Light Bulb History - Invention of the Light Bulb
Warren De la Rue, James Bowman Lindsay,
James Prescott         Joule,
Frederick de Moleyns and Heinrich Gï¿½bel.
Between the years 1878 and 1892 the electric light industry was growing in      terms of installed lights but shrinking in terms of company competition as      both Thomas Edison and George Westinghouse determined to control the      industry and its advancement. They even formed the Board of Patent Control,      a joint arrangement between General Electric and the Westinghouse Company to      defend the patents of the two companies in litigation. This proved to be a      wise decision as over 600 lawsuits for patent infringement were filed.
The easiest way to understand those turbulent times in the early lighting      industry is to follow the company's involved. Of the hundreds of companies      in the business, we only cover the major players. We show the flow of inventor's      patents and inventor's companies and how the industry ended up monopolized by GE and      Westinghouse. Company names listed in GREEN      ultimately became part of General Electric.     Company names listed in RED ultimately became part of Westinghouse.
American Electric Company.
In the late 1870's high school teachers Elihu Thomson and      Edwin Houston began experimenting with and patenting improvements on      existing arc lamp and dynamo designs. In 1880 after being approached by a      group of businessmen from New Britain CT, They all agreed to the      formation of a company that would engage in the commercial manufacture of      lighting systems (both arc and incandescent) based on their own patents.      This was the American Electric Company which existed until 1883 when it was      reorganized and was renamed the Thomson-Houston Electric Company.
Brush Electric Company
In 1880, Charles F. Brush forms the Brush Electric Company. That same      year he installs the first complete eclectic arc-lighting system in Wabash,      Indiana. Wabash was the first American city to be lit solely by electricity and to own      its own municipal power plant (that small dynamo driven by a threshing      machine engine). The installation in Cleveland the year before had been a demonstration, but Cleveland would soon begin      lighting its streets with arc lamps as well. In 1876 Charles F. Brush      invented a new type of simple, reliable, self-regulating arc lamp, as well      as a new dynamo designed to power it. Earlier attempts at self regulation      had often depended on complex clockwork mechanisms that, among other things,      could not automatically re-strike an arc if there were an interruption in      power. The simpler Brush design for a lamp/dynamo system made central station      lighting a possibility for the first time.  Joseph Swan sold his United      States patent rights to the Brush Electric Company in June 1882. In         1889, Brush Electric Company merged into the Thomson-Houston Electric Company.
Edison Electric Light Company
In the period from 1878 to 1880 Edison and his associates worked on at      least three thousand different theories to develop an efficient incandescent      lamp.
Edisons lamp would consist of a filament housed in a glass vacuum bulb. He had         his own glass blowing shed where the fragile bulbs were carefully crafted for his         experiments. Edison was trying to come up with a high resistance system that would require         far less electrical power than was used for the arc lamps. This could eventually mean         small electric lights suitable for home use.
By January 1879, at his laboratory in Menlo Park, New Jersey, Edison had built his         first high resistance, incandescent electric light. It worked by passing electricity         through a thin platinum filament in the glass vacuum bulb, which delayed the filament from         melting. Still, the lamp only burned for a few short hours. In order to improve the bulb,         Edison needed all the persistence he had learned years before in his basement laboratory.         He tested thousands and thousands of other materials to use for the filament. He even         thought about using tungsten, which is the metal used for light bulb filaments now, but he         couldnt work with it given the tools available at that time.
He tested the carbonized filaments of every plant imaginable, including          bay wood,         boxwood, hickory, cedar, flax, and bamboo. He even contacted biologists who sent him plant         fibers from places in the tropics. Edison acknowledged that the work was tedious and very         demanding, especially on his workers helping with the experiments. He always recognized         the importance of hard work and determination. "Before I got through," he         recalled, "I tested no fewer than 6,000 vegetable growths, and ransacked the world         for the most suitable filament material."
Edison decided to try a carbonized cotton thread filament. When voltage was applied to         the completed bulb, it began to radiate a soft orange glow. Just about fifteen hours         later, the filament finally burned out. Further experimentation produced filaments that         could burn longer and longer with each test. By the end         of 1880, he had produced a 16-watt bulb that could last for 1500 hours and he began to         market his new invention.
In Britain, Swan took Edison to court for patent infringement. Edison lost      and as part of the settlement, Edison was forced to take Swan in as a      partner in his British electric works. The company was called the Edison and      Swan United Electric Company (later known as Ediswan which was then      incorporated into Thorn Lighting Ltd). Eventually, Edison acquired all of      Swan's interest in the company. Swan sold his United States patent rights to      the Brush Electric Company in June 1882.
In 1889 the Edison Electric Light Company merged with several other          Edison companies to become the Edison General Electric Company. When the     Edison General Electric Company merged with Thomson-Houston in     1892, a bitter struggle developed, Edison's name was dropped, and Edison          himself had no more involvement with the newly formed General Eclectic          Company beyond defending his patents.
In 1903 Willis Whitnew invented a filament that would not blacken the          inside of a light bulb. It was a metal-coated carbon filament. In 1906,          the General Electric Company was the first to patent a method of making          tungsten filaments for use in incandescent light bulbs. The      filaments were costly, but by 1910 William David Coolidge had      invented an improved method of making tungsten filaments. The tungsten      filament outlasted all other types of filaments and Coolidge made the costs      practical.
Edison & Swan          United Electric Company
In Britain, Joseph Swan took Edison to court for patent infringement.          Edison lost and as part of the settlement, Edison was forced to take          Swan in as a partner in his British electric works. The company was          called the Edison and Swan United Electric Company (later known as          Ediswan). Eventually, Edison acquired all of Swan's interest in the          company.
General Electric Company
In 1892, a merger of            Edison General Electric Company and Thomson-Houston Electric Company created      General Electric Company. General Electric, GE is the only            company listed in the Dow Jones Industrial Index today that was also            included in the original index in 1896.
Sawyer & Man Electric Company
William Sawyer and Albon Man are issued Patent No, 205,144 on June 18,      1878 for Improvements in Electric Lamps. In 1884, Albon Man formed the Sawyer & Man Electric Co      for the purpose of protecting the  Sawyer-Man electric      lamp patent. William Sawyer had died the previous year. In 1886, the Thomson-Houston Electric Company purchased the Sawyer & Man Electric Company and      began making incandescent lamps under the Sawyer-Man patents.
Swan Electric Light Company
Joseph Wilson Swan (1828-1914) was a physicist and chemist born in      Sunderland, England.
Swan was the first to construct an electric         light bulb, but he had trouble maintaining a vacuum in his bulb. In 1850          he began working on a light bulb using carbonized paper filaments in an          evacuated glass bulb. By 1860 he was able to demonstrate a working          device, and obtained a UK patent covering a partial vacuum, carbon          filament incandescent lamp. However, the lack of good vacuum and an          adequate electric source resulted in a short lifetime for the bulb and          an inefficient light.
Fifteen years later, in 1875, Swan returned to consider the problem of          the light bulb and, with the aid of a better vacuum and a carbonized          thread as a filament. The most significant feature of Swan's lamp was          that there was little residual oxygen in the vacuum tube to ignite the          filament, thus allowing the filament to glow almost white-hot without          catching fire. Swan received a British patent for his device in 1878
.
Swan had reported success to the Newcastle Chemical Society and at a          lecture in Newcastle in February 1879 he demonstrated a working lamp.          Starting that year he began installing light bulbs in homes and          landmarks in England. In 1880, Swan gave the          world's first large-scale public exhibition of electric lamps at          Newcastle upon Tyne England. In 1881 he had started his own          company, The Swan Electric Light Company, and started commercial      production.
Swan took Edison to court          in Britain for patent infringement. Edison lost and as part of the          settlement, Edison was forced to take Swan in as a partner in his          British electric works. The company was called the Edison and Swan          United Electric Company (later known as Ediswan). Eventually, Edison          acquired all of Swan's interest in the company. Also in         1882 Joseph Swan sold his United States patent rights to the Brush          Electric Company, a successful "arc" street light manufacture.
Thomson-Houston Electric Company
In the late 1870's high school teachers Elihu Thomson, a teacher of          physics and chemistry, and      Edwin Houston, a science teacher, began experimenting with and patenting improvements on      existing arc lamp and dynamo designs. In 1880 after being approached by a      group of businessmen from New Britain CT, Thomson & Houston agreed to the      formation of a company that would engage in the commercial manufacture of      lighting systems (both arc and incandescent) based on their own patents.      This was the American Electric Company which existed until 1883 when it was      reorganized and was renamed the Thomson-Houston Electric Company. .
The company became quite successful and diversified into other      electrical markets. In 1886 they purchased the Sawyer & Man Electric Co. and      began making incandescent lamps under the Sawyer-Man patents. In 1889 in an attempt to avoid patent disputes      over a double-carbon arc lamp design, Thomson-Houston negotiated the      purchase of a controlling interest in the Brush company. The Swan      Incandescent Light Company was part of the Brush plant so it was included in the takeover. In 1892 Thomson-Houston merged      with the Edison companies to form the giant General Electric Company.
United States Electric Lighting Company
Founded in 1878      by the prolific inventor Hiram Maxim, the United States Electric      Lighting soon established      itself as Thomas Edison's chief rival in the field of incandescent lighting.      The company made some of the earliest installations of this new technology      using Maxim's patent on a carbon-filament lamp, which was similar to that      invented by Edison in 1879. When Maxim left USEL in 1881 to pursue other      lines of invention, the company purchased the Weston Electric Lighting      Company in Newark, NJ, and the services of its founder Edward Weston.      The inventor of a successful "arc" lighting system, Weston, as works manager      and chief designer of USEL, developed a comprehensive arc and incandescent      system which the USEL began to market in 1882.     In January 1882, Lewis Latimer, an employee of USEL, received a patent for the "Process of      Manufacturing Carbons," an improved method for the production of light bulb      filaments which yielded longer lasting bulbs than Edison's technique. In         1888, United States Electric Lighting Co. was purchased by Westinghouse Electric Company.
Westinghouse Electric          Company
In 1886, George Westinghouse formed the Westinghouse Electric          Company. The main function of the      Electric & Manufacturing Company was to develop and produce "apparatus for      the generation, transmission and application of alternating current      electricity." The company also produced electric      railway motors, producing approximately 75,000 by 1905.
Weston Electric Lighting      Company
Founded in New Jersey by Edward Weston      in 1880, the company's innovations included the Weston standard cell, the      first accurate portable voltmeters and ammeters, the first portable      light meter, and many other electrical developments. In 1881, the United States Electric Lighting Company      purchased the Weston Electric Lighting      Company, and the services of its founder Edward Weston.      The inventor of a successful "arc" lighting system, Weston, as works manager      and chief designer of USEL, developed a comprehensive arc and incandescent      system which the USEL began to market in 1882.
Woodward and Evans Light
On July      24, 1874 a Canadian patent was filed for the Woodward and Evans Light by a      Toronto medical electrician named Henry Woodward and a colleague Mathew      Evans, who was described in the patent as a "Gentleman" but in reality a      hotel keeper. They built their lamp with a shaped rod of carbon held between      electrodes in a glass globe filled with nitrogen. Woodward and Evans found      it impossible to raise financial support for the development of their      invention and in 1875 Woodward sold a share of their Canadian patent to      Thomas Edison.
The Edison Vision
The economic effect of electric lighting went far beyond increasing the      workday. Profits generated by the electric lamp, in effect, paid for a      network of generators and wires. This infrastructure then became available      for a whole new class of inventions: appliances and equipment that by the      1930s had transformed the home and the workplace.
Edison didn't just invent a light          bulb, either. He put together what he knew about electricity with what          he knew about gas lights and invented a whole system of electric          lighting. This meant light bulbs, electricity generators, wires to get          the electricity from the power station to the homes, fixtures (lamps,          sockets, switches) for the light bulbs, and more. It was like a big          jigsaw puzzle--and Edison made up the pieces as well as fitted them          together. He did it his way.
TO     LEARN MORE
100 Inventions         That Shaped World History
by Bill Yenne, Morton, Dr. Grosser (Editor) / Paperback - 112 pages (1983) / Bluewood Books 
This book contains inventions from all around the world from microchips to fire. This is a         really good book if you are going to do research on inventions.
by Charles Panati / Paperback - 480 pages Reissue edition     (September 1989) / HarperCollins
Discover the fascinating stories behind the origins of over 500 everyday items,     expressions and customs.
Edison: A Life         of Invention
by Paul Israel / Hardcover: 480 pages / John Wiley & Sons; (October 1998)
The well-known inventions--the incandescent lightbulb, the phonograph, the         kinetoscope for motion pictures, the carbon transmitter for telephones--are all here in         detail, and so are the lesser-known ones as well as some Edisonian projects that did not         succeed.
Edison : A Biography (Limited Availability)
by Matthew Josephson / Paperback: 528 pages / Wiley; Reprint edition      (February 11, 1992)
Regarded as the classic standard biography on Thomas      Edison. It is the only biography written in the last 40 years to be      recommended by the official voice of the caretakers of the Edison Laboratory      National Monument in New Jersey which houses all of Edison's original      records, sketches, notes, correspondence and memoranda.
At Work With Thomas Edison
by Blaine McCormick / Paperback: 272 pages / Entrepreneur Press; 1 edition      (December 1, 2001)
In addition to patenting over 1,000 inventions, Edison      was a capable businessman who recognized that innovation is a business,      emphasizing the importance of creating a company that produces more than      just one good idea. Edison never invented simply to create a new thing, but      rather focused on crafting something that would have a practical use.
(Limited availability.)
by John J. Wolfe / Hardcover - 240 pages (June 1999) / Southern Illinois Univ Pr (Txt);
Little has been written about Ami Argand and the development of the Argand lamp, a two-air         draft burner for oil lamps, especially as his discovery is generally recognized as the         first scientific advancement in lighting.
The Lightbulb   (Limited availability.)
by Joseph Wallace / School & Library Binding - 80 pages (September 1999) / Atheneum
When Thomas Alva Edison was a boy, he couldn't just flick a switch to turn on the light if         he wanted to finish reading a book after the sun had set. Then, in 1879, he invented the         ightbulb, and houses, shops, factories, schools, streets, ballparks -- every place you         could think of, indoors and out -- could at last be easily illuminated after dark.
Edison:         Inventing the Century   (Limited availability.)
Neil Baldwin / Paperback / Published 1996
Using unprecedented access to Edison family papers and years of research at         the Edison corporate archives, Neil Baldwin offers a revealing portrait of one of         America's seminal inventors.
Thomas Edison
DVD / 1 Volume Set / 50 Minutes / Bipgraphy Channel / Less than $25.00 /          Also VHS
Life in the modern world would be unthinkable without his inventions.          More than any other individual, he paved the way for the future. Thomas          Alva Edison has rightly earned a place among the most important men in          history.
From the The Franklin Institute Science Museum.
(URL: sln.fi.edu/qa98/attic12/attic12.html)
GE Follows Thomas Edison's Lead and Shines a Light on      Innovation
What would Thomas Edison think of incandescent lights that last 750 hours or      filter out harsh colors of the spectrum to provide a purer, cleaner light?      Little did he know his light bulb that lasted only 40 hours would lead to      products like the Revealï¿½ bulb, which has sold more than 170 million       since 2001.
(URL: www.ge.com)
United States Electric Lighting - Weston Electric Lighting      Company
Founded in 1878      by the prolific inventor Hiram Maxim, the USEL soon established itself as      Thomas Edison's chief rival in the field of incandescent lighting. The      company purchased the Weston Electric Lighting      Company in Newark, NJ, and the services of its founder Edward Weston.
(URL:      www.ieee.org/organizations/history_center/milestones_photos/central_station.html)
Presented by Kilokat's antique light bulb site. A bulb collectors dream come      true.
(URL: bulbcollector.com/gateway/Patent_Archive/Incandescent_Lamp_Patents)
Lighting a      Revolution
This web site accompanies an exhibition at the National Museum of American      History exploring the process of invention. The story is told in two      parallel sections comparing Thomas Edison's light bulb invention with      several electric lighting inventions of a century later.
(URL: americanhistory.si.edu/lighting/index.htm)
Elihu Thomson joined with Edwin Houston, a fellow teacher, experimenting in      things such as arc-lighting and centrifugal force. They made several      inventions and improvements in both fields.
(URL: www.swampscotthistory.org/docs/thomson.html)
Charles F. Brush invented a new type of simple, reliable, self-regulating      arc lamp, as well as a new dynamo designed to power it. Site maintained by      Charles Brush the great grandson of the founder of Brush Electric Company.
(URL: www.electricmuseum.com)
Founded in New Jersey by Edward Weston in 1888, the company's innovations      included the Weston standard cell, the first accurate portable voltmeters      and ammeters, the first portable lightmeter, and many other electrical      developments.
(URL: weston.ftldesign.com/)
Charles F. Brush designed and developed an electric arc lighting system that      was adopted throughout the United States and abroad during the 1880's. His      inventive genius ranked with an elite group of electric pioneers including      Thomas A. Edison.
(URL: www.lafavre.us/brush/brushbio.htm)
Allm about Edison and his inventions. Thomas Alva Edison changed our          world! His genius gave us electric lights in our home. From the Lemelson          Center at the Smithsonian.
(URL: invention.smithsonian.org/centerpieces/edison/default.asp)
This site presented by the Edisonian Museum offers photographs and descriptions of many of         Thomas Edison's inventions.
(URL: www.edisonian.com/)
Located at Inventure Place, the online home of creative minds.Thomas Edison was         inducted in 1973 for his invention of the Electric Lamp Patent Number 223,898.
(URL: www.invent.org/hall_of_fame/50.html)
Celebrates inventor/innovator role models through outreach activities and annual         awards to inspire a new generation of American scientists, engineers, and entrepreneurs.         Featured Thomas Alva Edison for his invention of the Electric Light Bulb.
(URL: web.mit.edu/invent/iow/edison.html)
Consequences of Edison's Lamp
Over the course of the next half century two      especially significant social effects became clear. We gained control over      light in homes and offices, independent of the time of day. And the electric      light brought networks of wires into homes and offices, making it relatively      easy to add appliances and other machines. From the Lighting Revolution at      the Smithsonian.
(URL: americanhistory.si.edu/lighting/19thcent/consq19.htm)
Rutgers University has a section of their site dedicated to Edison. The goal of the         project was to organize and publish a select edition of the estimated 5 million pages of         Thomas Alva Edison's technical, business, and personal papers.
(URL: edison.rutgers.edu/)
The main function of the Electric & Manufacturing Company was to develop and      produce "apparatus for the generation, transmission and application of      alternating current electricity."
(URL: memory.loc.gov/ammem/papr/west/westelec.html)
Guinness Book of World      Records
The oldest known working lightbulb was first installed at the fire      department hose cart house in 1901. Then moved to fire station at First and      McLeod, then to its present site in 1976 at the fire station, 4550 East      Ave., Livermore, California
(URL: www.centennialbulb.org/facts.htm)
Early Incandescent      Lamps
The history of the electric incandescent lamp can be considered to have      begun with the invention of the voltaic pile by Alessandro Volta in 1800.      Although the earlier history needs to be revealed in detail, this site      concentrates mainly on lamp development between the years 1880-1925.
(URL: home.frognet.net/~ejcov/index40.html)
"The electric light has caused me          the greatest amount of study and has required the most elaborate          experiments. I was never myself discouraged, or inclined to be hopeless          of success. I cannot say the same for all my associates." -
Thomas          Alva Edison
"Genius is one percent inspiration and ninety-nine percent          perspiration." -
Thomas          Alva Edison
HOW IT WORKS:
The incandescent light      bulb (archaically known as the electric lamp) uses a glowing wire filament      heated to white-hot by electrical resistance, to generate light (a process      known as thermal radiation or incandescence). The bulb is the glass      enclosure which keeps the filament in a vacuum or low-pressure noble gas, or      a halogen gas in the case of quartz-halogen lamps in order to prevent      oxidation of the filament at high temperatures. Because of its poor efficiency and yellowish color, incandescent      light bulb are gradually being replaced in many applications by fluorescent      lights, high-intensity discharge lamps, LEDs, and other devices.
You can view an incandescent light bulb illustration at the Merriam-Webster Web site.      The incandescent light bulb consists of six componets;: 1 bulb      containing gas, 2 filament, 3 connecting and supporting wires, 4 exhaust      tube, 5 screw base, 6 base contact.