The Thomas A. Edison Papers Digital Edition

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This file consists of testimony entered by Ludwig K. Boehm in the case of Boehm v. Edison, which involved conflicting claims over a vacuum pump for the incandescent lamp. Included are statements by Boehm, Edison employee Alfred Haid, and former Edison employee George Crosby in response to questions by attorney Paul Goepel. Boehm, a German-born glassblower who worked at the Menlo Park laboratory, constructed the vacuum pumps and the globes used in Edison's incandescent light. He left Edison's employee in October 1880 and subsequently worked for the United States Electric Lighting Co. and the American Electric Light Co. During his tenure with the former company, Boehm filed a patent application on a modified Sprengel pump that he claimed to have invented at Menlo Park. His application was placed in interference with an application filed by Edison in January 1881, which was ultimately issued as U.S. Patent 248, 433. Edison later characterized Boehm as "the most extraordinarily conceited man I have ever come across."