The Thomas A. Edison Papers Digital Edition

These letters, which cover the years 1886-1894, 1918-1931, and 1939 are primarily from Edward B. Miller (1859-1936) to his younger sister, Mina Miller Edison. The first five letters date from 1886—the year of Mina's marriage to Thomas A. Edison. Included are references to a visit by Mina's parents to Fort Myers, Florida, where Thomas and Mina were spending their honeymoon. There is also mention of a visit by Ed to Glenmont, the Edison home in Llewellyn Park, after which he pronounced Mina to be a "good house keeper." Ed's plans to go to Mexico are mentioned in several of the letters. Among the topics discussed in the three 1889 letters are the upcoming European tour of Mary and Grace Miller, a visit to Akron by Canadian businessman Hart Almerrin Massey, and a trip to the East during which Ed visited New York City, Philadelphia, and Pittsburgh. Two letters from 1893-1894 discuss the impact of the Panic of 1893 on Aultman, Miller & Co. and other Miller family businesses.

A letter written on June 11, 1918, shortly after Ed returned to Ohio from a visit to West Orange, comments on the death of Akron-born tenor Harry Evan Williams and observes that, like the people he saw in the east, everyone around Akron "is after money for the war funds." A letter from May 13, 1920, contains Ed's reaction to the death of Chautauqua co-founder John Heyl Vincent. An undated letter written shortly after Christmas, probably in January 1930, mentions the purchase of a new home in Akron and a possible trip to Florida, where Thomas and Mina were vacationing. A letter from February 1931 comments on the birth of the fourth Edison grandchild, Michael Edison Sloane, and on the declining health of Thomas Edison. Also included is a handwritten note from Edward's widow, Elizabeth Lewis Miller, inviting her nieces Margaret and Elizabeth to attend her wedding to Cleveland jeweler Hugh Wilson Beattie on April 30, 1939.