After the horrible death of my wife, Mary Stilwell, I remarried to a woman named Mina Miller. I bought a house in West Orange, New Jersey. We moved there and I built my largest laboratory. I was so proud of it, and I continued to do my works there. One time I worked for 3 days straight, only pausing for short naps. I have lived my life well and I'm glad with the outcomes of everything. But I could've never done it without my family and my hard-work. After all, genius is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration.
My first invention was the electric vote recorder. It wasn't successful at all. The little gadget blew up in my face , and another time it set me on fire. But I didn't let this misfortune stop me. I made the stock ticker work better, and I improved the telegraph. Those improvements I have always been proud of. But one of my most favorite inventions is the phonograph. I remember the day I was working on it. My "muckers" were guiding me, giving me the tools I needed. The last thing I did was tightly screw a bolt into place. Then I pressed the button and recited "Mary Had a Little Lamb". I pressed the stop button. I pressed the buttons to play back the messages, and it recorded back! I was so proud of the hard work I did. But I could never forget the work of my "muckers".
During my telegraph job, I had some time on my hands. I started to take things apart to see how they worked. The gadgets interested me so much. The way they worked, how delicate some parts were, and how incredible the system powered. One day as I was playing with a gadget, I just decided to become an inventor. I wanted to see if I was brilliant enough to build something as wonderful as those different objects. It was time to put my creative mind to work . As I always say, be brave as your fathers before you. Have faith and go forward.
One morning I just thought of the idea of selling newspapers. I mean, why not sell a reading material which relates to my hobby. Everyday I got at least $10. That was more than I needed for a whole day! I saved some money to put to good use such as my own little laboratory I had in my basement. But mother complained about the ferocious scents crawling through the house. So I moved some laboratory equipment to a locked room in the basement, and I put the rest in my locker room on the train. I wasn't even going to think twice about getting rid of a possession of my own!
One day I started asking my parents questions about Newton's theories and Principia. I got information about that from all the books I started reading in the local library. My parents seemed dumbfounded by my curious questions and they tried to answer them. But somehow they didn't seem right to me. The next three days a person came to my house. My parents called him "tutor". I remembered reading about a tutor once, and I remembered the definition of which I looked up: one that gives additional, special, or remedial instruction.I was just waiting to see if this "tutor" knew more than I did.
My favorite things to do are read and memorize poetry. I could really relate myself to some characters I read about in the stories. I also enjoyed figuring out the messages in the poetry. My favorite was Gray's Elegy In a Country Churchyard. My favorite line is "The boast of heraldry of pomp and power, All that beauty all that wealth ere gave, Alike await the inevitable hour. The path to glory leads but to the grave." This is my favorite because it's the only line of poetry that I never could figure out. I read it over and over again, but the meaning never came to me.
