Gould presently acquired control of
the Western Union; and, having thus removed competition from his
path, "he then," says Edison, "repudiated his contract with the
automatic telegraph people and they never received a cent for
their wires or patents, and I lost three years of very hard
labor. But I never had any grudge against him because he was so
able in his line, and as long as my part was successful the money
with me was a secondary consideration. When Gould got the Western
Union I knew no further progress in telegraphy was possible, and
I went into other lines."*
* Quoted in Dyer and Martin. "Edison", vol. 1, p. 164.
In fact, however, the need of money forced Edison later on to
resume his work for the Western Union Telegraph Company, both in
telegraphy and telephony. His connection with the telephone is
told in another volume of this series.* He invented a carbon
transmitter and sold it to the Western Union for one hundred
thousand dollars, payable in seventeen annual installments of six
thousand dollars. He made a similar agreement for the same sum
offered him for the patent of the electro-motograph. He did not
realize that these installments were only simple interest upon
the sums due him. These agreements are typical of Edison's
commercial sense in the early years of his career as an inventor.
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