The vote recorder was an early attempt to restrict/prevent ballot box
stuffing. It is intuitively obvious that here would be loud and
scurrilous resistance to such a device.
On 08/17/2013 11:10 AM, john robles wrote:
Hi Andrew
Yes, it alarms me how badly modern "journalism" is researched, especially items
like this that are aimed at the younger public who doesn't have a long attention span.
This article gives the impression that the electric pen was a writing instrument, not a
tool for creating a stencil.
The vote recorder was a failure, I think, because it was sabotaged so much by
those who didn't want votes in Congress cast against their purposes. At least
I have read of tampering with it in that way.
John
________________________________
From: Andrew Baron <[email protected]>
To: Antique Phonograph List <[email protected]>
Sent: Friday, August 16, 2013 8:16 PM
Subject: Re: [Phono-L] Electric pen
Hi John ~
A friend sent me this link this morning and I watched the video. This may
sound harsh (for me), but I found it to be typically inaccurate media-mill
fodder, with a catchy segment title to attract a big audience. Seems they're
also catering to the contingent that's hungry to pounce on an Edison failure,
perhaps?
In reality, wasn't the electric pen Edison's first successful mass-produced
product; i.e., mass produced by Edison's own shops and marketed in America and
Europe, keeping his first factory quite occupied during its brief heyday?
While we know that
although the apparatus was hard to maintain by untrained office staff, conceptually the
idea was successful enough to attract lumber man A. B. Dick, who with the much simplified
"Edison's Mimeograph" put himself on the map as a major office machine and
supplies manufacturer.
Certainly it is true that the motorized pen was the ideal basis for the tattoo
stylus (or whatever the right word might be).
A more accurate brief account than the tv.yahoo video:
http://edison.rutgers.edu/pen.htm
NOW FOR ACCURACY IN REPORTING
Edison's "worst invention" in terms of unsuccessful marketing, must have been
his Electric Vote Recorder, his first issued patent unless I got this from a flawed
history book. None were manufactured beyond the prototype.
Andrew Baron
Santa Fe
On Aug 16, 2013, at 8:48 PM, john robles wrote:
Here is a clip on what was
called "Thomas Edison's Worst Invention". Of course it is not well
researched, but it is an interesting wawtch!
http://tv.yahoo.com/video/playlist/primetime/thomas-edisons-worst-invention-061926628.html
John Robles
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