The Electricity Race

By Tiffany Amber Stockton

Last month, I shared about the world-wide impact and influence of the British Empire over the past 500 years or so.  If you missed that post, you can read it here: https://www.hhhistory.com/2019/10/the-sun-never-sets-on.html.

Earlier this month, my husband and I went out to see The Current War in the theater. Initially, I hadn't heard anything about the movie, so my husband showed me the trailer. As soon as I realized it was about the competition between Edison and Westinghouse to be the first to provide America with electricity, I wanted to see the film. Seeing Martin Scorcese directed and Benedict Cumberbatch starred intrigued me even more.

THE CURRENT WAR

The Industrial Revolution period was an exciting time in history. There were some amazing and brilliant minds who pushed the limits, burning candles at both ends in order to share their life-changing inventions with the world. I've done a lot of research for this period, but somehow I completely missed the name Westinghouse in everything I read. Thomas Edison was always forefront in all accounts of the light bulb and providing electric light to the masses.

The movie (based on a compilation of facts) brought George Westinghouse to center stage. It also showcased Nikola Tesla, and his futuristic mindset. The Tesla name I know because there's a historical marker in downtown Colorado Springs (where I live) designating the site of Nikola Tesla's famed and now long-gone laboratory.

The lab was built in 1899 and used for his study of the use of high-voltage, high-frequency electricity in wireless power transmission. Although Edison and Westinghouse focused on wires and filaments to power their light bulb inventions, Tesla proposed the idea of electricity *without* wires. Hmm...wireless electricity. Today? Of course! But in 1899?

I also learned of the name Tesla thanks to Elon Musk, who named his modern-day electric car in honor of the legacy Tesla left. Although Tesla's mind attracted interest from Westinghouse in the competition with Edison, Tesla was a man ahead of his time. Thomas Edison's focus was on the direct current (DC) supplying the necessary energy, and Tesla proposed the alternating current (AC) as another option. Serbian-born Tesla arrived in the United States in 1884 with almost nothing but the clothes on his back, and he landed a job working for Edison. However, his ideas were quickly dismissed by Edison, who chose to pursue his own methods.

George Westinghouse learned of Tesla, and because he wanted to beat Edison so badly, he sought out Tesla and proposed a partnership. That joint effort resulted in Westinghouse winning the bid to "light up" the Chicago World's Fair in 1893, leaving Edison to shift his focus over to other inventions that also had worldwide impact. Although Edison didn't invent electricity or the light bulb, he *did* understand it enough to make it all work together successfully. He was also the type of man and business tycoon who didn't allow much to get in his way, and that's why his name resonates today, having gone down in history as a shrewd businessman and astounding inventor.

Despite the initial investment from Westinghouse that resulted in a partnership with Tesla, the contributions to the Chicago World's Fair ended up being Tesla's biggest claim to fame...and Westinghouse got the credit. Unable to profit from his inventions, Tesla died a poor man in his hotel room, and his name disappeared from history...until Elon Musk. I encourage you to research more about Nikola Tesla and the extraordinary ideas he held. The world likely wasn't ready at the time for everything he proposed, but imagine what life would have been like if the world *had* been ready.

NOW IT'S YOUR TURN:

* What other inventions did Thomas Edison create that are still in use today?

* What items in your home have the Westinghouse label on them?

* Name one thing in your life that is improved because of electricity.

Leave answers to these questions or any comments on the post below. Come back on the 9th of November for my next appearance.

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BIO

Tiffany Amber Stockton has been crafting and embellishing stories since childhood, when she was accused of having a very active imagination and cited with talking entirely too much. Today, she has honed those childhood skills to become an award-winning and best-selling author and speaker who is also an advocate for literacy as an educational consultant with Usborne Books. Through personal development, she strives to help others become their best from the inside out.

She lives with her husband and fellow author, Stuart Vaughn Stockton, along with their two children and three dogs in Colorado. She has sold twenty (21) books so far and is represented by Tamela Hancock Murray of the Steve Laube Agency. You can find her on Facebook and GoodReads.

World's Fair Exhibits

World’s Fair Contributions to Science

The St. Louis Exposition of 1904 

by Martha Rogers

Welcome to the Fair

Palace of Electricity

Many of the inventions on exhibit at the fair were forerunners to items that have become an integral part of our culture today. The Palace exhibited novel applications of electricity and how light waves could be used for communication and medical means were on display. The men behind the exhibit wanted to dispel the misconceptions people had about the dangers of electricity and educate them as to the possibilities for use. This photo is how the building looked in the daytime near the Lagoon and fountains.

 The palace also contained many communications exhibits. These included a wireless telephone or radiophone. The crowds were enthralled with being able to hear spoken messages transmitted from an apparatus in the Palace to a telephone receiver in the courtyard. Alexander Graham Bell invented the radiophone with a transmitter that transformed sound waves into light waves then into a receiver which converted them back into sound waves and became the precursor for the radio and early mobile phones which eventually evolved into our modern day cell phone.

The Fax Machine or telautograph was invented in 1888 by Elisha Gray and improved upon to be displayed at the fair. This was a device which sent electrical impulses to the receiving pen of the device to recreate drawings to a piece of paper at the same time a person wrote them in longhand on the other end.

At night, the fair became a virtual fairyland of light. Here is the Palace as it looked at night.

Palace of Transportation

Exhibits showcased vehicles which would revolutionize transportation for the future. Among them were the electric street railcars, the personal automobile or motor car powered by gasoline, electricity, and steam. 

This is a how the automobile exhibits 
One were arranged.





One of the largest was the locomotive pictured here.

Lee de Forest also exhibited a prototype car radio. The fair hosted the first ever “Airship Contest” and offered a grand prize of $100,000 to an airship or other flying machine that managed the best time through a course set out. Viewers became witnessed to the first public dirigible flight in America. This event led to the city’s nickname of “Flight City.”   

On The Pike

The Pike was a mile long midway much like we see at fairs today. It featured rides, amusements, food, and fantastic exhibitions for fun. Although a primary source of pleasure, many of its features were educational as well. This aerial photo gives a good picture of the length of The Pike.

 The expression “coming down the Pike” originated from this feature because one never knew what to expect. Exhibits included a Blarney Castle, a Parisian fashion show, wild animals, model ships staging a replica of the Naval Battle of Santiago, and a visit to the North Pole.

One of the most interesting was the display of Medical contributions. I was amazed by them. Things like the X-ray machine and infant incubator were on included. Invented in 1895 by German scientist, Wilhelm Rontgen, the machine was developed and perfected by Thomas Edison with his assistant Clarence Dally for exhibit at the 1904 Exposition. The infant incubator was an air-tight glass box with a metal frame.

 Here a nurse is attending an infant in an incubator on display.

This is the exhibit and how people were able to view the babies. 

Constant temperature was maintained by pumping in hot air. This provided a sanitary environment to reduce infection and preserve the lives of children born pre-maturely. The exhibit had ten nurses who cared for twenty-four neo-natal babies in the incubators. Glass walls separated the babies from visitors and prevented germ exposure. Known today as “isolettes,” this invention is a vital component of neo-natal intensive care units (NICU) all over our nation.

The Liberal Arts Palace was a nine-acre building housing some of the world's finest exhibits classified as Liberal Arts. These included models of famous lighthouses, a coin collection from the British Mint, photography, musical instruments and art from around the world. China had a display of ancient books and art from its people.

Researching all the exhibits from around the world revealed more and more fascinating displays.

For a chance to win a copy of my book, Meet Me at the Fair set at the fair in 1904 leave a comment answering one of the questions below along with your email address and be included in the drawing. 

1. What is your favorite part of going to the fair?
2. Which exhibit mentioned in the blog would you most liked to have visited?
3. Does your state have its own fair every year?



MEET ME AT THE FAIR
Laurel has a tragic past and the rejections of men who can't see beyond her scars keep her from opening up to others, and she keeps the scars well-

hidden. The first time Trent sees her, he is smitten with both her beauty and her delicious candy. When she goes to St. Louis to open her candy booth at the fair, Trent seizes the opportunity to learn more about her. He sees beyond the scars to the intelligent and talented business woman she is, but can she open her heart and trust him to find a love stronger and deeper than any physical scars?

Martha Rogers is a multi-published author and writes a weekly devotional for ACFW. Martha and her husband Rex live in Houston, Texas where they are active members of First Baptist Church. They are the parents of three sons and grandparents to eleven grandchildren and great-grandparents to four, soon to be five. Martha is a retired teacher with twenty-eight years teaching Home Economics and English at the secondary level and eight years at the college level supervising student teachers and teaching freshman English. She is the Director of the Texas Christian Writers Conference held in Houston in August each year, a member of ACFW, ACFW WOTS chapter in Houston, and a member of the writers’ group, Inspirational Writers Alive.

Find Martha at:  www.marthawrogers.com

Light That Tree

While researching the availability of electric lights for a story set in 1890 America, I came across a reference to a letter from Montana pioneer Elizabeth Chester Fisk who wrote to her parents on December 29, 1891 that " . . . we lit the tree using electric lights. The effect was good and we had no candles to watch and no wax drippings to clear from the carpet or gifts." (Travers, Sam. Christmas in the Old West, Missoula, MT: Mountain Press Publishing Co., 2003. Page 155. ISBN 0-87842-460-1)

Electric lights on a Christmas tree in 1891? Clearly, this needed investigating. What I found was that Christmas lights back then were a lot more complicated that just looking for one burnt out bulb in a string. Check out this photo from GE Reports.

A box of GE Christmas tree lights from 1905. Image credit: The Schenectady Museum of Innovation and Science.

My research led me to Mr. E. H. Johnston, President of the Edison Company for Electric Lighting, who was the first person to use electric lights on a Christmas tree when he lit his 1882 tree with 120 globes of different colors. He then attached them to a dynamo, or crank, in the cellar which caused the tree to revolve, delighting his children and people who passed his window. Read the detailed newspaper article written about it here. (In and About the City: How an Electrician Amused his Children". New York Times. December 27, 1884. Retrieved July 17, 2015)

Early GE Christmas tree lights advertisements. Image credit: Museum of Innovation and Science Schenectady. Courtesy GE Reports

The White House tried them out in 1894 when Frances Cleveland decorated the library tree with "Tiny parti-colored electric lamps instead of the old-time wax candles." (Courtesy wikipedia.)

I've read that the public was leery of them and stuck with candles despite the fire danger, but the site Envisioning the American Dream has the explanation that it was due to cost and practicality. It shows that when the first General Electric (GE) Christmas light set came out in 1903, it cost $12, while at the time, the average wage earner brought home a weekly paycheck of about $13.20. 

And you couldn't just plug them into a socket like we do today. Back then, all electric appliances like toasters, irons, and extras like Christmas lights had to be connected to an existing wall or ceiling light socket, like you see in the above ad. Sometimes you had to choose between the light, or the appliance in the dark. 

Edwardian Drawing Room. Courtesy of The Cambridge Historical Society, Cambridge, MA

Can you see how the table lamp is hooked up to the ceiling light in the above photo? It kind of stands out, doesn't it?

I couldn't find a photo of an interior White House Christmas tree, but here's one of President Calvin Coolidge illuminating the community Christmas tree south of the White House on the Monument Grounds on December 24, 1923. Courtesy the Library of Congress National Photo Company Collection.

President Coolidge illuminating the community Christmas tree south of the White House on the Monument Grounds on December 24, 1923. Courtesy Library of Congress

Over the years there have been many different colors and shapes of bulbs to pretty your tree. Here are some of the earlier ones, courtesy of GE Reports.

Several shapes and colors of GE lights, 1910. Image credit: The Schenectady Museum of Innovation and Science.

By 1916, the price of Christmas lights had decreased by half, followed by another large cut in the 1920s which finally made them affordable to everyone. 

1916 Sears Roebuck and Company catalogue 

There have also been numerous other lighted decorations, such as these tree stands...

1926 3-Bulb Belmont Treeliter Metal Christmas Tree Stand sold by Etsy

1936 NOMA Lithographed Tin Lighted Tree Stand sold by Etsy

The tree stands look like they would highlight the tree wonderfully from the bottom up since the middle is usually the darkest part. However, the thought of water leakage onto the unprotected wires gives me the willies. Death by fire or electrocution? 

1904 General Electric advertising

I've steered clear of the technical aspects of electricity, however if you're really interested, check out the links I've scattered throughout this post. Whether or not you celebrate Christmas with a tree, I hope you've enjoyed this short walk through the brightly lit world Thomas Edison gave us. 

I'd love to hear your thoughts and memories of old Christmas lights, or any other decorations of days gone by. 

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Anita Mae Draper's historical romances are woven under the western skies of the Saskatchewan prairie where her love of research and genealogy yields fascinating truths that layer her stories with rich historical details.  Anita's short story, Here We Come A-Wassailing, was a finalist for the Word Guild's 2015 Word Awards. Her novellas are included in Austen in Austin Volume 1, and The American Heiress Brides Collection. Readers can check out Anita's Pinterest boards for a visual idea of her stories to enrich their reading experience.  Discover more at:

Website - www.anitamaedraper.com

Pinterest - www.pinterest.com/anitamaedraper/

Where Would We Be Without Electricity by Debbie Lynne Costello

Giveaways everyday in March and a drawing for a Kindle and a $25 Amazon gift card at the end of March

So when was the discovery of electricity? Care to take a guess?  I bet a lot of you said 1752 when Benjamin Franklin flew his kite and key. What would you say if I told you it was actually 600 BC? A man name Thales of Miletus wrote about rubbing two amber rods together and them becoming charged. What he was describing was static electricity. Then in 1600 William Gilbert, an English scientist coined the word electricity. 1660 brought the invention of a machine that made static electricity and things just snowballed from there. Europe and America were making discoveries about this new power source by leaps and bounds.

But when did we actually start really using electricity. Although they were learning it wasn’t until the 1870’s that all their work started coming to fruition. In 1879 electric lights were first used for lighting street lamps in Cleveland, Ohio. That same year in San Francisco a power company began selling electricity to customers. But they could power less than 2 dozen arc lights.

1881 brought the electric street cars and as most know in 1882 Edison opened the Pearl Street Power Station of New York City. Edison was able to light 5000 bulbs! I find that amazing when just 2 years earlier another company could only light 21.

And from then on the inventions and improvements were coming yearly.

Electric power houses had to be built in cities in the 1880’s where they could get power to the street lights and in to very select homes. People of power and wealth were the fortunate ones to receive electricity. So technically it was the 1879 that homes got power but that was such a minute amount of the population even into the 80’s it could hardly be counted. And remember you had to live in the city for that to be a possibility.

Even as electricity progressed into the 1890’s there still was not that many homes with power, mostly the affluent. Restaurants, hotels, industry, and street lights used most of the power. But things were progressing and by the mid 90’s several power companies had laid 20 miles of wire! I think oh my goodness. I drive that far to go to the store but 20 miles was really a big deal back then and they were quite proud of those 20 miles of wire. 

The thing is most homes were already built. Can you imagine wiring a house that never had electricity? None of those holes or wires are anywhere. It’s not like today when a house needs to be rewired you just pull them through as you tug the old ones out. Nope, didn’t have that luxury. So that was a factor. But as the 19^th century turned to the 20^th century the new houses being built had electricity. Life was about to change forever.

                                             By Sergei Prokudin-Gorskii - This image is available from the United States Library of Congress's Prints and Photographs divisionunder the digital ID ppmsc.04414.This tag does not indicate the copyright status of the attached work. A normal copyright tag is still required. See Commons:Licensing for more information., Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=2823428

By the 1920’s almost every major city across the nation had power stations to supply their cities with electricity and by 1930 most large city or town residents were blessed with light bulbs instead of gas lamps.

 However, if you were a rural farmer you might still be running by batteries and crude stoves as you awaited the lines to be run out to remote places. Only 10% of farmers had electricity in the 30’s.  Power companies were privately owned and they were there to make money. Running miles of wires out to a farm didn’t seem economically sound. Not to mention they didn’t believe the poor farmers would pay them. By 1939 the number of farmers with electricity had risen to 25%.

So now onto the place I love. Charleston, SC. Just a few quick tidbits of information. Okay I can’t make anything about Charleston short…but I can try..

In 1881 The Charleston Company was organized by a group of local businessmen. In the summer of 1882 they purchased land on Queen Street and by September they had completed their central-station building. Within one year the company had gained private customers, strung wires along two streets, provided electricity to two textile mills, and the Agricultural Hall. In 1883 they told the city how they could light a city street in Charleston and even demonstrated it. But alas, City Council voted to stick with the tried and true gas lamps (you don’t suppose they had lobbyists back then do you?)

A year later the company went out of business. Yikes! What happens when the only power company in town goes out of business? Yep, that’s right you don’t get power. So all those people who were relying on their electricity to run their business or light their home suddenly found themselves in the dark. ;o)  It took two years before the enlightened city of Charleston would have electricity again. A contract was given that all the principle streets would be lit by electricity and the side streets by gas.

And now for the answer you’ve all been wondering your whole life—Who invented the Christmas tree lights? The answer is—Edward Johnson an inventor and business associate of Thomas Edison was the first person to come up with the electric Christmas tree lights in 1882. J

I'm giving away a bath basket to one lucky winner and a 19th century hand made bracelet to another. Leave a comment to be entered. Follow this blog for a second entry. Tweet it and Facebook today's post for another 1 point each. Be sure and let me know if you are following, tweeted or FB so I can give you the extra entries. Four entries possible!

And don't forget we are giving away a Kindle and a $25 Amazon gift card
For each day you comment on CFHS you receive one entry in the kindle and $25 Amazon gift card giveaway. Comment on every post in the month of March and earn 31 entries!