Radio Boys Cronies | Page 9

Al
would play with my little two-and-a-half-year old son, Jimmy.
"'It was at 9:30 on a lovely summer morning. The train had arrived,
leaving its passenger coach and baggage car standing on the main track
at the north end of the station platform, the pin between the baggage
and the first box car having been pulled out. There were about a dozen
freight cars, which had pulled ahead and backed in upon the
freight-house siding. The train men had taken out a box car and pushed
it with force enough to reach the baggage car without a brakeman
controlling it.
"'At this moment Al turned and saw little Jimmy on the main track,
throwing pebbles over his head in the sunshine, all unconscious of
danger. Dashing his papers and cap on the platform he plunged to the
rescue.

"'The train baggage man was the only eyewitness. He told me that
when he saw Al jump toward Jimmy he thought sure both boys would
be crushed. Seizing Jimmy in his arms just as the box car was about to
strike them, young Edison threw himself off the track. There wasn't a
tenth of a second to lose. By this instinctive act he saved his own life,
for if he had thrown the little chap first and then himself, he would
have been crushed under the wheels.
"'As it was, the front wheel struck the heel of the newsboy's boot and he
and Jimmy fell, face downward on the sharp, fresh-gravel ballast so
hard that they were both bleeding and the baggage man thought sure
the wheel had gone over them. To his surprise their injuries proved to
be only skin deep.
"'I was in the ticket office when I heard the shriek and ran out in time to
see the train hands carrying the two boys to the platform. My first
thought was: 'How can I, a poor man, reward the dear lad for risking his
life to save my child's?' Then it came to me, 'I can teach him
telegraphy.' When I offered to do this, he smiled and said, 'I'd like to
learn,' and learn he did. I never saw any one pick it up so fast. It was a
sort of second nature with him. After the conductor treated him so
badly, throwing off his apparatus, boxing his ears and making him hard
of hearing, Al seemed to lose his interest in his business as train boy.
"'Some days Al would stop at my station at half past nine in the
morning and stay all day while the train went on to Detroit and returned
to Mt. Clemens in the evening. The train baggage man who saw Al
rescue Jimmy would get the papers in Detroit and bring them up to Mt.
Clemens for him. During these long hours the Edison boy made rapid
progress in learning. And every day he made the most of the half hour
or more of practice he had while the train stopped at Mt. Clemens each
way.
"'At the end of a couple of weeks I missed him for several days. Next
time he dropped off he showed me a set of telegraph instruments he had
made in a gunshop in Detroit, where the stationer who had sold him
goods had told the owner of the machine shop the story of the printing
press.'

"The first place young Edison worked after he was graduated from the
Mt. Clemens private school of telegraphy was in Port Huron, his home
town. Here he had too many boy friends to let him keep on the job as a
youthful telegrapher should. Besides, he had a laboratory in his home
and found it too fascinating to take enough sleep. Between too much
side work and mischief, young Edison sometimes found himself in
trouble. Some of his escapades he has described to his friend and
assistant, William H. Meadowcroft.
"'About every night we could hear the soldiers stationed at Fort Gratiot.
One would call out: "Corporal of Guard Number One!" This was
repeated from one sentry to another till it reached the barracks and "No.
1" came out to see what was wanted. The Dutch boy (who used to help
me with the papers) and I thought we would try our hand in military
matters.
"'So one dark night I called, "Corporal of the Guard Number One!" The
second sentry, thinking it had come from the man stationed at the end,
repeated this, and the words went down the line as usual. This reached
Corporal Number One, and brought him back to our end only to find
out that he had been tricked by someone.
"'We did this three times, but on the third night they were watching.
They caught the Dutch boy and locked him up in the