Boyhood At Port Huron, Michigan - 8

Boyhood At Port Huron, Michigan - 8

One afternoon about a week before Christmas Edison's train jumped the track near Utica,

a station on the line. Four old Michigan Central cars with rotten sills collapsed in the

ditch and went all to pieces, distributing figs, raisins, dates, and candies all over the track

and the vicinity. Hating to see so much waste, Edison tried to save all he could by eating

it on the spot, but as a result "our family doctor had the time of his life with me in this

connection."

An absurd incident described by Edison throws a vivid light on the free-and-easy

condition of early railroad travel and on the Southern extravagance of the time. "In 1860,

just before the war broke out there came to the train one afternoon, in Detroit, two finelooking

young men accompanied by a colored servant. They bought tickets for Port

Huron, the terminal point for the train. After leaving the junction just outside of Detroit, I

brought in the evening papers. When I came opposite the two young men, one of them

said: `Boy, what have you got?' I said: `Papers.' `All right.' He took them and threw them

out of the window, and, turning to the colored man, said: `Nicodemus, pay this boy.' I

told Nicodemus the amount, and he opened a satchel and paid me. The passengers didn't

know what to make of the transaction. I returned with the illustrated papers and

magazines. These were seized and thrown out of the window, and I was told to get my

money of Nicodemus. I then returned with all the old magazines and novels I had not

been able to sell, thinking perhaps this would be too much for them. I was small and thin,

and the layer reached above my head, and was all I could possibly carry. I had prepared a

list, and knew the amount in case they bit again. When I opened the door, all the

passengers roared with laughter. I walked right up to the young men. One asked me what

I had. I said `Magazines and novels.' He promptly threw them out of the window, and

Nicodemus settled. Then I came in with cracked hickory nuts, then pop-corn balls, and,

finally, molasses candy. All went out of the window. I felt like Alexander the Great!--I

had no more chance! I had sold all I had. Finally I put a rope to my trunk, which was

about the size of a carpenter's chest, and started to pull this from the baggage-car to the

passenger-car. It was almost too much for my strength, but at last I got it in front of those

men. I pulled off my coat, shoes, and hat, and laid them on the chest. Then he asked:

`What have you got, boy?' I said: `Everything, sir, that I can spare that is for sale.' The

passengers fairly jumped with laughter. Nicodemus paid me $27 for this last sale, and

threw the whole out of the door in the rear of the car. These men were from the South,

and I have always retained a soft spot in my heart for a Southern gentleman."

While Edison was a newsboy on the train a request came to him one day to go to the

office of E. B. Ward & Company, at that time the largest owners of steamboats on the

Great Lakes. The captain of their largest boat had died suddenly, and they wanted a

message taken to another captain who lived about fourteen miles from Ridgeway station

on the railroad. This captain had retired, taken up some lumber land, and had cleared part

of it. Edison was offered $15 by Mr. Ward to go and fetch him, but as it was a wild

country and would be dark, Edison stood out for $25, so that he could get the

companionship of another lad. The terms were agreed to. Edison arrived at Ridgeway at

8.30 P.M., when it was raining and as dark as ink. Getting another boy with difficulty to

volunteer, he launched out on his errand in the pitch- black night. The two boys carried

lanterns, but the road was a rough path through dense forest. The country was wild, and it

was a usual occurrence to see deer, bear, and coon skins nailed up on the sides of houses

to dry. Edison had read about bears, but couldn't remember whether they were day or

night prowlers. The farther they went the more apprehensive they became, and every

stump in the ravished forest looked like a bear. The other lad proposed seeking safety up

a tree, but Edison demurred on the plea that bears could climb, and that the message must

be delivered that night to enable the captain to catch the morning train. First one lantern

went out, then the other. "We leaned up against a tree and cried. I thought if I ever got out

of that scrape alive I would know more about the habits of animals and everything else,

and be prepared for all kinds of mischance when I undertook an enterprise. However, the

intense darkness dilated the pupils of our eyes so as to make them very sensitive, and we

could just see at times the outlines of the road. Finally, just as a faint gleam of daylight

arrived, we entered the captain's yard and delivered the message. In my whole life I never

spent such a night of horror as this, but I got a good lesson."