Dr. Paul Israel

He briefly attended the new public school in Port Huron, and that's where he encountered his first science book, Parker's Natural Philosophy.

There was a lot in there about electricity and chemistry.

In fact, the funnest piece of the book was the telegraph system.

And he and a friend experimented with their own telegraph line.

Edison began to think about chemistry since batteries, for example, were chemical batteries, right?

So Edison began to learn about electricity and about the telegraph from this experience.

And then he

decided that he didn't really enjoy working on his father's truck farm out in the hot sun.

And so he got a job on the local rail line.

There was a new line, the Grand Trunk Railway, between Port Huron that moved down the line to Detroit, which was south of the town he grew up in.

And he sold newspapers and magazines and candy and things like that.

And over time, he began to collect a little chemical lab, buying materials in Detroit.

The Detroit Free Press editor gave him a little printing press, and he actually printed a little newspaper for a while on the train.

And so even as a newsboy on the train, he was beginning to experiment.

And then there was this event going on at the same time he was doing this, the Civil War.

That was obviously a major concern to all the people living in that area, especially when family members were in battles.

And there was one major battle where Edison knew that a lot of the people from the local area were involved in a battalion.

And so he got the Detroit Free Press editor to give him extra papers.

And as he went down the line and the number of papers dwindled, his price went up.

And so he was learning some business values and entrepreneurial values from being on the train.