Inducted into the Michigan Walk of Fame on May 25, 2006, Thomas Edison was a technological genius who is credited with more than 1,000 patents and laboratories that helped establish the concept of industrial research.

As a boy in Port Huron, Thomas Edison spent hours in the laboratory he created in his parents’ basement.  Partially deaf as a teen, Edison was a telegraph operator in Mount Clemens.  Many of his early inventions related to “telegraphy” including a stock ticker and electric vote counter.

Edison had passion for inventing devices that met practical needs of everyday people.  “I never perfected an invention that I did not think about in terms of the service it might give others,” Edison said, “I find out what the world needs, then I proceed to invent.”

Edison devised a safe, economical incandescent electric light, as well as the dynamos, meters, switches and fuses needed to generate and distribute electric power. He also invented the motion picture camera and projector and such office equipment as the mimeograph and the dictating machine. The phonograph was Edison’s personal favorite.