Metuchen Edison History Features

Recollections of

Boyhood Days

In Old Metuchen

By

David Trumbull Marshall

Published by The Case Publishing Co., Flushing NY 1930

(Second Edition)- (c) 1930

Mr. Kramer Sees Edison.
By Mr. Edward Kramer

I went to work for Mr. Edison in 1879, carting brick for his laboratory. One day at lunch time I was quite inquisitive to see Mr. Edison himself and said to my helper, "I would give two dollars to see Mr. Edison." At the same time a man appeared from the office, going into the new building, and asked my helper what we were doing. My helper said I was willing to give two dollars to see Mr. Thomas A. Edison. The man said that if I would make it five dollars he would show me Mr. Edison. I stated that I was only getting five dollars, and had to take care of my wife and pay rent and couldn't pay any more. The man then said that if I insisted on seeing Mr. Edison himself he would make it fifty cents. There stood a man with a blue flannel shirt and a black tie, and he said, looking me right in the face, "This is Thomas A. Edison." He questioned me as to what I had been doing before I came there. I said that I had never done such hard laboring work before. It was through his influence that I started a store in Metuchen.