----- Original Message ----- From: "Douglas Houston" <cdh041 at earthlink.net> To: "Antique Phonograph List" <phono-l at oldcrank.org> Sent: Wednesday, November 21, 2007 9:08 PM Subject: Re: [Phono-L] Last Con Edison Direct Current Customer Is History > > No need to get your backs arched, and claws drawn about Edison's > shortcomings. He had them, like any other human being has. He was great, > and the world recognizes his greatness. But he was a human being, and had > soft spots, like all of us, but fewer than most of us. Who else in history > ever rated a whole nation turning out lights for a minute in reverence at > his passing? Edison was a VERY adept self-publicist, from the beginning. He carefully built himself up as an everyman who also happened to be a genius. He came across as someone you might find in your own family- intelligent but with enough flaws to be comfortable with (some rather coarse flaws, at least until Mina reconstructed him into the Grand Old Man). His rather ruthless business instincts weren't on display to the general public. The opposite might be Ford- the self made mechanic who comes off as a rather cold man. Even the seeming folksy nature of Greenfield Village has cold calculation behind it. If Edison and Ford had ever gone into direct competition there would have been fireworks. Eric Stott