When Edison was a boy of fifteen he worked as a telegraph operator. He had to be on duty from 7 p.m. to 7 a.m. and give a signal every hour to prove that he did not sleep. The signals were made with a stonishing exactness. One night an inspector arrived and saw Edison sleeping on the chair. He was about a to shake him when he caught a sight of the mechanism on the table near the telegraph instrument. He waited to see what would happen. When a hand of the clock pointed to an hour, the instrument got busy and one level threw open the key while other sent a signal over the wire. The inspector seized the sleeping boy, roused him and fired him. That is why the first of Edison’s numerous inventions was never patented.
I liked the story very much. I went with Lisa to the library and took the book "Crimson Sails".