The Thomas A. Edison Papers Digital Edition

These documents consist primarily of letters and postcards from Mina Miller Edison to her son Theodore and daughter-in-law Ann. Many of the communications are addressed to Theodore and Ann jointly, but some are addressed to Theodore by himself and one is addressed to Ann. Other correspondents, who sent letters of sympathy to Theodore shortly before or immediately after Thomas Edison's death on October 18, 1931, include cousin Rachel Miller; friends John H. Hammond, Jr., and Madison Ward; Jeanette Hayden Sears, the mother-in-law of Ann's sister Olga; Henry L. Davisson of the Edison Storage Battery Co.; and Trenton manufacturer Joseph W. Thropp. There are also two postcards from Mina's brother, John V. Miller, who accompanied her to Puerto Rico in December 1931.

The first twelve letters were written from Seminole Lodge, the family's winter home in Fort Myers, Florida, where Thomas and Mina resided from January 21 until June 15, 1931. The first letter, written on February 8, 1931, contains extensive comments about the health of the aging inventor, who would celebrate his eighty-fourth birthday three days later. According to Mina, "Father dear has not been at all well since getting down here." She attributes her husband's health problems to uremia exacerbated by his stubborn adherence to his milk diet, which has created an iron deficiency. She mentions a visit to Seminole Lodge by physician John Harvey Kellogg, superintendent of the Battle Creek Sanitarium in Michigan, who a few months earlier had opened a facility in Miami Springs. Kellogg prescribed a supplement to the milk, which Edison tried for one day before forbidding Mina to put it in anymore. Mina informs Theodore that she plans to surreptitiously add the supplement "from time to time if he will not consent to it himself." By early March, the inventor's health had improved. "His stomach is so much better," Mina writes on March 5, noting that he had finally returned to work in his laboratory. Even so, "long trips tire him very much." A letter from April 23 indicates the recurrence of stomach problems, which would trouble Edison for the remainder of his stay in Florida. One letter comments on Edison's growing deafness, remarking that he had told one correspondent that he was not interested in the "Bell apparatus" because "I am getting too deaf to be able to use it." The letter of February 8, as well as the two letters that follow, entreat Theodore to come to Florida and visit Dr. Kellogg at his new sanitarium as soon as his brother Charles returns from England. "Let him build you up," Mina writes. "You are lacking iron too no doubt."

In a letter of April 10, Mina reacts to Theodore's decision (announced to Charles on April 1) to sever all ties with the Edison company and laboratory and to set up his own company, Calibron Products, Inc. She supports his decision, believing that he will be better off "doing the thing you like" rather than being "absolutely miserable in the work you were doing." At the same time, she acknowledges that she is waiting for "an auspicious moment" to show his letter to Thomas, as "it may be a little difficult for him to see your point of view." In fact, Mina waited for more than three weeks before finally bringing the matter to her husband's attention. He read Theodore's letter quietly and then simply remarked, "the end of a dream." Mina expresses relief that Edison had finally learned the news about Theodore's resignation, since she had been screening the mail out of concern that someone might casually mention it in a letter. She also expresses hope that after Theodore turns his own business into a success, he will return to the Edison laboratory "and make the old place hum again." Mina connects Theodore's desire to grow and develop with what she believes to be Ann's wish to have children. "I feel that Ann has just that same wish to develop," she writes. ". . . Think of her happiness too. Let a woman be a woman . . . And not l