By Chris Jacob writing for Gizmodo
Thomas Edison was known for his wacky publicity stunts, but during the Christmas of 1880 he went for the sentimental rather than shock value. That year, instead of electrocuting an elephant, he brought us the first electric Christmas light display.
The Wizard’s Light Show
By the time 1880 rolled around, Edison had his incandescent light bulbs pretty well figured out, and was on the lookout for a way to advertise them. Brian Murray’s article “Christmas Lights and Community Building in America” [PDF] describes Edison’s marketing trick during that holiday season. To display his invention as a means of heightening Yuletide excitement, he strung up incandescent bulbs all around his Menlo Park laboratory compound [PDF], so that passing commuters on the nearby railway could see the Christmas miracle. But Edison being Edison, he decided to make the challenge a little tricker by powering the lights from a remote generator eight miles away.
World-Wide Business Centres
Office Space and Meeting Rooms
575 Madison Avenue – 10th floor
New York, NY 10022
(212) 605-0200