telegraph, who then lived in Adrian and went to his
office in Toledo every day, happened that day to be in the Western Union
office up-town--and it was the superintendent I was really struggling
with! In about twenty minutes he arrived livid with rage, and I was
discharged on the spot. I informed him that the general superintendent
had told me to break in and send the despatch, but the general
superintendent then and there repudiated the whole thing. Their families
were socially close, so I was sacrificed. My faith in human nature got a
slight jar."

Edison then went to Toledo and secured a position at Fort Wayne, on the
Pittsburg, Fort Wayne & Chicago Railroad, now leased to the Pennsylvania
system. This was a "day job," and he did not like it. He drifted two
months later to Indianapolis, arriving there in the fall of 1864, when
he was at first assigned to duty at the Union Station at a salary of $75
a month for the Western Union Telegraph Company, whose service he
now entered, and with which he has been destined to maintain highly
important and close relationships throughout a large part of his life.
Superintendent Wallick appears to have treated him generously and to
have loaned him instruments, a kindness that was greatly appreciated,
for twenty years later the inventor called on his old employer, and
together they visited the scene where the borrowed apparatus had been
mounted on a rough board in the depot. Edison did not stay long in
Indianapolis, however, resigning in February, 1865, and proceeding to
Cincinnati. The transfer was possibly due to trouble caused by one of
his early inventions embodying what has been characterized by an expert
as "probably the most simple and ingenious arrangement of connections
for a repeater." His ambition was to take "press report," but finding,
even after considerable practice, that he "broke" frequently, he
adjusted two embossing Morse registers--one to receive the press
matter, and the other to repeat the dots and dashes at a lower speed, so
that the message could be copied leisurely. Hence he could not be rushed
or "broken" in receiving, while he could turn out "copy" that was a
marvel of neatness and clearness. All was well so long as ordinary
conditions prevailed, but when an unusual pressure occurred the little
system fell behind, and the newspapers complained of the slowness with
which reports were delivered to them. It is easy to understand that with
matter received at a