Elisha Gray
Born	(1835-08-02)August 2, 1835 Barnesville, Ohio, U.S.
Died	January 21, 1901(1901-01-21) (aged 65) Newtonville, Massachusetts, U.S.
Occupation	Engineer/Inventor
Awards	Elliott Cresson Medal (1897)

Elisha Gray (August 2, 1835 – January 21, 1901) was an American electrical engineer who co-founded the Western Electric Manufacturing Company. Gray is best known for his development of a telephone prototype in 1876 in Highland Park, Illinois and is considered by some writers^[1] to be the true inventor of the variable resistance telephone, despite losing out to Alexander Graham Bell for the telephone patent.

Gray is also considered to be the father of the modern music synthesizer,^[2] and was granted over 70 patents for his inventions.^[3]

Biography and early inventions[link]

Born into a Quaker family in Barnesville, Ohio, Gray was brought up on a farm. He spent several years at Oberlin College where he experimented with electrical devices. Although Gray was not a graduate of Oberlin College, he taught electricity and science at Oberlin and built laboratory equipment for Oberlin science departments.

In 1862 while at Oberlin, Gray met and married Delia Minerva Shepard.

In 1865 Gray invented a self-adjusting telegraph relay that automatically adapted to varying insulation of the telegraph line.

In 1867 Gray received a patent for the self-adjusting telegraph relay and in later years he received patents for more than 70 other inventions.

In 1869, Elisha Gray and his partner Enos M. Barton founded Gray & Barton Co. in Cleveland, Ohio to supply telegraph equipment to the giant Western Union Telegraph Company. The electrical distribution business was later spun off from Western Electric and organized into a separate company, Graybar Electric Company, Inc.. Barton had been employed by Western Union to examine and test new products.

In 1870 financing for Gray & Barton Co. was arranged by General Anson Stager, a superintendent of the Western Union Telegraph Company. Stager became an active partner in Gray & Barton Co., which moved to Chicago. Gray moved from Ohio to Highland Park near Chicago and remained on the board of directors. But he gave up his administrative position as chief engineer to focus on inventions that could benefit the telegraph industry. Gray's inventions and patent costs were financed by a dentist, Dr. Samuel S. White of Philadelphia, who had made a fortune producing porcelain teeth. White wanted Gray to focus on the acoustic telegraph which promised huge profits to the exclusion of what appeared to be unpromising competing inventions such as the telephone. It was White's decision in 1876 to abandon Gray's caveat for the telephone.

In 1870, Gray developed a needle annunciator for hotels and another for elevators. He also developed a telegraph printer which had a typewriter keyboard and printed messages on paper tape.

In 1872 Western Union, then financed by the Vanderbilts and J. P. Morgan, bought one-third of Gray and Barton Co. and changed the name to Western Electric Manufacturing Company of Chicago. Gray continued to invent for Western Electric.

In 1874, Gray retired to do independent research and development. Gray applied for a patent on a harmonic telegraph which consisted of multi-tone transmitters, each tone being controlled by a separate telegraph key. Gray gave several private demonstrations of this invention in New York and Washington, D.C. in May and June 1874.

Gray was a charter member of the Presbyterian Church in Highland Park, Illinois. At the church, on December 29, 1874, Gray gave the first public demonstration of his invention for transmitting musical tones and transmitted "familiar melodies through telegraph wire" according to a newspaper announcement. This was one of the earliest electric musical instrument using self vibrating electromagnetic circuits that were single-note oscillators operated by a two-octave piano keyboard. The "Musical Telegraph" used steel reeds whose oscillations were created by electromagnets and transmitted over a telegraph wire. Gray also built a simple loudspeaker in later models consisting of a vibrating diaphragm in a magnetic field to make the oscillator tones audible and louder at the receiving end. In 1900 Gray was working on an underwater signaling device. After his death in 1901 officers were investigating his house, who then gave the invention to Oberlin College and some of the students tested it out. After a few years of testing he was recognized as the inventor of the underwater signaling device.

On July 27, 1875, Gray was granted patent 166,096 for "Electric Telegraph for Transmitting Musical Tones" (acoustic telegraphy).

Elisha Gray and the telephone[link]

Because of Samuel White's^[4] opposition to Gray working on the telephone, Gray did not tell anybody about his new invention for transmitting voice sounds until February 11, 1876 (Friday). Gray requested that his patent lawyer William D. Baldwin prepare a "caveat" for filing at the US Patent Office. A caveat was like a provisional patent application with drawings and description but without a request for examination.

Excerpts from Elisha Gray's patent caveat of February 14 and Alexander Graham Bell's lab notebook entry of March 8, demonstrating their similarity.

On Monday morning February 14, 1876 Gray signed and had notarized the caveat that described a telephone that used a liquid microphone. Baldwin then submitted the caveat to the US Patent Office. That same morning a lawyer for Alexander Graham Bell submitted Bell's patent application.

Which application arrived first is hotly disputed, although Gray believed that his caveat arrived a few hours before Bell's application.^[5] Bell's lawyers in Washington, DC had been waiting with Bell's patent application for months, under instructions not to file it in the USA until it had been filed in Britain first. (At the time, Britain would only issue patents on discoveries not previously patented elsewhere.)

According to Evenson, during the weekend of February 12–14, 1876, before either caveat or application had been filed in the patent office, Bell's lawyer learned about the liquid transmitter idea in Gray's caveat that would be filed early Monday morning February 14.^[5] Bell's lawyer then added seven sentences describing the liquid transmitter and a variable resistance claim to Bell's draft application. After the lawyer's clerk recopied the draft as a finished patent application, Bell's lawyer hand-delivered the finished application to the patent office just before noon on Monday, a few hours after Gray's caveat was delivered to the patent office by Gray's lawyer. Bell's lawyer requested that Bell's application be immediately recorded and hand-delivered to the examiner on Monday so that later Bell could claim it had arrived first. Bell was in Boston at this time and was not aware that his application had been filed in the US patent office.^[6]

Five days later, on February 19, Zenas Fisk Wilber, the patent examiner for both Bell's application and Gray's caveat, noticed that Bell's application claimed the same variable resistance feature described in Gray's caveat. Wilber suspended Bell's application for 90 days to give Gray time to submit a competing patent application. The suspension also gave Bell time to amend his claims to avoid an interference with an earlier patent application of Gray's that mentioned changing the intensity of the electric current without breaking the circuit, which seemed to the examiner to be an "undulatory current" that Bell was claiming. Such an interference would delay Bell's application until Bell submitted proof, under the first to invent rules, that Bell had invented that feature before Gray.^[7]

Bell's lawyer telegraphed Bell, who was still in Boston, to come to Washington DC. When Bell arrived on February 26, Bell visited his lawyers and then visited examiner Wilber who told Bell that Gray's caveat showed a liquid transmitter and asked Bell for proof that the liquid transmitter idea (described in Bell's patent application as using mercury as the liquid) was invented by Bell. Bell pointed to an application of Bell's filed a year earlier where mercury was used in a circuit breaker. The examiner accepted this argument, although mercury would not have worked in a telephone transmitter. On February 29, Bell's lawyer submitted an amendment to Bell's claims that distinguished over Gray's caveat and Gray's earlier application.^[8] On March 3, Wilber approved Bell's application and on March 7, 1876 patent 174,465 was published by the U.S. Patent Office.

Bell returned to Boston and resumed work on March 9, drawing a diagram in his lab notebook of a water transmitter being used face down and very similar to that shown in Gray's caveat."^[9] Bell and Watson built and tested Gray's water transmitter design on March 10 and successfully transmitted clear speech saying "Mr. Watson – come here – I want to see you." Bell's notebooks did not become public until the 1990s.^[10]

The importance of Bell's test of Gray's water transmitter idea was it proved that clear speech could be transmitted electrically. It was a scientific experiment, not development of a commercial product. Prior to that, Bell had only an unproven theory.

Although Gray had abandoned his caveat, Gray applied for a patent for the same invention in late 1877. This put him in a second interference with Bell's patents. The Patent Office determined "while Gray was undoubtedly the first to conceive of and disclose the [variable resistance] invention, as in his caveat of 14 February 1876, his failure to take any action amounting to completion until others had demonstrated the utility of the invention deprives him of the right to have it considered."^[11] Gray challenged Bell's patent anyway, and after two years of litigation, Bell was awarded rights to the invention, and as a result, Bell is credited as the inventor.

In 1886, the patent examiner (Zenas Fisk Wilber) stated in a sworn affidavit^[12] that he was an alcoholic and deeply in debt to Bell's lawyer Marcellus Bailey with whom Wilber had served in the Civil War. Wilber stated that, contrary to Patent Office rules, he showed Bailey the caveat Gray had filed. Wilber also stated that he showed the caveat to Bell and Bell gave him $100. Bell testified that they only discussed the patent in general terms, although in a letter to Gray, Bell admitted that he learned some of the technical details.

Bell's patent was also disputed in 1888 by attorney Lysander Hill who accused Wilber of allowing Bell or his lawyer Pollok to add a handwritten margin note of seven sentences to Bell's application that describe an alternate design similar to Gray's liquid microphone design.^[13] However, the marginal note was added only to Bell's earlier draft, not as a marginal addition to his patent application that shows the seven sentences already present in a paragraph in Bell's patent application when it was filed in the Patent Office on February 14, 1876. Bell testified that he added those seven sentences in the margin of an earlier draft of his application "almost at the last moment before sending it off to Washington" to his lawyers. Bell or his lawyer could not have added the seven sentences to the application after it was filed in the Patent Office, because then there would not have been any 90 day suspension of Bell's application on February 19.^[14]

Although Bell was accused, and is still accused, of stealing the telephone from Gray,^[15] Bell used Gray's water transmitter design only after Bell's patent was granted and only as a proof of concept scientific experiment^[16] to prove to his own satisfaction that intelligible "articulate speech" (Bell's words) could be electrically transmitted.^[17] Bell's assistant Thomas Watson testified that he tested all of the competing designs.^[18] After March 1876, Bell and Watson focused on improving the electromagnetic telephone and never used Gray's liquid transmitter in public demonstrations or commercial use.^[19] When Bell demonstrated his telephone at the Centennial Exhibition in June 1876, he used his improved electromagnetic transmitter, not Gray's water transmitter.

Gray's further inventions[link]

In 1887 Gray invented the "telautograph", a device that could remotely transmit handwriting through telegraph systems. Gray was granted several patents for these pioneer fax machines, and the Gray National Telautograph Company was charted in 1888 and continued in business as The Telautograph Corporation for many years; after a series of mergers it was finally absorbed by Xerox in the 1990s. Gray's telautograph machines were used by banks for signing documents at a distance and by the military for sending written commands during gun tests when the deafening noise from the guns made spoken orders on the telephone impractical. The machines were also used at train stations for schedule changes.

Gray displayed his telautograph invention in 1893 at the 1893 Columbian Exposition and sold his share in the telautograph shortly after that. Gray was also chairman of the International Congress of Electricians at the World's Columbian Exposition of 1893.

Gray conceived of a primitive closed-circuit television system that he called the "telephote". Pictures would be focused on an array of selenium cells and signals from the selenium cells would be transmitted to a distant station on separate wires. At the receiving end each wire would open or close a shutter to recreate the image.

In 1899 Gray moved to Boston where he continued inventing. One of his projects was to develop an underwater signaling device to transmit messages to ships. One such signaling device was tested on December 31, 1900. Three weeks later, on January 21, 1901, Gray died from a heart attack in Newtonville, Massachusetts.

As of 2006 no book-length biography has been written about the life of Elisha Gray. An Oberlin physics department head named Dr. Lloyd W. Taylor began writing a Gray biography, but the book was never finished because of Taylor's accidental death in July 1948. Dr Taylor's unfinished manuscript is in the College Archives at Oberlin College.

Gray's publications[link]

Gray wrote several books including:

• Experimental Researches in Electro-Harmonic Telegraphy and Telephony, 1867–1876 (Appleton, 1878)
• Telegraphy and Telephony (1878)
• Electricity and Magnetism (1900) and
• Nature's Miracles (1900) a nontechnical discussion of science and technology for the general public.

See also[link]

• Invention of the telephone
• Timeline of the telephone
• The Telephone Cases
• Water microphone

References[link]

Notes

Bibliography

This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (February 2008)

External links[link]

Wikisource has original works written by or about: Elisha Gray

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Elisha Gray

• Elisha Gray biography from Oberlin
• Gray's telephone caveat filed on February 14, 1876 same day as Bell's application
• Gray's telephone caveat with drawings, filed on February 14, 1876
• Gray's "Musical Telegraph" of 1876
• Gray's "Harmonic Multiple Telegraph"
• Bell–Gray conflict over the harmonic telegraph
• "Telautograph" description
• 1911 Britannica article
• Grave of Elish Gray in Rosehill Cemetery, Chicago

Gray's patents[link]

Patent images in TIFF format

• U.S. Patent 166,095 Electric Telegraph for Transmitting Musical Tones, filed Jan 19, 1875, issued July 27, 1875
• U.S. Patent 166,096 Improvement in Electric Telegraph for Transmitting Musical Tones, issued July 27, 1875
• U.S. Patent 173,460 Automatic Circuit-Breakers for Electro-Harmonic Telegraphs, filed Jan 8, 1876, issued Feb 15, 1876
• U.S. Patent 173,618 Electro-Harmonic Telegraph, filed Jan 27, 1876, issued Feb 15, 1876
• U.S. Patent 175,971 Telephonic Telegraph Apparatus, filed Jan 8, 1876, issued April 11, 1876
• U.S. Patent 186,340 Electro-Harmonic Telegraph, filed Jan 27, 1876, issued Jan 16, 1877
• U.S. Patent 386,814 Art of Telegraphy, issued July 1888 (writing telegraph or telautograph)
• U.S. Patent 386,815 Telautograph, issued July 1888
• U.S. Patent 461,470 Telautograph, issued October 1891
• U.S. Patent 461,472 Art of and Apparatus for Telautographic Communication, issued October 1891 (improved speed and accuracy)
• U.S. Patent 491,347 Telautograph, issued February 1893
• U.S. Patent 494,562 Telautograph, issued April 1893

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Prophet Elisha
Elisha raising the Shunammite’s Son, early 1900s Bible Card illustration
Prophet
Died	Samaria
Honored in	Judaism Roman Catholic Church Eastern Catholic Churches Eastern Orthodox Church Lutheranism Islam
Feast	June 14
Attributes	Clothed as a prophet, often holding a scroll

Elisha ( /ɨˈlaɪʃə/;^[1] Hebrew: אֱלִישָׁע, Modern Elisha Tiberian ʼĔlîšāʻ ; "My God is salvation", Greek: Ἐλισσαῖος, Elissaîos or Ἐλισαιέ, Elisaié, Arabic: الْيَسَع‎ Elyasaʻ) is a prophet mentioned in the Hebrew Bible and the Qur'an. His name is commonly transliterated into English as Elisha via Hebrew, Eliseus via Greek and Latin, or Alyasa via Arabic.

Biblical biography[link]

Russian icon of Elisha (18th century, Kizhi Monastery, Russia).

Elisha was a prophet of the Northern Kingdom of Israel who was active during the reign of Joram, Jehu, Jehoahaz, and Jehoash (Joash).^[2]

Elisha was the son of Shaphat of Abel-meholah; he became the attendant and disciple of Elijah (1 Kings 19:16–19), and after Elijah was taken up into the whirlwind, he was accepted as the leader of the sons of the prophets, and became noted in Israel. He possessed, according to his own request, "a double portion" of Elijah's spirit (2 Kings 2:9); and for sixty years (892–832 BC) held the office of "prophet in Israel" (2 Kings 5:8).

His name first occurs in the command given to Elijah to anoint him as his successor (1 Kings 19:16). After learning, in the cave on Mount Horeb, that Elisha, the son of Shaphat, had been selected by God as his successor in the prophetic office, Elijah set out to make known the Divine will. On his way from Sinai to Damascus, Elijah found Elisha "one of them that were ploughing with twelve yoke of oxen". Elisha delayed only long enough to kill the yoke of oxen, whose flesh he boiled with the very wood of his plough. He went over to him, threw his mantle over Elisha's shoulders, and at once adopted him as a son, investing him with the prophetic office. Elisha accepted this call about four years before the death of Israel's King Ahab. For the next seven or eight years Elisha became Elijah's close attendant until Elijah was taken up into heaven. During all these years we hear nothing of Elisha except in connection with the closing scenes of Elijah's life.

After he had shared this farewell repast with his father, mother, and friends, the newly chosen Prophet "followed Elijah and ministered to him". (1 Kings 19:8–21) He went with his master from Gilgal to Bethel, to Jericho, and thence to the eastern side of the Jordan, the waters of which, touched by the mantle, divided, so as to permit both to pass over on dry ground. Elisha then was separated from Elijah by a fiery chariot. He then beheld Elijah taken up by a whirlwind into heaven. By means of the mantle let fall from Elijah, Elisha miraculously recrossed the Jordan, and so won from the prophets at Jericho the recognition that "the spirit of Elijah hath rested upon Elisha" (2 Kings 2:1–15). He won the gratitude of the people of Jericho for healing its barren ground by adding salt to its waters.

Before Elijah was taken up into the whirlwind, Elisha asked to "inherit a double-portion" of Elijah's spirit. This is indicative of the property inheritance customs of the time, where the oldest son received twice as much of the father's inheritance as each of the younger sons. For example, if a man had three sons, his property was divided into fourths. Each son received one-fourth, with the oldest receiving two-fourths (twice as much as the others). In this instance with Elijah, Elisha is not asking to become twice as powerful as Elijah, but that he may be seen as the "rightful heir" to the work of the Lord that Elijah had done.

Before he settled in Samaria, the Prophet passed some time on Mount Carmel (2 Kings 2:25). When the armies of Judah, Israel and Edom, then allied against Mesha, the Moabite king, were being tortured by drought in the Idumean desert, Elisha consented to intervene. His double prediction regarding relief from drought and victory over the Moabites was fulfilled on the following morning (2 Kings 3:4–24). When a group of children from Bethel taunted the prophet for his baldness, Elisha cursed them in the name of God and two female bears came out of the forest and mauled 42 of them (2 Kings 2:23–25).

Personal and political work[link]

Elisha's work within Israel involved two areas: personal and political. He tried to be accessible to the people and interceded in moments of crisis. He is termed a patriot, as he had involvement in helping soldiers and kings.^[2]

Personal[link]

That Elisha inherited the wonder-working power of Elijah is shown throughout the whole course of his life. To relieve the widow importuned by a hard creditor, Elisha so multiplied a little oil as to enable her, not only to pay her indebtedness, but to provide for her family needs (2 Kings 4:1–7). To reward the rich lady of Shunam for her hospitality, he obtained for her from YHWH, at first the birth of a son, and subsequently the resurrection of her child (2 Kings 4:8–37). To nourish the sons of the prophets pressed by famine, Elisha changed into wholesome food the pottage made from poisonous gourds (2 Kings 4:38–41). By the cure of Naaman, who was afflicted with leprosy, Elisha, little impressed by the possessions of the Syrian general, whilst willing to free King Joram from his perplexity, principally intended to show "that there is a prophet in Israel". Naaman, at first reluctant, obeyed the Prophet, and washed seven times in the Jordan. Finding his flesh "restored like the flesh of a little child", the general was so impressed by this evidence of God's power, and by the disinterestedness of His Prophet, as to express his deep conviction that "there is no other God in all the earth, but only in Israel" (2 Kings 5:1–19). In the Christian tradition, Jesus referred to this event when he said, "And there were many lepers in Israel in the time of Elisha the prophet: and none of them was cleansed but Naaman the Syrian" (Luke 4:27).

Political[link]

In punishing the avarice of his servant Gehazi (2 Kings 5:20–27), in repeatedly saving King Jehoram of Israel from the ambushes planned by Benhadad (2 Kings 6:8–23), in ordering the elders to shut the door against the messenger of Israel's ungrateful king (2 Kings 6:25–32), in bewildering with a strange blindness the soldiers of the Syrian king (2 Kings 6:13–23), in making iron float to relieve from embarrassment a son of a prophet (2 Kings 6:1–7), in confidently predicting the sudden flight of the enemy and the consequent cessation of the famine (2 Kings 7:1–20), in unmasking the treachery of Hazael (2 Kings 8:7–15), Elisha proved himself a divinely appointed Prophet of the one true God, whose knowledge and power he was privileged to share.

Elisha refusing the gifts of Naaman, by Pieter de Grebber 1630

After Elijah's departure, Elisha returned to Jericho, and there healed the spring of water by casting salt into it (2 Kings 2:21).

Elisha is next encountered in Scripture when he asks for a fall of rain when the army of Jehoram was faint from thirst (2 Kings 3:9–20). Other miracles Elisha accomplishes include multiplying the poor widow's jar of oil (4:1–7), restoring to life the son of the woman of Shunem (4:18–37), and multiplying the twenty loaves of new barley into a sufficient supply for a hundred men (4:42–44). During the military incursions of Syria into Israel, Elisha cures Naaman the Syrian of his leprosy (5:1–27), punishes his servant Gehazi for his falsehood and his greed, and recovers an axe lost in the waters of the Jordan (6:1–7). He administered the miracle at Dothan, half-way on the road between Samaria and Jezreel, and at the siege of Samaria by the king of Syria, Elisha prophesied about the terrible sufferings of the people of Samaria and their eventual relief (2 Kings 6:24–7:2).

Elisha then journeyed to Damascus and prophesied that Hazael would be king over Syria (2 Kings 8:7–15); thereafter he directs one of the sons of the prophets to anoint Jehu, the son of Jehoshaphat, king of Israel, instead of Ahab. Mindful of the order given to Elijah (1 Kings 19:16), Elisha delegated a son of one of the prophets to quietly anoint Jehu King of Israel, and to commission him to cut off the house of Ahab (2 Kings 9:1–10). The death of Joram, pierced by an arrow from Jehu's bow, the ignominious end of Jezabel, the slaughter of Ahab's seventy sons, proved how faithfully executed was the Divine command (2 Kings 9:11–10:30). After predicting to Joash his victory over the Syrians at Aphek, as well as three other subsequent victories, ever bold before kings, ever kindly towards the lowly, "Elisha died, and they buried him" (2 Kings 13:14–20).

The miracle at the grave of Elisha. (Jan Nagel, 1596)

While Elisha lies on his death-bed in his own house (2 Kings 13:14–19). Joash, the grandson of Jehu, comes to mourn over his approaching departure, and utters the same words as those of Elisha when Elijah was taken away, indicating his value to him: "My father, my father! the chariot of Israel, and the horsemen thereof."

The very touch of his corpse served to resuscitate a dead man. "In his life he did great wonders, and in death he wrought miracles" (Ecclesiasticus, xlviii, 15). After his death, a dead body was laid in Elisha's grave a year after his burial. No sooner does it touch Elisha's remains than the man "revived, and stood up on his feet" (2 Kings 13:20–21).

Veneration[link]

He is venerated as a saint in a number of Christian Churches. His feast day is on June 14, on the Eastern Orthodox, and Eastern Catholic liturgical calendars (for those churches which use the traditional Julian Calendar, June 14 falls on June 27 of the modern Gregorian Calendar). St. John of Damascus composed a canon in honor of the Prophet Elisha, and a church was built at Constantinople in his honor.

In Western Christianity he is commemorated on the Carmelite religious order's calendar of saints.^[3] He is also commemorated as a prophet on the Calendar of Saints of the Lutheran Church – Missouri Synod. Both calendars also celebrate him on June 14. Both the Orthodox and Roman Catholics believe that he was unmarried, celibate.^[4]

Julian the Apostate (361–363) gave orders to burn the relics of the prophets Elisha, Obadiah and John the Baptist, but they were rescued by the Christians, and part of them were transferred to Alexandria. Today, the relics of the prophet Elisha are claimed to be among the possessions of the Coptic Orthodox Monastery of Saint Macarius the Great in Scetes, Egypt.^[5]

In Islam[link]

Elisha is also mentioned in the Qur'an as a prophet. He is seen by Muslims to be the prophetic successor to Elijah, known in Islam as Ilyas. Elisha is mentioned twice in the Qur'an as a prophet, and is mentioned both times alongside fellow prophets:

And commemorate Isma'il, Elisha, and Zul-Kifl: Each of them was of the Company of the Good.

—Quran 38:48)

And Ishmael and Elisha and Jonah and Lot: and to all We gave favour above the nations:
(To them) and to their fathers, and progeny and brethren: We chose them, and we guided them to a straight way.

—Quran 6:86–87)

Ibn Kathir traces Elisha's genealogy through his father, in Islamic tradition named Ukhtub, back to the lineage of Aaron.^[6] In the various Stories of the Prophets compilations in Islamic literature, Elisha's story is often grouped with that of his contemporary Elijah. The historian Hasan of Basra said:

Elisha came after Elias, peace be upon them. He called his people to the way of God and followed the laws and Shariah revealed to Elias, till he passed away.^[7]

Muslims believe that Elijah was directed by God to appoint Elisha as the succeeding prophet before vanishing into the protection of God.^[8] The narrative of Elisha in Muslim tradition is similar to that in the Hebrew Bible. Muslim scholars believe Elisha that prophesied through the reign of four kings: Joram, Jehu, Jehoahaz, and Jehoash^[9] but that Israel refused to hear his words.^[10]

There is also "the tomb of the prophet Elisha" in Aloujam in the eastern region of Saudi Arabia. Reports from the city of Aloujam say that the shrine was removed by the authorities, because it is not in accordance with Sunni Islam, although in ancient times people used to visit it from afar.^[11]

See also[link]

• Biblical narratives and the Qur'an
• Legends and the Qur'an
• Prophets of Islam
• Stories of The Prophets

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Eliseus

Wikisource has the text of the 1905 New International Encyclopedia article Elisha.

• Elisha at the Internet Movie Database – Animated depiction of the life of Elisha
• "Eliseus" article from The Catholic Encyclopedia
• Prophet Elisha in Carmelite Tradition
• Prophet Elisha Orthodox icon and synaxarion

 This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Herbermann, Charles, ed. (1913). Catholic Encyclopedia. Robert Appleton Company.  This article incorporates text from Easton's Bible Dictionary (1897), a publication now in the public domain.

This article relies on references to primary sources or sources affiliated with the subject, rather than references from independent authors and third-party publications. Please add citations from reliable sources. (September 2011)

The Greatest American was a four-part American television series hosted by Matt Lauer in 2005. The show featured biographies and lists of influential persons in U.S. history, and culminated in a contest in which millions in the audience nominated and voted for the person they felt was the "greatest American". The competition was conducted by AOL and the Discovery Channel and reported on by the BBC.

Nominations[link]

Nominations were accepted through January 31, 2005. The seven-hour-long series was broken into four episodes: The first episode counted down the top 100 and introduced the top 25 nominees in alphabetical order. The second episode featured biographies of the top 25 nominees as well as commentaries from influential people such as celebrities and politicians. The third episode, called "The Great Debate", introduced the top five nominees and pitted the studio audience supporters of each of the nominees and a person selected to represent each of the top five candidates against a panel of three celebrities. In the finale the top five "Greatest Americans" were announced as well as what percentage of the votes each had received. Votes were taken through a toll free (if calling from a land line) phone number, through text messages from cell phones, and through online voting. Voters were allowed to vote three times per voting method, so anyone had a chance of voting at least nine times.

Top 25[link]

1. Ronald Reagan,
40th President of the United States, 1981–1989.

2. Abraham Lincoln,
16th President of the United States, 1861–1865; assassinated by John Wilkes Booth.

3. Martin Luther King, Jr., civil rights activist.

4. George Washington, 1st President of the United States, 1789–1797.

4. George Washington,
1st President of the United States, 1789–1797.

5. Benjamin Franklin,
author, inventor, statesman, and scientist.

6. George W. Bush
43rd President of the United States.

7. Bill Clinton
42nd President of the United States.

8. Elvis Presley
singer, songwriter, and musician.

9. Oprah Winfrey
talk show host, magazine publisher, and actress.

10. Franklin D. Roosevelt
32nd President of the United States.

1. Ronald Reagan
2. Abraham Lincoln
3. Martin Luther King, Jr.
4. George Washington
5. Benjamin Franklin
6. George W. Bush
7. Bill Clinton
8. Elvis Presley
9. Oprah Winfrey
10. Franklin D. Roosevelt
11. Billy Graham
12. Thomas Jefferson
13. Walt Disney
14. Albert Einstein
15. Thomas Alva Edison
16. John F. Kennedy
17. Bob Hope
18. Bill Gates
19. Eleanor Roosevelt
20. Lance Armstrong
21. Muhammad Ali
22. Rosa Parks
23. The Wright Brothers
24. Henry Ford
25. Neil Armstrong

Alphabetical list[link]

On April 18, 2005, AOL and The Discovery Channel announced the top 100 nominees.

The remaining 75 nominees:

• Maya Angelou
• Susan B. Anthony
• Lucille Ball
• Alexander Graham Bell
• Barbara Bush
• George H. W. Bush
• Laura Bush
• Andrew Carnegie
• Johnny Carson
• Jimmy Carter
• George Washington Carver
• Ray Charles
• César Chávez
• Hillary Rodham Clinton
• Bill Cosby
• Tom Cruise
• Ellen DeGeneres
• Frederick Douglass
• Amelia Earhart
• Clint Eastwood
• John Edwards
• Dwight D. Eisenhower
• Brett Favre
• Mel Gibson
• Rudolph Giuliani
• John Glenn
• Alexander Hamilton
• Tom Hanks
• Hugh Hefner
• Katharine Hepburn
• Howard Hughes
• Michael Jackson
• Steve Jobs
• Lyndon B. Johnson
• Michael Jordan
• Helen Keller
• Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis
• Robert F. Kennedy
• Rush Limbaugh
• Charles Lindbergh
• George Lucas
• Madonna
• Malcolm X
• Dr. Phil
• Marilyn Monroe
• Michael Moore
• Audie Murphy
• Richard M. Nixon
• Barack Obama
• Jesse Owens
• George S. Patton
• Colin Powell
• Christopher Reeve
• Condoleezza Rice
• Jackie Robinson
• Theodore Roosevelt
• Babe Ruth
• Carl Sagan
• Jonas Salk
• Arnold Schwarzenegger
• Frank Sinatra
• Joseph Smith, Jr.
• Steven Spielberg
• James Stewart
• Martha Stewart
• Nikola Tesla
• Pat Tillman
• Harry Truman
• Donald Trump
• Harriet Tubman
• Mark Twain
• Sam Walton
• John Wayne
• Tiger Woods
• Chuck Yeager