the
field of light and power, and began his own career as an inventor; and
there also Mr. Etienne Fodor, general manager of the Hungarian General
Electric Company at Budapest, received his early training. It was he who
erected at Athens the first European Edison station on the now universal
three-wire system. Another visitor from Europe, a little later, was
Mr. Emil Rathenau, the present director of the great Allgemeine
Elektricitaets Gesellschaft of Germany. He secured the rights for the
empire, and organized the Berlin Edison system, now one of the largest
in the world. Through his extraordinary energy and enterprise the
business made enormous strides, and Mr. Rathenau has become one of the
most conspicuous industrial figures in his native country. From Italy
came Professor Colombo, later a cabinet minister, with his friend Signor
Buzzi, of Milan. The rights were secured for the peninsula; Colombo and
his friends organized the Italian Edison Company, and erected at Milan
the first central station in that country. Mr. John W. Lieb, Jr., now
a vice-president of the New York Edison Company, was sent over by Mr.
Edison to steer the enterprise technically, and spent ten years in
building it up, with such brilliant success that he was later decorated
as Commander of the Order of the Crown of Italy by King Victor. Another
young American enlisted into European service was Mr. E. G. Acheson,
the inventor of carborundum, who built a number of plants in Italy and
France before he returned home. Mr. Lieb has since become President of
the American Institute of Electrical Engineers and the Association of
Edison Illuminating Companies, while Doctor Acheson has been President
of the American Electrochemical Society.

Switzerland sent Messrs. Turrettini, Biedermann, and Thury, all
distinguished engineers, to negotiate for rights in the republic; and
so it went with regard to all the other countries of Europe, as well as
those of South America. It was a question of keeping such visitors away
rather than of inviting them to take up the exploitation of the Edison
system; for what time was not spent in personal interviews was required
for the masses of letters from every country under the sun, all making
inquiries, offering suggestions, proposing terms. Nor were the
visitors merely those on business bent. There were the lion-hunters and
celebrities, of whom Sarah Bernhardt may serve as a type. One visit
of note was that paid by Lieut. G.