National Park After Dark - Phone a (Dead) Friend: Thomas Edison National Historical Park

Episode Date: October 14, 2024

A universal desire to have more time to convey our love to those who we have lost has been in existence for as long as humans have. For most of history, those wishing to connect with the deceased relied on mediums, until two of history’s most brilliant minds added science to the equation in hopes of inventing a direct line to the other side.For a full list of our sources, visit npadpodcast.com/episodesFor the latest NPAD updates, group travel details, merch and more, follow us on npadpodcast.com and our socials:Instagram: @‌nationalparkafterdarkTikTok: @‌nationalparkafterdarkSupport the show by becoming an Outsider and receive ad free listening, bonus content and more on Patreon or Apple Podcasts. Want to see our faces? Catch full episodes on our YouTube Page!Thank you to this week’s partners!Naked Wines: To get 6 bottles of wine for $39.99 and join the Naked Wines community, head to NakedWines.com/npad.Ollie: Use NPAD to get 60% off your first box of meals when you subscribe today.IQBAR: Text PARK to 64000 to get 20% off all IQBAR products and free shipping.Zocdoc: Use our link to download the Zocdoc app for free. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Close your eyes. Focus. Listen to work getting done with Monday.com. Relax. As AI does the manual work, while your teams are aligned on a single source of truth. Feel the sensation of an AI work platform, so flexible and intuitive, it feels like it was built just for you. Notice you're limitless.

Limitless. Now open your eyes. Go to Monday.com. Start for free and finally. Breathe. Girl, winter is so last season. And now Springs got you looking at pictures of tank tops with hungry eyes. Your algorithm is feeding you cutoffs. You're thirsty for the sun on your shoulders.

That perfect hang on the patio sundress. Those sandals you can wear all day and all night. And you've had enough of shopping from your couch. Done hoping it looks anything like the picture when you tear up on that envelope? It's time for a little in-person spring treat. It's time for a trip to Ross. Work your magic. Ask any grieving person and they'd all agree.

No matter how much time we are given with those we love, it is never enough. No matter if those we have lost died old or young, suddenly or after a long battle with disease or age, for those of us left behind, all we want is more time. More time to spend with one another, just a few more fleeting moments to convey how much we care for them or miss them. humans have been desiring these final conversations for as long as we have grieved deaths hundreds of millions of people across every continent and throughout time the aching to connect with our dearly departed is universal many cope with this need through prayer or seeking the aid of mediums while at times this is certainly comforting these avenues can lead to one-sided conversations or putting trust in a stranger in hopes that what they are community communicating back to you is true. And while this is more than enough for some, others wanted to take it a step further. They wanted to know with absolute certainty they had a direct line to the spirit world and that their person was on the other end, kind of like picking up a telephone

and dialing straight to the other side. Hey, now that is an idea. Welcome to National Park After Dark. I'm really excited for this episode because you've hinted and you've told me off of the podcast what this is about. And now I'm very excited to hear the story because I don't know it at all. So I'm excited as well. And I really enjoyed researching this topic. And I hope it's going to come across in a way that gives you everything you want. But there is some parts that I was not expecting. And I think that it's going to leave you. wanting more a little bit. Okay. Okay. Because I certainly want more for sure. But yeah, so today we are, is the beginning of spooky season here at National Park After Dark and around the world. And we are doing, every week this month is going to be somewhat spooky themed. So we've planned out this month to revolve around that in some capacity, except for last week because we took a break. Yeah, if you're looking for an episode that happened last week. It didn't happen. I'm not sure if we ever announced that outside of social media, but last week we did take a break, but we're back. Yeah, we're back, baby.

And today we are going to a national historical park in New Jersey. Fun. Oh, New Jersey. We haven't been there yet for the podcast. Yeah. I've briefly been there and not for the podcast, but yeah, it's a cool. I've only ever driven through New Jersey. That's my only experience there. Well, it's funny because I was thinking back at our episodes and just confirming we hadn't. And there is another story from New Jersey that I really want to do, oddly enough. I could have done this month, but I think I'm going to give it a break because I have some other ideas. But it's just fun. Is it the Jersey devil? It is. Yeah, the Pine Barrens. We have people request that all the time. So I think you should do it at some point. I just, I feel like sometimes because I just listen to so many true crime paranormal mashup

legend lore historical podcasts, like that story is told so often that I feel that maybe I don't want to like throw my hat in the ring in it in regards to it as well. Hey, I'm the person to tell because I haven't listened to any of those and I haven't heard the story a single time. So if you need someone to talk to that has no idea what you're talking about, I'm your girl because I have not heard that story. Okay, well, I'll consider it. But... Thank you. Today, we are going back in time to New Jersey. It was a brisk winter night and the wind was howling through the trees when they all gathered. A group of scientific minds shook off the chill of the evening as they stepped into their friend's laboratory at 211 Main Street in West Orange, New Jersey. They had heard rumors of the

anticipated demonstration, but their friend had been tight-lipped about his newest project. They settled in as the lights were shut off and a soft electrical humming noise began thrumming from a machine on a nearby workbench. Next, a beam of light, similar to a motion picture projector was shot from the device into a photoelectric cell, a device used to convert light energy into electrical energy. From the darkness, the inventor cleared his throat and explained what the audience was seeing. He explained how the machine functioned, that the light on the cell would recognize any disturbance to the beam of light, no matter how small, and that disturbance would then be displayed on a nearby meter, a confirmation to the operator, or witness, that something was present,

even if it could not be seen with the naked eye. The crowd exchanged some confused glances. These components of this new machine were familiar to them, being of the scientific community. Many of the attendees recognized the parts by name, but fashioned together in this way, they were a little bit lost on its purpose. Likely sensing the air of confusion, the great inventor paused, perhaps for dramatic effect or preparing himself for the big reveal, before stating, I have been at work for some time building an apparatus

to see if it is possible for personalities which have left this earth to communicate with us, a machine which could be operated by personalities which have passed on to another existence or sphere. There were likely some looks exchanged amongst the audience, the silent quick glances that conveyed what did he just say, and perhaps some raised eyebrows. This was Mr. Thomas Edison speaking after all. The Wizard of Menlo Park, one of the greatest inventors of all time, known for his systematic and methodical scientific approach to all things. Equal to his allegiance to the scientific method,

however, was his public dismissal of spiritualists, or more specifically, those who claimed to have the ability to speak to the dead. But Edison had another surprise in store for that evening. There were others in the audience that night, whom the scientific community by and large had historically not taken seriously. Spiritualists. Mediums, clairvoyance, and channelers who had taken to table tipping, tea leaf reading, and Ouija boards to convey messages from the departed. People that for most of this great inventor's life, he had largely dismissed or outright mocked. After all, he was a scientific skeptic, but a scientist threw and through, and tonight, he needed their help. The lights remained off, candles were lit, and the mediums were invited from their seats to the front of the room.

Voices hushed as the mediums gathered, the candles flickered, and the steady hum of the machine filled the air. For decades, Thomas Edison posed questions, the first step of the scientific method. But this night, his question was one that millions of people have pondered, either out loud or privately, for centuries. When a person died, did they truly cease to exist? He wondered if our consciousness disappeared, or did it have an essence of ourselves, our personality, did it linger in this dimension? Or perhaps, did they somehow become translated into another form of being that reached beyond our five senses? and if the latter was true, could an invention be created to become our six cents, a way of perceiving what we could not? Edison had already formed a hypothesis. He believed our memories are groupings of electrons, which he dubbed life clusters,

which he claimed defined individual people. Those life clusters, Edison argued, survived past this physical reality and thus could be contacted through a channel of communication. one that he was hoping to create called the Spirit Phone, one whose prototype was now sitting before this hushed crowd, humming and waiting as a medium spoke up. Is there anyone here with us? The seance, experiment, commenced, and all eyes were glued to the Spirit Phone, waiting for an answer. I'm so interested in this.

This is, I've, okay, if my history teacher's ever, taught me this in high school, I apologize, but I feel like I learned a lot about Thomas Edison. And I don't remember learning, never about seances. That's so cool. Like, I don't know, I feel like I've never, never associated seances and a spirit phone with Thomas Edison. I would 100% agree with that. And there's a reason for that, that we'll kind of get into in a little bit. but this was very underwaps, hush, hush, and at the very end of his life. This wasn't something that he was really renowned for, known for. I mean, the guy, like you said, I remember learning about Thomas Edison.

Everyone does. I don't remember when, at what point. I'm going to say fifth grade. Before, okay, so before this. Fourth, fifth and sixth grade. All three. Before this episode, if somebody came up to me on the street and was, like, name one thing that Thomas Edison invented, I think I would have just thrown out like,

I don't even know, like what I would have thrown out. Do you know? Honestly, no. I remember he was an inventor, but. And that's about it. Yeah. So that's about it. Yeah. So, I mean, if my history teachers ever did mention it, I probably wouldn't remember either, I guess. Yeah, which is kind of embarrassing. It's like actually really embarrassing, especially because as I kept reading more and more about him, it all kind of came back. So it'll come back for you as well. But kind of like I alluded to before, he just, he was for a large part of his life, a big reason you probably didn't hear about this is because he was not in the camp of afterlife belief. He was. I guess afterlife belief isn't really something that you learn about as an elementary school. fourth grader. That is also a good point. Yes. So, well, so basically, maybe it should be. Maybe it should be. And maybe I feel like in some Montessori school somewhere it is. And I love Montessori schools. I think they're so cool. I know. I wish I could go back in time and be a Montessori school student. But maybe in the next life. So anyways, what in the world would

prompt Edison to attempt such an invention. Despite the last time we may have thought about him, Thomas Edison is in much of our day-to-day lives. His inventions light up our cities, created the first municipal power supply grid, and made it possible for early musical artists to preserve their works on phonograph cylinders. His camera was the birth of the motion picture industry. He was co-founder of General Electric. He is cemented in history as one of the most brilliant minds and most prolific, one of the most prolific inventors. He was granted more than 1,000 patents in his lifetime. To be exact, it's 1093. And that record held for over 80 years. We remember him today for all of those things and more, but not many know that he spent his last decade of life

geared towards communicating with the dead, seeking to prove an essence of life persists after bodily death. So let's learn a little bit about Thompson before we go on because I think context is key here. Yes, please, because I feel like I'm missing. When you just said some of the stuff that he invented, I'm like, right. Yes, right. I do slightly remember he's part of everything. Yes, yes. Yeah. So this episode is brought to you by Prime. Obsession is in session. And this summer, Prime Originals have everything you want. steamy romances, irresistible love stories, and the book to screen favorites you've already read twice. Off campus, L, every year after, the love hypothesis, Sterling Point, and more.

Slow burns, second chances, chemistry you can feel through the screen. Your next obsession is waiting. Watch only on Prime. Thomas Elva Edison was born on February 11, 1847, in his family home in Milan, Ohio. The seventh child to Samuel and Nancy Edison, Thomas was fascinated with the world from the very beginning. His working class family had actually lost three children the same year that Thomas was born and decided to move west to port here on Michigan for better employment opportunities and more opportunities for their growing family.

By age seven, Thomas was enrolled in a local school, but quickly he turned out to be a quote-unquote difficult student. He was really restless. He was super bored by the curriculum, like bored to tears. He was really fidgety. He just was not interested in anything that class was about. And it got so bad to the point that a teacher kind of called him out in front of everybody, scolded him, and called him out in front of all the other students for his behavior. And when Thomas went home to tell his mom about the incident, she, as a response,

pulled him directly from school and took it upon herself to nurture her son's creativity and desire for learning that didn't abide by the standard curriculum and school norms for the time. Wow. From then on, Thomas was homeschooled by his mom, who was a former teacher herself, and his mind blossomed. He became an avid reader, had an exceptional memory, and excelled in all subjects, but none captured his mind as much as the sciences. It wasn't long until he was conducting his own experiments in the basement of his family home in his homemade laboratory. Approaching adolescence, he read the works of Newton, Ben Franklin, Francis Bacon, and Galileo regularly.

He taught himself Morris Code and he studied all the time. Like any free hour he had, aside from being homeschooled, he was studying on his own. I wish my brain worked like that. I don't, I feel like it would be way. too busy. I'm good with my level of intelligence. I'm good with that. I'm good with that. I don't know. I feel like it's almost a superpower. You can you can teach yourself Morse code. I can't even teach myself Spanish. Like, I know. Some of us are Ben Franklin's. I mean, Thomas Edison's. See, what I'm talking about with the intelligence? intelligent displayed. And here we are.

It is also very late and it is late. We don't usually record this late. Yeah. So anyway, excuse me. People are going to be like, you shouldn't be talking about this. Yeah, well, I am. So there. Maybe I'm too tired because this is so funny to me.

I know. We're losing it a little bit. Okay. So back to Thomas Alba Edison. By the age of 12, he had his first job. He was selling goods on railroad cars. And with his brilliant and entrepreneurial mind, he soon created and reported for and edited and published a newspaper for the train to sell to the passengers that he created himself and sold himself and kind of started in like one of the first subscription services for all. He's not even a teenager yet. And he, he, did this all out of the baggage train of the car. Like, that's where he produced this newspaper. And the car also served as a mobile chemistry lab for him because, again, he loves science. He's all about it, even when he's working, his other job. So he would work, sell newspapers,

and then do chemistry experiments on the baggage car of this train. And at childhood. And at one point, he was, he was experimenting. with nitroglycerin. And somebody on the train car was familiar with what that was when he like went up to show them and he freaked out and he threw it outside of the train car and it exploded and caused like a minor derailment of the train. And then another time he like lit the car on fire through one of his experiments and needless to say, he wasn't very popular with his bosses anymore. And he was kicked out. Yeah. If he's lighting the train on fire, I can see why. that would not go over too well. Yeah. And he actually, he is known for having really bad hearing. And there are a lot of reports. And he has even said a couple of times in different interviews and things like that later in

life that during that when he was getting kicked off the train for like the last time, his boss picked him up by the ear or tugged on his ear really hard to literally throw him off of the train. and that's what damaged his hearing so badly when he was a child. So I thought that was interesting. But going forward, he mastered Morris Code and found work as a sort of freelance telegraph operator in several cities and states around the country. By 1869 at the age of 22, young Edison found himself in Boston as a full-time inventor when he received his first patent for an electric vote recorder. Later, he moved to New York and opened up two shops in Newark, New Jersey,

specialing in telegraphs. He met his future wife there, Mary, in one of the shops when she was 16 and he was 24. They were later married and went on to have three children. Two of home, he nicknamed Dot and Dash as his nod to his love for Morris Code. He like really loved Morris Code. That's a really cute nerdy thing to do. Dot and Dash. I know. It was cute, but then the third child. Dot and Dash is cute too. And that's it. I think you were an accident. Just kidding.

While his home life kind of fell a bit flat, he didn't have the best relationship with his wife for quite a while. His professional life really flourished. By now, he had solidified a name for himself and was regarded by and large as a genius. Although it is good to mention that there is a lot of controversy over several of his supposed inventions in regards to whose idea they truly were. But despite some of the ideas maybe coming from other people, the patents to those ideas and thus their claims to success are truly his and belong to him. Edison grew up during a big crossroads in this country. He was born just a year before the boom of spiritualism across the United States in Europe. By the 1850s, it had a chokehold.

on society. Even President Franklin Pierce and his wife Jane, along with President Abraham Lincoln and First Lady Mary Todd Lincoln, were known for inviting mediums to and holding seances in the White House, which we covered in episode 182. While the public remained divided on the matter, Edison remained removed from it, largely focusing on his own inventions and work throughout the boom of the Second Industrial Revolution. Although he did sit at seances, conducted by one of his employees named Bart Rees, who was a clairvoyant and medium, and he did have a lot of works from famous mystics, like Emanuel Swedenborg, in his own personal library. So it did, he did show an interest at least in maybe understanding what it was about without fully subscribing

to it. Okay. The desire to connect with deceased loved ones is nothing new, and that hope has never gone away, although there have been times in history where it has spiked, mostly in the wake of large-scale death events. For example, in the years following the Civil War, only added fuel to the fire of spiritualism and the desire for connection to deceased loved ones. Hundreds of thousands of widows, orphans, and childless parents locked to mediums for their chance to connect with family who they had lost in the bloodiest war ever fought on American soil. We also covered an episode on that with two girls, one ghost. Remember, we did that crossover with them.

Yeah, it was sometime around this time last year. Yeah, that is true. Throughout all of human history. What was that? Did you hear that? Yeah. I don't know. You're awakening the spirits.

I am and I'm actually kind of a little. That was freaky. I don't know what that was. It sounded like something foul. It did, but I don't know what. I'm kind of like trapped in between a bunch of chords to like I can't really go see. Okay. Is anyone here with us?

Okay. Kim, hold that. I'm nervous. Okay. Well, let's keep going and, you know, no, if anything is with us, then it needs to like blink my light. What light? The light that's on my face. This ring light.

Oh, the ring light. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. then we'll really know. I like it. Yep. Yep.

And this is on video. We're on YouTube now, so you can watch this all go down if it happens. If it happens, yeah. I kind of hope it doesn't until like the very end so I can just like... Get through this. Yeah, I get through this. All right. So throughout all of human history, the desire to understand death and what follows has been woven into our experience.

But not until the 1880s was science introduced to the scene. and likely began to peak Edison's interests specifically. The Society for the Psychical Research and the American Society for Psychical Research were founded, which applied scientific analysis to paranormal events for the first time, creating a new way to study and research psychic phenomenon, which prior to was left up for individual interpretation and trust in whoever you're going to see, whether it was a medium, a channeler, a psychic, clairvoyant, whatever you want to call. them, you were, there was no way to measure what they were saying. No science was behind it. And now,

during 1880s, that's starting to change. It reminds me a lot of what we see with Ghostbusters today, where people go in with the meters to see if anything's interacting. Yeah. If there's any type of electrical charges or currents that are happening around you. Yes. Like there's, it's hard to just be like, oh yeah, I had this feeling. It's like, okay, well, what type of feeling was the temperature different? Like in that one spot, like, let's look at the temperature gauge. Like, let's look at hard numbers to correlate any findings with the feelings or the messages you're getting or whatever. Like, that's when this really started to happen. And there was more scientific support for different phenomenon that was happening. So that's kind of where Edison,

started to get involved. And he spent most... And he's such a science brain that he needs measurable, tangible things that he can explain. Yes, precisely. And he spent most of his professional career at the height of the second industrial revolution studying people and demographics, basically determining a potential market and then inventing a device aimed at those consumers that need this thing now. That's...

He wasn't necessarily being like, I have this brilliant. idea out of nowhere. He was studying people and being like, what, what is, what could people do with? Like, what, what do people need? And what could they utilize? And what would make life easier or better? Or what can I create that doesn't exist yet? That would solve this problem. So it was a time of new industry, the second industrial revolution, expansion, inventions, and Edison was thriving. Remember, he had over a thousand patents by the time he died. Like, He was turning them out. Yeah.

Among his achievements is the incandescent light bulb, the motion picture camera, phonograph, central power station, vote recorder, improvements to the telegraph and the telephone, the phonograph, and the alkaline storage battery. By the time Edison was well into his career, it was also a time when spiritualism was beginning to be scientifically studied, and in that crossroads, he had an idea that would bridge both worlds. As I mentioned, Edison had been vocal about his beliefs for a long time, that most psychics and mediums of the time were hoaxes that kind of just preyed upon the vulnerability of those in deep grief. Especially at that time in history, just as we mentioned after the Civil

War when our nation was just collectively grieving and mourning, so too was the nation and the world mourning the loss of millions and millions of people who died during the Spanish flu pandemic. On the other side of the coin, though, he thought there could be some science to what these mediums practiced. Perhaps it was another calculated invention, one which he wanted to build to fit a need that he saw, a rise in society in deep grief and warning, or maybe it was his own genuine curiosity, but either way, he began his work on a spirit phone. A staunch believer in Einstein's theory of special relativity, that nothing truly faded out of existence, Edison believed that the universe was made up of eternal matter

that was neither created nor destroyed, and that all of life on Earth was purely a physical manifestation of that energy. Thinking that perhaps the energy of the deceased could be a mass to exert pressure on our reality, his desire was to invent a machine that would allow waves of energy to pass through it and be registered on a meter. He then compared the way that he envisioned this working as if like you're speaking, a human voice is speaking into a megaphone. And the megaphone, that device, increases the volume of our voice and how far it travels. So he's basically trying to find a machine that's going to amplify even the slightest energetic signatures. He planned to develop this device that could register movements of groups of electrons

or the clusters of life that he had dubbed them that proved the existence of life after death. And in conjunction, he would then develop a code that conveyed yes or no responses that proved sentience and intelligence to the energy moving. So in short, the spirit phone was not really a phone the way you picture a phone, but an energy indicator. Sure, if that makes sense. Developing the machine wasn't the hard part for Edison, believe it or not. The hard part was testing it, and he had to do this by summoning spirits. So, in other words, to test his invention, he needed the help of mediums and clairvoyance as a way of confirming his results. Which he didn't really believe in before.

Yep, exactly right. Or maybe even during this, because this is all kind of seems like an experiment for him. Like he has no idea how it's going to turn out. So he has all these subjects and this idea and theory of what might happen. He's hypothesized on what's going to happen. But it seems like he's probably throughout this entire process pretty skeptical that he's going to have any results that indicate what he's looking for. Yep, absolutely.

And Edison wasn't the only notable scientific figure who was open to this idea. Benjamin Franklin, Alexander Graham Bell, Isaac Newton, and Albert Einstein were all on that list, who either studied prophecy and astrology, seriously considered reincarnation, had books about the paranormal or the afterlife on the shelves of their personal libraries, or held firm beliefs that extraterrestrials were among us. But none played a bigger role or served as a bigger rival to Thomas Edison than Nikola Tesla, who just so happened to be at work creating his own ghost phone. Oh, there's competition.

There's two ghost phones. There's two. Oh, my, which one's better? Are we Thomas Edison or Tesla fans? You're going to have to decide. Interesting. I love that there's all these brilliant minds that are taking this very seriously. and because obviously this is something that we believe has importance.

So to hear like these minds, these incredible minds that have gone down in history, hundreds of years later, are interested in the same subject. Yeah. And I think that's what was so intriguing about this story is that not that you need backup from others to hold your own beliefs. But when you have people like Thomas Edison and Nicola Tesla. And Albert Einstein, you said, and Isaac Newton. Yeah.

Like, okay. Like you're all in the corner of believing that there has to be, there is something to this. Whether or not it's your exact belief or not, just to have all of them at least intrigued by the idea is it just adds a layer of, I don't know. Validity. Yeah. validity. Yeah. In 1898, about 20 years prior to any mention of Edison's work on an afterlife phone, Nikola Tesla was hard at work in his Pike's Peak Laboratory. He was conducting research on weather, specifically thunderstorms, and to do this, he constructed receivers to use radio frequency

that would indicate approaching storms. And the radio transmitter worked really well. It was not hooked up to power or any electrical source and was doing what it was supposed to do, which was to pick up static signatures generated by lightning. However, it was also picking up other signals, ones in which Tesla was unfamiliar with. Initially, his observations of these mystery signals terrified him. He was well accustomed to other electrical disturbances, like lightning static, things that are natural in nature,

like anything from signatures from the sun, the Aurora Borealis, and more. He had all noted those and was familiar. with those, but these that were coming through on this night were different and completely unknown to him. He heard what he thought were voices speaking in a language he couldn't understand. He wrote down his observations and thoughts in his journal as he pondered what he could have just stumbled upon, finishing with, quote, the feeling is constantly growing on me that I have been the first to hear the greeting of another planet. At a time when radio transmitters were near, nearly non-existent, Tesla pursued his interests in these signals as he began receiving more and more

human voices. And historians can't help but wonder if he was amongst the first to hear what we now classify today as an EVP. Edison wasn't aware of Tesla's discovery at first. But words soon got back to him that he was at work looking into this realm. And that was a big problem for Edison. He was known to be competitive. competition. Yeah, he was known to be really competitive, but no one was a bigger rival to him at this time than Nikola Tesla. Born in Serbia, Tesla was Edison's biggest competition. He was his own genius. I mean, he traveled, studied, and worked across Eastern Europe before landing a job at one of Edison's companies based in Paris. And he only worked there for about six months, but it was long enough for his brilliance to catch Edison's personal attention. Tesla went on to actually work for George Westinghouse, which was Edison's rival company in the race to supply cities with power. And Edison took notice of that. And there is an entire chapter in history about the Edison Tesla rivalry. It goes really deep. It's long. I mean, it got to the point that Tesla was offered a Nobel Prize and he declined it and he rejected it because he had to share it with Edison.

I actually feel like this part of history is striking. I feel like I remember learning about this. There's something called the War of the Currents that they were battling about... This is definitely ringing bells. Okay. Yes. Yeah. So it is really intriguing and really interesting, but it's not really relevant to this particular story. Just good to know that this is his rival.

Yes. Other than to know that they're both working on something similar. and they're pretty much rivals at this point. But just know that Edison was keeping a really close eye on Tesla because he wasn't just his main competitor, both intellectually and business-wise. He just wanted to know what he was up to, what he was patenting, working on, what his beliefs were, like where his work was headed. He just always had tabs on Tesla.

And for the sake of this story, he was extremely interested in Tesla's work. on his own ghost phone. Tesla once said, quote, the day science begins to study non-physical phenomena, it will make more progress in one decade than in all previous centuries of its existence. So he was, and if you know anything about Tesla, he is a really interesting historical figure. He was so brilliant and he's really known in the, I know, I hate to say the paranormal world, but the metaphysical world for like he a lot of people think that he was a clairvoyant and that a lot of his inventions came from like psychic downloads he saw visions he there was a lot of things going on with him that people are like something was up with him more than just being

an absolute genius so there's way more to that is if you're if you're interested in learning more about Tesla I totally would um there's a book I'll recommend after this that I read in part for this episode that goes deep into that realm. But anyways. Very interesting. So he believed, Tesla believed, that radio waves are eternal and that they could carry messages from other people, extraterrestrials, and spirits. And he was working on his own ghost phone, especially after he made this incidental finding of these disembodied voices. He didn't know where they were coming from.

but he wanted to create a machine that could basically tune in to that frequency of disembodied voices from the spirit world, especially after, you know, he thinks he made contact initially. He was very intrigued. And can you blame him? Upon hearing of Tesla's development in his own laboratory, a fire was essentially set under Edison's butt to get working on his own. So whether or not he had been thinking about this already or kind of had it in the works, hearing that Tesla was now working on this, he's like, oh, I'm really getting this down. So the two- I'm going to do it and I'm going to do it better.

Right, and faster. The two inventors worked privately on their own instruments, Tesla on a radio, and Edison more on that energy indicator that I described before, both with the goal of proving there is more to life than here in the physical world. Two of history's most brilliant minds were convinced there was something to this, yet they both died before they could achieve their goal of an afterlife communication device. Wait, they're not even alive for this invention. They both died before they could complete in-tend phone or anything?

Yeah, so, well, what I was describing before of that night with Edison, and he had the little prototype. It was a prototype. It's not like he created this and it worked. It was just the beginnings of a project. Oh, okay. All right. Plot twist.

Thomas Edison speaks on the spirit cone. Imagine. While Tesla's personal notes detailed their rivalry on the subject, Edison's estate deleted all mentions of the ghost throne from all of his notes, personal diary. and research. We know that he was working on developing it and his stance on the afterlife communication based on Tesla's accounts and interviews that Edison gave to a major newspaper at the time. But strangely, after his death, all the evidence of one of his final projects

was just completely erased. The Edison estate claims to not have seen any evidence of designs or prototypes in any of Edison's work, despite the... the interviews that he gave in the 1920s stating that he was working on such a device and detailed that quote unquote seance. I wonder why they would delete all that information. Do you know? I don't know. I don't know. It's sketchy. The seance at winter evening went for hours, but didn't produce any results that Edison could accept. While both Edison and Tesla's hopes for communication with the dead were never

realized, you can visit the place where Edison worked on the device and invented so many others. His laboratory closed its doors soon after his death, but reopened as a museum in 1948. In 1962, it was designated as a National Historic Site and finally declared part of the National Park System in 2009. Thomas Edison National Historical Park is located in West Orange, New Jersey, and is the site where he lived and worked from 1886 until his death. You can tour his laboratory, a three-story building that held a research library, machine shops, Edison's personal office, space for experiments, and various research projects where different small teams of his employees worked on aspects of

projects while he made his daily rounds. The laboratory complex where he developed the phonograph, storage battery, and the motion picture camera, and then Glenmont, which is his personal residence, are both open for tours and in your original condition. Although it's advised that you've reserved tours for the Glenmont Mansion, his personal home, they're not required, but if you want to go, definitely book them in advance because there's really high demand for them. It's all over the National Park Service site. Like if you want to get into his home, you've got to book it way in advance.

Interesting. Not only is the park a memorial to American Innovation. Under Edison's ownership and control, the property and buildings begin. the nation's first industrial research center and invention factory, essentially becoming the blueprint for research and development shops of the future. And although the spirit phone and the ghost phone never came to be, the mere idea of them marks a universal desire to have just one more conversation with our dead friends, family, and loved ones. To say, I love you, I miss you, or I'm sorry. And while that technology hasn't come yet and perhaps never will. There is another type of phone that brings

comfort to the grieving and that is called the wind phone. And I know I've mentioned this to you before because I have used one. But I just, I had to put this in here at the end because I think it's so beautiful. And it's a phone and it has to deal with talking to dead people. So it's relevant. Yes, it is. I love that you're at. this. In 2010, Aituro Sasaki, a garden designer living in Japan, was grieving the loss of his cousin when he decided to purchase a phone booth. The phone was not connected. There was no dial tone, no cords or wires connecting it to any power source. The connection came simply from him. He would pick up the receiver and speak to his deceased cousin. The conversations may have been one-sided,

but the relief and comfort he felt from physically picking up a phone and being able to talk as if his cousin was on the other end brought such immense comfort to him. The following year, a massive earthquake triggered a tsunami that decimated the coast of Japan that left over 18,000 people dead. Sasaki's garden phone, which he named Kase no Denwa, which translates to Telephone of the Wind, was salvaged, and he opened his phone to his grieving community. Word spread, and to date, over 40,000 people have visited his telephone of the wind to connect with those most important to them, who just aren't physically here anymore. But you don't have to travel to Japan to find a wind phone. In fact, there are over 200 of them in the U.S. alone, mostly in public outdoor spaces. And there's a website that I'll link the source to to find a wind phone near you. if you're interested because it has an interactive map with pins across all the world, but clearly for us in the U.S., that has all the known locations of wind phones out there.

And like I said, they're largely found in nature. They're on side of trails, in public parks, near lakes, on public benches, like anywhere that's in nature and a little secluded for privacy and grieving purposes. and they're typically disconnected rotary phones affixed to trees or in a small little built kiosk accompanied by a small plaque that reads something like, quote, this phone is for everyone who has lost a loved one. The phone is an outlet for those who have a message they wish to share with their lost friends and family. It is a phone for memories you never got to say.

And then usually there's a little dedication to someone in particular of, that phone was placed in memory of someone. But yeah, so I have been to Wend Phone. I've used to Wend Phone. I went to one when I lived in Olympia to talk to Ian and my dad. And it's a really therapeutic experience. And if you are interested, like, I mean, the New England area is full of them. Full. That's so cool. There's a map that someone put together with all of them. So Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts. Yep. Almost every state in the U.S.

Aside from like New Mexico, I want to say New Mexico, Utah, I don't know, a couple out west don't have them or at least don't have them marked yet. But the woman who runs this site, her name is Amy, and she started compiling them and runs it actively after one of her daughters passed. away and she became really involved in the wind phone. So yeah, you can look them up and there's one, there's one like 20 minutes from me that I had no idea about. Have you been to it? No. I didn't know until I looked at this map. Wow. Yeah. There's a few in Vermont. I think there's four or five in Vermont. That doesn't surprise me. Vermont has like little things like that. There's actually, it's not a phone. But in Vermont, Al actually stumbled across it. There was, he was out on a trail one day and he's out on this trail, not near a road or anything like that. And he came across a mailbox. And on the

outside of the mailbox, it said, dad. And then when you open it up, there was a, um, a spot where you could write letters to your dad. And it had like hundreds of people had filled this out too. And it was, a lot of it was to people who had dads who had passed away. And then there were others that were letters to their dad, if they didn't have communication with them anymore, but like a therapeutic way to speak to their fathers, which is really nice. It's so beautiful. And I think that anyone who is even vaguely interested in how that would feel should try it. Because there is something, especially with the wind phone, like, there's something about picking up a physical phone receiver and putting it to your ear, dialing their number and talking.

There's something about that that is just so deeply healing that I understand why they're so popular and gaining popularity as time goes on. All right, briefly back to Thomas Edison before we wrap this up. Okay. On his deathbed, Thomas Edison was surrounded by eight empty test tubes. Rumor has it, one of Edison's closest friends, Henry Ford, had requested his final breath. After his passing, Edison's son Charles had the test tubes sealed with paraffin wax and gave one of them to Ford, which was lost for a number of years before being rediscovered in the 1950s.

And it now sits at the Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn, Michigan, labeled as Thomas Edison's last breath. And while that's cool, what I find the most special isn't his final breath, but his final words. On October 18, 1931, he was in and out of consciousness when just hours before his death, he awoke, opened his eyes, and said to those next to him, It is very beautiful over there, before slipping back into a coma and passing away. To what he was referring to, we can only guess, but maybe one day, his life clusters will come back and tell us. The end.

I love it. I love how you ended that. What a cool story. What a cool episode. And perfect. Perfect for October for spooky season. And a different vibe than it's not like your typical paranormal, but still paranormal. Science and spiritualism combined.

Meat. Yeah. And yeah, I just, I know that was kind of all over the place. I'm very aware of that. Not my most eloquent put together story from there's not really like a beginning, middle and end. But that's largely because as I was saying in the beginning, the subject, like I see this subject all the time,

like Thomas Edison's Spirit Phone. And there's so many articles about it. And there's so many, there's so many little pieces about it. But there's really not a lot of information. So a lot of that I got from a book. It's called Edison versus Tesla, the battle over their last invention. And yes, it has to do with the Spirophone, but largely it's about both of their lives and their rivalry and their inventions and their beliefs and what they did for the world as far as what they brought to life from their minds. and it's a really interesting book. And I know that, you know, it kind of was just like, here's the spirit phone, kind of, not really at all.

But I think it was worth telling. And it's interesting. It's an interesting piece of history that the National Park Service preserves now through a National Historical Park. And it's cool. It's so funny because I was so interested in this topic and what you were talking about that I forgot. I almost forgot that there was a tie to a national park. and then towards the end there. You're like, oh, and this National Historic Park.

And I'm like, oh, yeah, National Park after dark. Like, this has a tie to National Park somewhere in here. But where is it? I almost forgot that that was there. But it's really cool. Yeah, it is. Which I feel like is, we're going to New York at some point soon, right? We've been saying that for like three years.

So soon when we go, maybe we'll pay them a visit and ask them directly about Edison's spirit phone and make them uncomfortable and they'll be like that isn't real. It doesn't exist. And then there'll be like. Wink, wink, wink. We get. We get it. There will be like someone official that comes up to us after and be like, it doesn't exist.

Yeah, it's like. Right. Right. Right. I can't wink that well. But anyways, yeah. So, great. Thanks for hanging in there and learning about.

Thomas Edison again for maybe the first time in 25 years like me. Like us. Literally. It's been so long. Yeah. So anyway, yeah, that book, I'll link it because it was really cool. Even if I only read, I'm going to say I only read about 75% of it because it got real science heavy and invention heavy. And you just needed the bits and pieces for you. Yeah. But if you're into this whole thing. definitely pick it up. But anyways, that's it. And we'll see you next week. Yeah, we'll be back next week for sure. In the meantime, enjoy the video. But watch you back. Bye. Bye. Bye. Thank you so much for joining us again this week. If you have a trail tale or story suggestion, send us an email at Stories at npadpodcast.com. Follow us on Instagram and Facebook at National Park After Dark and on Twitter at NPAD podcast. Join our outsiders-only community on Patreon or Apple subscriptions to listen ad-free, unlock monthly bonus episodes, and exclusive content. And remember, when you support our sponsors, you are supporting our show. For our exclusive discount codes and source information from today's episode, check out the show notes. For more information on our show, our book recommendations, merch updates, and more.

Visit our website at npadpodcast.com. And please rate, review, and subscribe from wherever you listen to podcasts. You're listening to this podcast, so I know you've got a curious mind. Here's a helpful fact you may not know yet. Drivers who switch and save with Progressive save over $900 on average. Pop over to progressive.com, answer some questions, and you'll get a quick quote with discounts that are easy to come by. In fact, 99% of their auto customers earn at least one discount.

Visit Progressive.com and see if you can enjoy a little cash back. Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates. National average 12-month savings of $946 by new customers surveyed, who saved with Progressive between June 2024 and May 2020. Potential savings will vary.