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[X018A8A-F] Edison, Theodore Miller (1907-1919)

Edison Family Papers

Title: [X018A8A-F] Edison, Theodore Miller (1907-1919)
Description: [This folder has not been completely edited. Letters are currently being added, and documents identified as "to be edited" may not have images or complete database information. In addition, the information in the folder target (editorial description) may not be up-to-date.]

These documents consist primarily of letters, telegrams, and postcards from Theodore Miller Edison (1898-1992) to his mother Mina Miller Edison. Also included are a few letters addressed to his father Thomas Edison (or addressed jointly to Mina and Thomas), some letters from Mina to Theodore, and a small number of letters to and from other relatives and non-family members. The dated items in this folder cover the years 1907-1919, but there are also undated and partially dated letters. Additional letters covering the years 1919-1932 can be found by clicking the "Next Text" button at the top of the page.

Among the earliest items are a series of letters and postcards written during the summer of 1909 while Theodore was attending Camp Pasquaney in Bridgewater, New Hampshire. Included are communications regarding plans for Mina and Thomas to visit Theodore in camp. (They visited for two days in mid-July. Other planned visits discussed in the letters were subsequently canceled.) The letters also mention camp traditions such as Water Sports Day and the Long Walk and camp routines such as the ice-cold spring bath that the campers had to take every day. Edward S. ("Mr. Ned") Wilson, founder and director of the camp, and Edward W. ("Mr. Teddy") Jackson, assistant director, are mentioned in some of the letters, as well as Marshall ("Mr. Barty") Bartholomew, who chaperoned Theodore and other campers from the New York area on the train trip home.

Other topics mentioned in the Camp Pasqueney correspondence include Theodore's efforts to get a replacement lamp and battery for the searchlight that he received as a birthday present and broke shortly afterwards; the health of Thomas Edison and his work on the disc phonograph; and a fire in Llewellyn Park that damaged the home of Mr. and Mrs. E. Remington Nichols. There are also references to Theodore's pet, Snowy, as well as to the ducks, chickens, and other animals at Glenmont. Numerous letters written by Mina Edison to Theodore while he was attending Camp Pasquaney can be found in the Miller Family Collection, Oliver Archives Center, Chautauqua, New York.

Also included in this folder are items relating to Theodore's early education, including report cards from the Dearborn-Morgan School and Montclair Academy and letters from John George MacVicar, headmaster of Montclair Academy. More than forty communications from the period February-May 1918 pertain to wartime research conducted by Theodore and others at Man Key, an island in the Florida Keys near the U.S. Naval Station in Key West, where Thomas Edison and his assistants were conducting their own experiments for the U.S. Navy. There are also numerous letters relating to an automobile trip through the mountains of Virginia and North Carolina, which Theodore took in September 1919 shortly before enrolling in the Massachusetts Institution of Technology.

The letters are primarily from Books #15 and #25 on the Charles Edison Fund microfilm. Click here for a list of all the correspondence books on the microfilm. Click here for a list of boxes with additional correspondence not on the microfilm. Other letters to and from Theodore Edison can be found in the Miller Family Collection, Oliver Archives Center and in other collections of family correspondence in the Family Records Series.

Please note: The images in this folder were scanned from m
URL: https://edisondigital.rutgers.edu/folder/X018A8A-F
Identifier: X018A8A-F
Alternative Title: Edison Family Papers -- Edison, Theodore Miller (1907-1919)
Is Part Of: Edison Family Papers
Rights: Charles Edison Fund Collection, Newark, N.J.

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