Professor
Hughes advised him by telegraph, and with this and other assistance an
apparatus was devised which indicated the locality of the ball. A full
account of his experiments was given in a paper read before the American
Association for the Advancement of Science in August, 1882.
Professor Bell continues to reside in the United States, of which he is
a naturalised citizen. He is married to a daughter of Mr. Gardiner G.
Hubbard, who in 1860, when she was four years of age, lost her hearing
by an illness, but has learned to converse by the Horace-Mann system of
watching the lips. Both he and his father-in-law (who had a pecuniary
interest in his patents) have made princely fortunes by the introduction
of the telephone.
CHAPTER IX.
THOMAS ALVA EDISON.
Thomas Alva Edison, the most famous inventor of his time and country,
was born at Milan, Erie County, Ohio, in the United States, on February
11, 1847. His pedigree has been traced for two centuries to a family of
prosperous millers in Holland, some of whom emigrated to America in
1730. Thomas, his great-grandfather, was an officer of a bank in
Manhattan Island during the Revolution, and his signature is extant on
the old notes of the American currency. Longevity seems a
characteristic of the strain, for Thomas lived to the patriarchal term
of 102, his son to 103, and Samuel, the father of the inventor, is, we
understand, a brisk and hale old man of eighty-six.
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