Long before he invented the phonograph, perfected the incandescent light bulb, or created motion pictures — indeed, long before he was celebrated worldwide as one of the greatest inventors of all time — Thomas Alva Edison was a simple telegraph operator who spent some of his formative years in Lambton County.

Members and guests of the Plympton Wyoming Historical Society investigated the light bulb inventor’s Camlachie connection with Bob Nix, Sarnia antique collector and past president of the Canadian Antique Phonograph Society.

Born in Milan, Ohio in 1847, Edison and his family moved to Port Huron when he was a young boy. Considered a ‘unruly dunce’ by one of his teachers, the 11-year-old dropped out of school after three months and began selling newspapers, snacks and vegetables on trains that took railway passengers from Port Huron to Detroit.

Edison’s entrepreneurial flair was fostered in Port Huron, as was his interest in inventing. Barely a teen, he created a mobile chemistry lab to conduct experiments during the long train trips.



Plympton Wyoming Historical Society members got the chance to see antique phonographs and music players. (CARL HNATYSHYN/ POSTMEDIA NETWORK)

In 1856, the section of the Grand Trunk Railroad from Sarnia through to Toronto was completed. The tracks ran through Sarnia, down what is now Cathcart Boulevard — “That’s why it’s so wide,” Nix said — and through to Camlachie on its way to Stratford.

At 17, Edison got a job as a telegraph operator on the Canadian side of the border, working for a period of time in Camlachie.

Nix said Edison earned approximately $25 a month as telegraph operator, and the work was taxing. Three to four passenger trains went from Camlachie to Stratford daily, while freight cars passed through day and night. Edison had inscribed his initials on one of the walls of the old Camlachie depot but the building was demolished several decades ago, Nix said.

In 1863, Edison began working the night shift at the Grand Trunk Railroad in Stratford, where an invention he was working on showed off his early ingenuity but ended his career with the company.

“He was at an early age into doing experiments already,” Nix said. “He would work long hours during the daytime. And then at nighttime when he was supposed to be working as the telegraph operator he was falling asleep. So he rigged up a self-made device to send ‘all-clear’ signals so the trains would (avoid collision).

“And of course he messed up one night. He fell asleep on the job and two trains nearly collided,” Nix said. “The two engineers luckily saw each other and tragedy was avoided.”

Having one of the most intelligent, inventive minds of his generation, even as a teen, Edison quickly realized his failed experiment was known as a ‘career-ending move’. His reaction? Run for the border.

“He knew was going to get fired from his job, so he packed up and took off and went back to the States again,” Nix said.

And so ended Edison’s time in southwestern Ontario.

Nix spoke about one of his interests — antique phonographs. Aside from being a collector, Nix also ran his own business, The Gramophone Doctor, repairing and selling phonographs following his retirement from Dow Chemical in 1998. While the business no longer exists, the Sarnia man spent years fixing and selling antique phonographs for customers from as far away as Mexico, India, Zimbabwe and Australia.

Nix and his wife Mable brought a vast and functioning array of phonographs and music players from different eras to the presentation, including cylinder phonographs from the early 20th century, an Edison disc music box that plays one-sided records with a diamond needle, and a portable, corrugated cardboard phonograph that was distributed to developing nations around the world to spread the Christian gospel.

Speaking after the presentation, Nix said his interest in phonographs stemmed from his childhood on a farm near Stevensville, just outside of Niagara Falls.

“When I was a boy and went up to the attic, I found this old phonograph there. I was really really excited about that. I just took a liking to it and begged and begged and begged my dad to please give it to me,” he said.

Nix’s father promised he would eventually pass down the phonograph to his son, just as his father had given it to him. Nix eventually got his beloved phonograph — a Berliner Type B, patented in 1897 and made in Montreal — shortly after he moved to Sarnia in 1966. He still has it.

“I inherited the phonograph from my parents in about the 1970 area,” he said. “Before I retired from Dow Chemical, I was looking for something to do as a hobby and started tinkering around with phonographs. So that’s how I got started — doing crude repairs and stuff.”

Lambton County has always been a hot spot for phonograph collectors, according to Nix.

“There are a lot of people here who have phonographs. They want them, they like them, they buy them and then they have a house full of them. It just happens that way.”

So while Edison spent a brief period of time working in Camlachie, his legacy in Lambton County lives on through one of his most popular inventions, the phonograph.