a weekly dividend. The works
sold for $1,085,000."

Incidentally it may be noted, as illustrative of the problems brought
to Edison, that while he had the factory at Harrison an importer in the
Chinese trade went to him and wanted a dynamo to be run by hand power.
The importer explained that in China human labor was cheaper than steam
power. Edison devised a machine to answer the purpose, and put long
spokes on it, fitted it up, and shipped it to China. He has not,
however, heard of it since.

For making the dynamos Edison secured, as noted in the preceding
chapter, the Roach Iron Works on Goerck Street, New York, and this
was also equipped. A building was rented on Washington Street, where
machinery and tools were put in specially designed for making the
underground tube conductors and their various paraphernalia; and the
faithful John Kruesi was given charge of that branch of production. To
Sigmund Bergmann, who had worked previously with Edison on telephone
apparatus and phonographs, and was already making Edison specialties in
a small way in a loft on Wooster Street, New York, was assigned the task
of constructing sockets, fixtures, meters, safety fuses, and numerous
other details.

Thus, broadly, the manufacturing end of the problem of introduction was
cared for. In the early part of 1881 the Edison Electric Light Company
leased the old Bishop mansion at 65 Fifth Avenue, close to Fourteenth
Street, for its headquarters and show-rooms. This was one of the finest
homes in the city of that period, and its acquisition was a premonitory
sign of the surrender of the famous residential avenue to commerce. The
company needed not only offices, but, even more, such an interior as
would display to advantage the new light in everyday use; and this house
with its liberal lines, spacious halls, lofty ceilings, wide parlors,
and graceful, winding stairway was ideal for the purpose. In fact, in
undergoing this violent change, it did not cease to be a home in the
real sense, for to this day many an Edison veteran's pulse is quickened
by some chance reference to "65," where through many years the work of
development by a loyal and devoted band of workers was centred. Here
Edison and a few of his assistants from Menlo Park installed immediately
in the basement a small generating plant, at first with a gas-engine
which was not successful, and then with a Hampson high-speed engine and
boiler, constituting a complete isolated plant.