Today is Thomas’ Edison’s birthday. This guy should be inspiration to all of us. Surely a genius, he nonetheless threw a bone to the rest of us to give us hope that we, too, may be possible of attaining great things when he said:

“Genius is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration.”

Thus was born the notion that if you work hard enough, you just may achieve great things regardless of your innate level of knowledge. Phew!! There’s hope for me yet.

I won’t list his numerous achievements here, but you undoubtedly already can name a few on your own, and you certainly can look more up when you get a free moment. I highly recommend doing that. It’s fascinating to see the breadth of his achievements. An early telecom pioneer, he’s also credited with developing the first industrial research lab, since he was the first to apply teams of people and assembly-line characteristics to the process of invention.

Anyway, as one of the great innovators not only of his time, but of all time, he has an incredible portfolio of patents to his name. Can you tell me how many? And which do you believe to be his greatest invention (and why)? His most interesting invention? Personally, I was stunned to discover what his very first patent was for. Do you know what it was?

A fascinating guy. An inspiration to all of us working to promote and support innovation.