Elihu Thomson
Elihu Thomson (March 29, 1853 – March 13, 1937) was an engineer and inventor who held 696 U.S. patents on numerous electrical inventions, including arc lights, generators, electric welding machines, x-ray tubes, and recording wattmeters. He played a formative role in the invention of the high-frequency dynamo and the transformer. He is also remembered for his role in founding major electrical companies in the United States, United Kingdom, and France.
Born in Manchester, England, Thomson grew up in Lynn, Massachusetts. His family moved to Philadelphia in 1858. Thomson became a science teacher at Philadelphia's Central High School.
In 1880, Thomson and fellow teacher Edwin Houston established the firm of American Electric Company with investors from New Britain, Connecticut. In 1883, a group of shoe manufacturers in Lynn, Massachusetts bought out the Connecticut investors, and established the Thomson-Houston Electric Company. The plant was moved to Lynn and sold arc lamps and related electrical systems. In 1886 Thomson-Houston purchased the Sawyer & Man Electric Company, and began making incandescant lamps under the Sawyer-Man patents. While contemporary Thomas Edison was promoting direct current technology, Elihu Thomson favored and experimented with alternating current instrumentation. His work was preferred and the U. S. adopted AC technology for its electrical distribution systems.
By 1890, the three biggest companies in the lighting industry were Edison General Electric Company, Thomson-Houston Electric Company, and Westinghouse Electric Company. In 1892, financier John Pierpont Morgan engineered a merger between Edison General and Thomson-Houston, creating General Electric (GE).
Thomson created an industrial and scientific research lab at GE in 1900.
Thomson served as acting president of MIT from 1920-1923. He retired to Swampscott, Massachusetts.
