Thomas Edison

Thomas Alva Edison was the famed inventor whose work gave the world the light bulb, the phonograph, and countless other creations. He died long before the present day, but in Odyssey he survives as a favorite lesson about potential and perseverance. As a boy in 1856 he was an odd, curious child whose wild experiments kept landing him in trouble. Sam Johnson met that young Thomas during an Imagination Station adventure. Not knowing who the boy was, Sam advised him to quit trying to discover things and just be normal. Only when he heard Thomas's mother call him by his full name did Sam grasp what the world would have lost. Edison's many mistakes are also remembered at Whit's End, as proof that even great inventors stumbled often on the way to greatness.