hours of minimum load. By the use of
storage-battery cars, this immense and uneconomical maximum investment
in plant can be cut down to proportions of true commercial economy, as
the charging of the batteries can be conducted at a uniform rate with a
reasonable expenditure for generating machinery. Not only this, but each
car becomes an independently moving unit, not subject to delay by reason
of a general breakdown of the power plant or of the line. In addition
to these advantages, the streets would be freed from their burden of
trolley wires or conduits. To put his ideas into practice, Edison built
a short railway line at the Orange works in the winter of 1909-10, and,
in co-operation with Mr. R. H. Beach, constructed a special type of
street-car, and equipped it with motor, storage battery, and other
necessary operating devices. This car was subsequently put upon the
street-car lines in New York City, and demonstrated its efficiency so
completely that it was purchased by one of the street-car companies,
which has since ordered additional cars for its lines. The demonstration
of this initial car has been watched with interest by many railroad
officials, and its performance has been of so successful a nature that
at the present writing (the summer of 1910) it has been necessary to
organize and equip a preliminary factory in which to construct
many other cars of a similar type that have been ordered by other
street-railway companies. This enterprise will be conducted by a
corporation which has been specially organized for the purpose. Thus,
there has been initiated the development of a new and important industry
whose possible ultimate proportions are beyond the range of present
calculation. Extensive as this industry may become, however, Edison is
firmly convinced that the greatest field for his storage battery lies
in its adaptation to commercial trucking and hauling, and to pleasure
vehicles, in comparison with which the street-car business even with its
great possibilities--will not amount to more than 1 per cent.

Edison has pithily summed up his work and his views in an article on
"The To-Morrows of Electricity and Invention" in Popular Electricity
for June, 1910, in which he says: "For years past I have been trying to
perfect a storage battery, and have now rendered it entirely suitable
to automobile and other work. There is absolutely no reason why horses
should be allowed within city limits; for between the gaso