNET, with certain content – mostly news – from the US CNET site. In addition, content is sometimes sourced from ZDNet.

In 2005, CNET launched CNET UK.^[9] This UK arm of CNET Networks covers similar areas to the main CNET, but specifically for UK consumers. As of January 2008, an independent audit certified CNET UK was the largest consumer electronics website in the UK, with 2.5 million unique visitors.^[10] The site is mainly focused on reviews, news, a gadget blog ('Crave', a name which the main CNET eventually adopted for its own blog) and editorial content from a team of editors, covering consumer electronics and car tech. CNET UK is managed and overseen by site editor Jason Jenkins (formerly of T3 Magazine). The CNET UK editorial team consists of Jason Jenkins (Editor), Nike Hide (Chief sub-editor), Charles Kloet (Sub-Editor), Rory Reid (Editor, Cars and Computing), Ian Morris (Editor, Home Cinema and Community), Flora Graham (Editor, Mobile Phones), Richard Trenholm (Editor, News and Features) and Luke Westaway (Staff Writer). CNET UK also releases a weekly podcast called the 'CNET UK Podcast'.

CNET Networks UK also comprises a number of other online-only publications, including GameSpot UK, Silicon.com, ZDNet.co.uk, and SmartPlanet.com (now defunct), each of which produce both editorial and audio-video productions, including GameSpot's video show 'Start/Select', and ZDNet's popular 'Dialogue Box' show. Collectively, the publications of CNET Networks UK generate 132 million monthly page views from 9.8 million unique visitors.^[11]

On November 19, 2007, CNET UK launched the UK version of CNET TV, CNETTV.co.uk, which ceased production on May 2, 2008.

BNET[link]

BNET, a portal designed similarly to CNET, was created for the businessman or woman, specifically those in the management field. It provides tools and information in an organized format, while also providing professional insight on emerging news and strategies affecting a range industries, many not specifically related to the technology industry.

Other websites[link]

Other CBS Interactive websites include GameSpot, Giant Bomb, GameFAQs, Metacritic, MP3.com, TV.com, Comic Vine and Movie Tome, which operate under the "CNET Networks Entertainment" brand name; Chow, Chowhound, UrbanBaby and Consumating; Webware, a blog launched in November 2006 dedicated to web applications.^[12]

CBS Interactive International Media[link]

CBS Interactive has foreign branches in Australia, Belgium, China, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Singapore, and Turkey.

CBS Interactive China maintains over 10 local sites including Zol (中关村在线), Xcar (爱卡）, Onlylady and 55BBS as well as Chinese versions of CNET, ZDNet and BNET^[13].

Business units[link]

Tech and News: CBS News.com, CNET.com, News.com (redirects to CNET News), VersionTracker.com (redirects to CNET Software), CNETContentSolutions.com

Business: BNET (redirects to CBS Money Watch), CBS MoneyWatch

Business Technology: ZDNet, TechRepublic, SmartPlanet

Entertainment and Lifestyle: CBS.com, TV.com, TheInsider.com, Chow.com, UrbanBaby.com, CBS Audience Network, MovieTome (redirects to Metacritic's movie section), Clicker.com, Comic Vine

Games and Music: CBS Radio.com, GameSpot, Last.fm, metacritic.com, Search.com, GameFaqs, Giant Bomb

Sports: CBSSports.com, MaxPreps.com,

See also[link]

	San Francisco Bay Area portal
	Companies portal

References[link]

External links[link]

• CBS Interactive.com
• [1]
• MaxPreps.com
• CBS Interactive
• CBS Interactive UK
• CBS Interactive Australia
• CBS Interactive China

Suzanne Vega
Suzanne Vega in 2010
Background information
Birth name	Suzanne Nadine Peck
Born	(1959-07-11) July 11, 1959 (age 52) Santa Monica, California, United States
Origin	New York City, United States
Genres	Alternative rock, folk rock
Occupations	Singer, songwriter, record producer
Instruments	Vocals, guitar
Years active	1982–present
Labels	A&M Blue Note Amanuensis Productions
Website	www.suzannevega.com

Suzanne Nadine Vega (born July 11, 1959) is an American songwriter and singer known for her eclectic folk-inspired music.

Two of Vega's songs (both from her second album Solitude Standing, 1987) reached the top 10 of various international chart listings: "Luka" and "Tom's Diner". The latter was originally an a cappella version on Vega's album, which was then remade in 1990 as a dance track produced by the British dance production team DNA.

Early life[link]

Vega was born July 11, 1959 in Santa Monica, California.^[1] Her mother, Pat Vega, is a computer systems analyst of German-Swedish heritage. Her father, Richard Peck, is of Scottish-English-Irish origin. They divorced soon after her birth.^[2] Her stepfather, Ed Vega, also known as Edgardo Vega Yunque, was a writer and teacher from Puerto Rico.^[3]

When Vega was two and a half, the family moved to New York City. She grew up in Spanish Harlem and the Upper West Side.^[4] At the age of nine she began to write poetry; she wrote her first song at age fourteen. Later she attended New York's prestigious High School of Performing Arts (now called LaGuardia High School). There she studied modern dance and graduated in 1977.

Career[link]

While majoring in English literature at Barnard College,^[5] she performed in small venues in Greenwich Village, where she was a regular contributor to Jack Hardy's Monday night songwriters' group at the Cornelia Street Cafe and had some of her first songs published on Fast Folk anthology albums.^[6] In 1984, she received a major label recording contract, making her one of the first Fast Folk artists to break out on a major label.

Vega's self-titled debut album was released in 1985 and was well-received by critics in the U.S.;^[4] it reached platinum status in the United Kingdom. Produced by Lenny Kaye and Steve Addabbo, the songs feature Vega's acoustic guitar in straightforward arrangements. A video was released for the album's song "Marlene on the Wall", which went into MTV and VH1's rotations. During this period Vega also wrote lyrics for two songs on Songs from Liquid Days by composer Philip Glass.

Her next effort, Solitude Standing (1987), garnered critical and commercial success including the hit single "Luka", an international success. "Luka" is written about, and from the point of view of, an abused child—at the time an uncommon subject for a pop hit. While continuing a focus on Vega's acoustic guitar, the music is more strongly pop-oriented and features fuller arrangements. The a cappella "Tom's Diner" from this album was later a hit, remixed by two British dance producers under the name DNA, in 1990. The track was originally a bootleg, until Vega allowed DNA to release through her record company, and it became her all-time biggest hit.

Tom's Diner[link]

Tom's Restaurant, after which the song Tom's Diner was named

Vega's song "Tom's Diner" was used as the reference track in an early trial of the MP3 compression system, thus earning her the distinction of being named "The Mother of the MP3". Because it is an a cappella vocal with relatively little reverberation, it was used as the model for Karlheinz Brandenburg's sound compression algorithm.^[7] Brandenburg heard “Tom's Diner” on a radio playing the song and was excited and at first convinced it would be “nearly impossible to compress this warm a cappella voice.”

"Tom's Diner" takes place in Tom's Restaurant at 112th Street and Broadway in New York City. Exterior shots of the same restaurant appear in the television sitcom Seinfeld as Monk's, which is the eatery where Jerry, George, Elaine, and Kramer hang out. The DNA remix of the track was so popular that it inspired many cover versions—the best of which were eventually collected by Vega on an album titled Tom's Album.^[7] The remixed version of "Tom's Diner" was later sampled by hip hop artist Nikki D in her single "Daddy's Little Girl". Rapper Tupac Shakur sampled the track in "Dopefiend's Diner".

Luka[link]

On a 1987 Swedish television special, Vega said this about her song "Luka":

Also, in an ASCAP interview, she responded to a question about "Luka":

"Luka" was covered by The Lemonheads on the 1989 album Lick, shortly before the band was signed by Atlantic Records, and was a minor college-airplay hit.

1990s[link]

Vega's third album, Days of Open Hand (1990) continued in the style of her first two albums.

In 1992 she released the album 99.9F°. It consists of a mixture of folk music, dance beats and industrial music.

Her fifth album, Nine Objects of Desire, was released in 1996. The music varies between a frugal, simple style and the industrial production of 99.9F°. This album contains "Caramel", featured in the movie The Truth About Cats & Dogs and, later, the trailer for the movie Closer. A song not included on that album, "Woman on the Tier", was featured on the soundtrack of the movie Dead Man Walking.

In 1997 she took a singing part on the concept album Heaven and Hell, a musical interpretation of the Seven deadly sins by her colleague Joe Jackson, with whom she had already collaborated in 1986 on "Left of Center" from the Pretty in Pink soundtrack (with Vega singing and Jackson playing piano).

In 1999, Avon Books published Vega's book "The Passionate Eye: The Collected Writings Of Suzanne Vega"; a volume of poems, lyrics, essays and journalistic pieces.

2000s[link]

On stage, 2008

September 2001 saw the release of a new album, Songs In Red and Gray. Three songs deal with Vega's divorce from first husband Mitchell Froom.

At the memorial concert for her brother Tim Vega in December 2002, she began as the long-term subject of a direct cinema documentary, Some Journey, by director Christopher Seufert of Mooncusser Films. This has not been completed.

In 2003, the twenty-one-song greatest hits compilation Retrospective: The Best of Suzanne Vega was released. (The UK version of Retrospective included an eight-song bonus CD as well as a DVD containing twelve songs.) In the same year she was invited by Grammy Award-winning jazz guitarist Bill Frisell, to play at the Century of Song concerts at the famed RuhrTriennale in Germany.

In 2003, she hosted the American Public Media radio series American Mavericks, about 20th century American composers, which received the prestigious Peabody Award for Excellence in Broadcasting.

On August 3, 2006, Vega became the first major recording artist to perform live in the Internet-based virtual world, Second Life. The event was hosted by John Hockenberry of public radio's The Infinite Mind.

On September 17, 2006, she performed in Central Park, as part of a benefit concert for The Save Darfur Coalition.^[10] During the concert she highlighted her support for Amnesty International, of which she has been a member since 1988.^{[11] [12]}

In early October 2006, Vega took part in the Academia Film Olomouc (AFO) in Olomouc, the Czech Republic, the oldest festival of documentary films in Europe, in which she appeared as a main guest. She was invited there as the subject of the documentary film by director Christopher Seufert, that had a test screening at the festival. At the end of the festival she performed her classical songs, and added one brand new piece called "New York Is a Woman".

Vega is also interviewed in the book Everything Is Just a Bet which was published in Czech in October 2006. The book contains twelve interview transcriptions from the talk show called Stage Talks that regularly runs in the Švandovo divadlo (Švandovo Theatre) in Prague. Vega introduced the book to the audience of the Švandovo divadlo (Švandovo Theatre), and together with some other Czech celebrities gave a signing session.

She signed a new recording contract with Blue Note Records in the spring of 2006, and released Beauty & Crime on July 17, 2007. The album was produced by Jimmy Hogarth, which won a Grammy for Best Engineered Album, Non-Classical. Her contract was not renewed and she was dropped in June 2008.^[13]

In 2007, Vega followed the lead of numerous other mainstream artists and released her track "Pornographer's Dream" as podsafe. The song spent two weeks at #1 during 2007 and finished as the #11^[14] hit of the year on the PMC Top10's annual countdown. Vega joined the 10th annual Independent Music Awards judging panel to assist independent musicians' careers.^{[15] [16] [17]} She was also a judge for the 6th, 7th, 8th, and 9th Independent Music Awards.^[18]

2010s[link]

A partial cover version of her song "Tom's Diner" is used to introduce the 2010 British movie 4.3.2.1, with its lyrics largely rewritten to echo the plot. This musical hybrid was released as "Keep Moving".

Vega is included in the Danger Mouse/Sparklehorse/David Lynch collaboration "Dark Night of the Soul". She wrote both melody and lyrics for her song, which is titled "The Man Who Played God", inspired by a biography of Pablo Picasso.

Vega is rerecording her back-catalogue,^[19] both for artistic and commercial (and control) reasons,^[20][21] in the Close-up series. Vol.1 (Love Songs) and Vol. 2 (People & Places) appeared in 2010 while Vol. 3 (States of Being) was released in July 2011 ^[22] and 4 (Songs of Family) is planned for the near future.

Vega sang lead vocals on the song "Now I Am an Arsonist" with singer-songwriter Jonathan Coulton on his 2011 album, Artificial Heart.

Theater[link]

Vega co-wrote (with Duncan Sheik) a play “Carson McCullers Talks About Love”, about the life of the writer Carson McCullers. In the play, which premiered in 2011, Vega alternates between monologue and songs. ^[23][24][25]

Personal life[link]

On March 17, 1995, Vega married Mitchell Froom, a musician and a record producer (who played in and produced 99.9F° and Nine Objects of Desire). They have a daughter, Ruby Froom (born July 8, 1994). The band Soul Coughing's Ruby Vroom album was named after her, with Vega's approval, though she requested a slight change.^[7] Recently Ruby sang with her mother on a couple of occasions.^[26][27][28] Vega and Froom separated in 1998.

On February 11, 2006, Vega married Paul Mills, a lawyer and poet. They originally met each other at Folk City on West 4th Street when singer-songwriter Lucy Kaplansky, a friend of both, introduced them. In the words of her website, "The couple met at Folk City on West 4th Street in 1981. Mr. Mills proposed to Miss Vega in May, 1983, and she accepted his proposal on Christmas Day, 2005."^[29]

Discography[link]

Studio albums[link]

• ¹ Days of Open Hand made #2 in Norway albums chart
• ² Nine Objects of Desire made #20 in Finland, #23 in Switzerland, #39 in Sweden
• ³ Beauty & Crime made #9 in Estonia, #13 in Finland, #37 in Czech Republic, #49 in Poland, #74 in Italy
• Close-Up Vol. 2, People & Places Number 2 Top Purchased Album (Amazon.com) 11th October-13th October

Compilation albums[link]

• Tried & True: The Best of Suzanne Vega, 1998 – UK #46, AUS #96, GER #58
• Retrospective: The Best of Suzanne Vega, 2003 – UK #27^[30]

Singles[link]

• "Rusted Pipe (DNA remix)", promotional, 1991
• "Caramel", 1996
• "Birth-day", promotional, 1997
• "World before Columbus", 1997
• "Headshots", promotional, 1997
• "Book & a Cover", 1998
• "Rosemary / Remember me", 1999
• "Widow's Walk", promotional, 2001
• "Last Year's Troubles", promotional, 2001
• "Penitent", promotional, 2001
• "(I'll Never Be) Your Maggie May", promotional, 2002
• "Frank & Ava", promotional, 2007
• "Ludlow Street", promotional, 2007
• "Unbound", promotional, 2007
• "Pornographer's Dream", podsafe, 2007 – PMC #1

Other contributions[link]

• Stay Awake: Various Interpretations of Music from Vintage Disney Films (1988) – "Stay Awake"
• One World One Voice (1990) – "One World, One Voice"
• Deadicated: A Tribute to the Grateful Dead (1991) – "Cassidy" and "China Doll"
• DNA: Taste This (1992) – "Tom's Diner (DNA Remix)" and "Salt Water"
• Hector Zazou: Songs From the Cold Sea (1994) – "The Long Voyage" (with John Cale)
• Grammy's Greatest Moments Volume III (1994) - "Luka" (live version)^[34]
• Tower of Song (1995) – "Story of Isaac"
• Dead Man Walking soundtrack (1995) – "Woman on the Tier (I'll See You Through)"
• The Smithereens: Blown to Smithereens (1995) – "In a Lonely Place"
• Time and Love: The Music of Laura Nyro (1997) – "Buy and Sell"
• "Perfect Day"^{[disambiguation needed ]} (1997)
• Joe Jackson: Heaven & Hell (1997) – "Angel (Lust)"
• Mitchell Froom: Dopamine (1998) – "Dopamine"
• Celebrate the Season (1998) – "Coventry Carol"
• Bleecker Street: Greenwich Village in the 60's (1999) – "So Long, Marianne" (with John Cale)
• Dan Zanes: Rocket Ship Beach (2000) – "Erie Canal"
• Hear Music Volume 7: Waking (2002) – "Widow's Walk"
• 107.1 KGSR Radio Austin - Broadcasts Vol.10 (2002) – "Widow's Walk"
• WYEP Live and Direct: Volume 4 - On Air Performances (2002) – "(I'll Never Be) Your Maggie May"
• Vigil (album) (2004) – "It Hit Home"
• WFUV: City Folk Live VII (2004) – "Penitent"
• The Acoustic Album (2006, Virgin) – "Marlene On the Wall"
• Dar Williams: Promised Land (2008) – "Go to the Woods"
• Danger Mouse and Sparklehorse Present: Dark Night of the Soul (2009) – "The Man Who Played God"
• Pioneers for a Cure: Songs To Fight Cancer (2011) – "Streets of Laredo"

References[link]

External links[link]

This article's use of external links may not follow Wikipedia's policies or guidelines. Please improve this article by removing excessive or inappropriate external links, and converting useful links where appropriate into footnote references. (July 2011)

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Suzanne Vega

• Official website
• Suzanne Vega on A&M Records
• Suzanne Vega at the Internet Movie Database
• Suzanne Vega on Charlie Rose
• Works by or about Suzanne Vega in libraries (WorldCat catalog)
• Suzanne Vega collected news and commentary at The New York Times
• Suzanne Vega documentary clips
• Love Songs Review – Love Songs Review by SLUG Magazine
• Suzanne Vega recording of 'Streets of Laredo' for Pioneers For A Cure

Thomas Edison
"Genius is one percent inspiration, ninety-nine percent perspiration." – Thomas Alva Edison, Harper's Monthly (September 1932)
Born	Thomas Alva Edison (1847-02-11)February 11, 1847 Milan, Ohio, U.S.
Died	October 18, 1931(1931-10-18) (aged 84) West Orange, New Jersey, U.S.
Nationality	American
Education	School dropout
Occupation	Inventor, businessman
Religion	Deist
Spouse	Mary Stilwell (m. 1871–1884) «start: (1871)–end+1: (1885)»"Marriage: Mary Stilwell to Thomas Edison" Location: (linkback:http://en-wiki.pop.wn.com/index.php/Thomas_Edison) Mina Miller (m. 1886–1931) «start: (1886)–end+1: (1932)»"Marriage: Mina Miller to Thomas Edison" Location: (linkback:http://en-wiki.pop.wn.com/index.php/Thomas_Edison)
Children	Marion Estelle Edison (1873–1965) Thomas Alva Edison Jr. (1876–1935) William Leslie Edison (1878–1937) Madeleine Edison (1888–1979) Charles Edison (1890–1969) Theodore Miller Edison (1898–1992)
Parents	Samuel Ogden Edison, Jr. (1804–1896) Nancy Matthews Elliott (1810–1871)
Relatives	Lewis Miller (father-in-law)
Signature

Edison as a boy

Thomas Alva Edison (February 11, 1847 – October 18, 1931) was an American inventor and businessman. He developed many devices that greatly influenced life around the world, including the phonograph, the motion picture camera, and a long-lasting, practical electric light bulb. Dubbed "The Wizard of Menlo Park" (now Edison, New Jersey) by a newspaper reporter, he was one of the first inventors to apply the principles of mass production and large-scale teamwork to the process of invention, and because of that, he is often credited with the creation of the first industrial research laboratory.^[1]

Edison is the fourth most prolific inventor in history, holding 1,093 US patents in his name, as well as many patents in the United Kingdom, France, and Germany. He is credited with numerous inventions that contributed to mass communication and, in particular, telecommunications. These included a stock ticker, a mechanical vote recorder, a battery for an electric car, electrical power, recorded music and motion pictures.

His advanced work in these fields was an outgrowth of his early career as a telegraph operator. Edison originated the concept and implementation of electric-power generation and distribution to homes, businesses, and factories – a crucial development in the modern industrialized world. His first power station was on Manhattan Island, New York.

Early life[link]

Thomas Edison was born in Milan, Ohio, and grew up in Port Huron, Michigan. He was the seventh and last child of Samuel Ogden Edison, Jr. (1804–96, born in Marshalltown, Nova Scotia, Canada) and Nancy Matthews Elliott (1810–1871, born in Chenango County, New York).^{[2][citation needed]} His father had to escape from Canada because he took part in the unsuccessful Mackenzie Rebellion of 1837.^{[citation needed]} Edison reported being of Dutch ancestry.^[3]

In school, the young Edison's mind often wandered, and his teacher, the Reverend Engle, was overheard calling him "addled". This ended Edison's three months of official schooling. Edison recalled later, "My mother was the making of me. She was so true, so sure of me; and I felt I had something to live for, someone I must not disappoint." His mother taught him at home.^[4] Much of his education came from reading R.G. Parker's School of Natural Philosophy and The Cooper Union.

Edison developed hearing problems at an early age. The cause of his deafness has been attributed to a bout of scarlet fever during childhood and recurring untreated middle-ear infections. Around the middle of his career, Edison attributed the hearing impairment to being struck on the ears by a train conductor when his chemical laboratory in a boxcar caught fire and he was thrown off the train in Smiths Creek, Michigan, along with his apparatus and chemicals. In his later years, he modified the story to say the injury occurred when the conductor, in helping him onto a moving train, lifted him by the ears.^[5][6]

Edison's family moved to Port Huron, Michigan after the railroad bypassed Milan in 1854 and business declined;^[7] his life there was bittersweet. He sold candy and newspapers on trains running from Port Huron to Detroit, and he sold vegetables to supplement his income. He also studied qualitative analysis, and conducted chemical experiments on the train until an accident prohibited further work of the kind.^[8]

He obtained the exclusive right to sell newspapers on the road, and, with the aid of four assistants, he set in type and printed the Grand Trunk Herald, which he sold with his other papers.^[8] This began Edison's long streak of entrepreneurial ventures, as he discovered his talents as a businessman. These talents eventually led him to found 14 companies, including General Electric, which is still one of the largest publicly traded companies in the world.^[9][10]

Telegrapher[link]

Edison became a telegraph operator after he saved three-year-old Jimmie MacKenzie from being struck by a runaway train. Jimmie's father, station agent J.U. MacKenzie of Mount Clemens, Michigan, was so grateful that he trained Edison as a telegraph operator. Edison's first telegraphy job away from Port Huron was at Stratford Junction, Ontario, on the Grand Trunk Railway.^[11]

In 1866, at the age of 19, Edison moved to Louisville, Kentucky, where, as an employee of Western Union, he worked the Associated Press bureau news wire. Edison requested the night shift, which allowed him plenty of time to spend at his two favorite pastimes—reading and experimenting. Eventually, the latter pre-occupation cost him his job. One night in 1867, he was working with a lead–acid battery when he spilled sulfuric acid onto the floor. It ran between the floorboards and onto his boss's desk below. The next morning Edison was fired.^[12]

One of his mentors during those early years was a fellow telegrapher and inventor named Franklin Leonard Pope, who allowed the impoverished youth to live and work in the basement of his Elizabeth, New Jersey home. Some of Edison's earliest inventions were related to telegraphy, including a stock ticker. His first patent was for the electric vote recorder, (U.S. Patent 90,646),^[13] which was granted on June 1, 1869.^[14]

Marriages and children[link]

On December 25, 1871, Edison married 16-year-old Mary Stilwell (1855-1884), whom he had met two months earlier; she was an employee at one of his shops. They had three children:

• Marion Estelle Edison (1873–1965), nicknamed "Dot"^[15]
• Thomas Alva Edison, Jr. (1876–1935), nicknamed "Dash"^[16]
• William Leslie Edison (1878–1937) Inventor, graduate of the Sheffield Scientific School at Yale, 1900.^[17]

Mary Edison died at age 29 on August 9, 1884, of unknown causes: possibly from a brain tumor^[18] or a morphine overdose. Doctors frequently prescribed morphine to women in those years to treat a variety of causes, and researchers believe that some of her symptoms sounded as if they were associated with morphine poisoning.^[19]

Mina Edison in 1906

On February 24, 1886, at the age of thirty-nine, Edison married the 20-year-old Mina Miller (1866-1947) in Akron, Ohio.^[20] She was the daughter of the inventor Lewis Miller, co-founder of the Chautauqua Institution and a benefactor of Methodist charities. They also had three children together:

• Madeleine Edison (1888–1979), who married John Eyre Sloane.^[21][22]
• Charles Edison (1890–1969), who took over the company upon his father's death and who later was elected Governor of New Jersey.^[23] He also took charge of his father's experimental laboratories in West Orange.
• Theodore Edison (1898–1992), (MIT Physics 1923), credited with more than 80 patents.

Mina outlived Thomas Edison, dying on August 24, 1947.^[24][25]

Beginning his career[link]

Photograph of Edison with his phonograph (2nd model), taken in Mathew Brady's Washington, DC studio in April 1878.

	Mary Had a Little Lamb Thomas Edison reciting "Mary Had a Little Lamb"
Problems listening to this file? See media help.

Thomas Edison began his career as an inventor in Newark, New Jersey, with the automatic repeater and his other improved telegraphic devices, but the invention that first gained him notice was the phonograph in 1877. This accomplishment was so unexpected by the public at large as to appear almost magical. Edison became known as "The Wizard of Menlo Park," New Jersey.

His first phonograph recorded on tinfoil around a grooved cylinder, but had poor sound quality and the recordings could be played only a few times. In the 1880s, a redesigned model using wax-coated cardboard cylinders was produced by Alexander Graham Bell, Chichester Bell, and Charles Tainter. This was one reason that Thomas Edison continued work on his own "Perfected Phonograph."

Menlo Park (1876–1881)[link]

Edison's Menlo Park Laboratory, removed to Greenfield Village at Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn, Michigan. (Note the organ against the back wall)

Edison's major innovation was the first industrial research lab, which was built in Menlo Park, New Jersey. It was built with the funds from the sale of Edison's quadruplex telegraph. After his demonstration of the telegraph, Edison was not sure that his original plan to sell it for $4,000 to $5,000 was right, so he asked Western Union to make a bid. He was surprised to hear them offer $10,000,^{[citation needed]} ($202,000 USD 2010) which he gratefully accepted.

The quadruplex telegraph was Edison's first big financial success, and Menlo Park became the first institution set up with the specific purpose of producing constant technological innovation and improvement. Edison was legally attributed with most of the inventions produced there, though many employees carried out research and development under his direction. His staff was generally told to carry out his directions in conducting research, and he drove them hard to produce results.

William Joseph Hammer, a consulting electrical engineer, began his duties as a laboratory assistant to Edison in December 1879. He assisted in experiments on the telephone, phonograph, electric railway, iron ore separator, electric lighting, and other developing inventions. However, Hammer worked primarily on the incandescent electric lamp and was put in charge of tests and records on that device. In 1880, he was appointed chief engineer of the Edison Lamp Works. In his first year, the plant under General Manager Francis Robbins Upton turned out 50,000 lamps. According to Edison, Hammer was "a pioneer of incandescent electric lighting".

Thomas Edison's first successful light bulb model, used in public demonstration at Menlo Park, December 1879

Nearly all of Edison's patents were utility patents, which were protected for a 17-year period and included inventions or processes that are electrical, mechanical, or chemical in nature. About a dozen were design patents, which protect an ornamental design for up to a 14-year period. As in most patents, the inventions he described were improvements over prior art. The phonograph patent, in contrast, was unprecedented as describing the first device to record and reproduce sounds.^[26]

Edison did not invent the first electric light bulb, but instead invented the first commercially practical incandescent light.^{[citation needed]} Many earlier inventors had previously devised incandescent lamps, including Henry Woodward and Mathew Evans. Others who developed early and commercially impractical incandescent electric lamps included Humphry Davy, James Bowman Lindsay, Moses G. Farmer,^[27] William E. Sawyer, Joseph Swan and Heinrich Göbel. Some of these early bulbs had such flaws as an extremely short life, high expense to produce, and high electric current drawn, making them difficult to apply on a large scale commercially.^[28]