Thomas Alva Edison’s great-grandson, David E. Sloane, looked up at the Edison Memorial Tower on Sunday and smiled.
David E. Sloane, great-grandson of Thomas Alva Edison, speaks to the crowd Sunday during a celebration marking the 85th anniversary of Edison’s return to Menlo Park and for the unveiling of a memorial tablet. MATT DENTON “I just love it,” he said. “It’s gorgeous. … It’s wonderful that Edison Township has really made this a center where people can explore.”
Sloane, who was making his first visit to the site where his famous great-grandfather invented the phonograph and the incandescent light bulb, was one of the honored guests at the event, held to celebrate the 85th anniversary of Thomas Edison’s return to Menlo Park and for the unveiling of the memorial tablet donated by the state in honor of Edison and his work.
Other guests at Sunday’s event included Paul Israel, director and editor of the Thomas A. Edison papers at Rutgers University, Edison Mayor Antonia Ricigliano, former Mayor Thomas Paterniti, Township Council members, state Assemblymen Peter Barnes III and Patrick Diegnan, Middlesex County Freeholder Millie Scott, members of the Menlo Park Fire Department and members of the Edison Memorial Tower Corp. (EMTC).
Boy Scout Troops 12 and 66 led the crowd in the “Pledge of Allegiance,” and the Edison High School Chamber Singers sang “The Star-Spangled Banner.” Rich Paul and Marc Garabedian, trumpeters from J.P. Stevens High School, played taps, and a student from the Wardlaw-
Hartridge School read the Menlo Park poem.
The memorial tablet remains at the edge of the site of Edison’s home, adjoining Lincoln Highway (Route 27).
Theodore Fauquier, 91, was 6 years old when he attended that ceremony on May 16, 1925. He still lives down the street from where Edison had his laboratory.
“School was closed that day,” he said, recalling the historic event. Fauquier noted that he shook hands with Edison and Henry Ford at that ceremony.
“As a kid, it was a great thing, and it is a great honor to come here today. As I became older, I really began to cherish what has happened in history. It is great to be part of something that has been happening all along,” he said.
In the 1920s, Ford came to New Jersey with Edison to recover the buildings of the invention laboratory; however, they found that most of them had been removed or collapsed, according to the Henry Ford Museum’s website. He had his staff reconstruct the buildings using photographs, and they now stand at his museum in Dearborn, Mich.
Barnes noted that Thomas Edison was named the “Man of the Millennium” by Time Magazine.
“If you think about all the people in the past millennium, what an honor that Edison’s inventions were invented right here in Menlo Park,” the assemblyman said. “He is part of who we are as Edison residents, and when I see the Edison tower from my law office, it is inspiring.”
Paterniti reminded the crowd that the township celebrated the 100th anniversary of the electric light bulb 34 years ago when he was mayor.
“We had a parade, and Edison’s daughter came; she was close to 90 years old at the time. We also had celebrities, actresses Susan Sarandon and Gail Fisher were there,” he said. “[Edison’s] daughter gave a bronze plaque to me, which was engraved by her and by Charles Edison, who was the former governor of New Jersey.”
Paterniti noted that Christie Street, where the Edison Memorial Tower is located, was the first street in the township to have electric lighting.
“It’s an honor to have Edison’s grandson walk the same hallowed grounds that his grandfather walked 134 years ago,” he said.
Ricigliano said she remembers when, as a high school student in Irvington, she heard that Raritan Township had changed its name to Edison Township.
“I shouldn’t tell you that, because I’m datingmyself, but I still remember that,” she said.
Ricigliano explained that a couple of years ago she became part of an organization to save the Edison Memorial Tower.
“We had two busloads of people join us on May 22 of that year, who came from all around world,” she said. “A good number of them were from Australia. Thomas Edison is so revered in Australia that so many youngsters’ first nameswere Edison; even two people on that trip said their brothers’ names were Edison. … He is a wonderful figure in our history.”
Ricigliano presented Sloane and his familywith a pin featuring a picture of the Edison Memorial Tower.
Paul Israel shared the history of Thomas Edison’s time in Menlo Park with the crowd, and attendees were able to tour the museum and the grounds of the memorial tower.
Nancy Zerbe, president of the nonprofit Edison Memorial Tower Corp., said the point of the celebration was to look at both the past and the future. She explained that the organization is working to renovate the museum by providing handicap accessibility and providing a better treatment of the historic artifacts. The organization is also working on the restoration of the tower, a project that is expected to go out to bid this summer. Ultimately the group will be making plans for a new museum.
“The museum is a wonderful two-room building, but our board, feisty at times, agreed that the museum is not large enough and does not do justice to the tremendous historic significance of the site,” Zerbe said.
The chief of the Menlo Park Volunteer Fire Department said members of the department come to the site every February to celebrate Edison’s life. Thomas Edison’s inventions indirectly instigated the formation of the volunteer Edison Fire Company in 1924 because he had his employees become aware of fire safety at the laboratory.
Sloane, a professor at the University of New Haven in Connecticut, attended the event with his wife, Bonnie, son David Jr. and daughter Elizabeth. He explained that his grandfather was “not cynical at all” about his accomplishments.
“He was a patriot who understood what his role as a citizen was, and he invented and made money while doing it,” he said. He displayed one of the original Edison Portland Cement Co. bags.
“This did not come down the family line … I actually got it on eBay for $18,” Sloane said to laughs from the crowd.
Sloane said he is working on a book about his mother, Madeleine, who was the product of Edison’s second marriage. He read a passage describing how his family has dealt with being in the public eye.
“It’s hard being that visible, but the tower here is public and people are supposed to come here,” he said. “You have something that no one else has, the inventiveness, the enthusiasm, the family and the values, and the whole community is centered around that. I urge you to share it with each other, because it is a beautiful thing.”
Elsye Crossin of Edison said she first visited the tower with a friend a few years ago and found the condition of the tower “embarrassing.” Crossin then became involved with helping to restore the site.
“I felt that this was a serious cause for the schools, the Scouts, for the culture of the community.… Many people are not aware of the tower,” she said. “This is a place where people can come to the museum and have a picnic.”
Edison resident Thomas Good said it was great to see the large turnout on Sunday. He felt that they should have honored Edison a long time ago with the restoration of the tower and the creation of the museum.
“We shouldn’t have waited this long,” he said.