This folder contains correspondence and other documents relating to Edison's deafness and to devices for the hearing impaired. Included are requests for Edison's opinion of existing hearing aids, as well as inquiries concerning his plans to invent such a device. One letter from a correspondent offering Edison a remedy for his deafness contains a comment by the inventor that "I am ready to try anything for deafness except taking medicine." The correspondents for 1916 include attorney William J. Curtis of Sullivan & Cromwell and Edison acquaintance Frederic A. Whiting of Framingham, Massachusetts.
Approximately 1 percent of the documents, including all items receiving a substantive response from Edison, have been selected. The unselected letters received no answer or a standard reply stating that Edison had discontinued his hearing aid experiments and that he expected to return to them in the future.
[E1621AA], Letter from Wade Ramsey Bedingfield to Thomas Alva Edison, January 4th, 1916 1916-01-04