‘Edison’ biography launches at the inventor’s WO labs

WEST ORANGE, NJ — To celebrate the publication of “Edison,” the new biography of Thomas A. Edison by Pulitzer Prize-winning author Edmund Morris, Random House will host a book launch reception on Saturday, October 26, from 2 to 4 p.m. at the park’s laboratory complex. The event is free and open to the general public.

Random House editor Andrew Ward will offer brief remarks at the reception and Thomas Edison National Historical Park will announce the details of “One Book, One Town: West Orange Reads ‘Edison,’” a communitywide reading experience to encourage all to read and discuss the biography together.

Copies of “Edison” will be available for purchase, and on display in the park archives will be rarely-seen historic documents accessed by Morris while he researched the biography.

“Edison” is the first major biography of Thomas Edison to be published in the last 20 years. Morris spent several years exploring the vast five-million-page archive preserved at Thomas Edison NHP. In the process he has not only resurrected Edison as a person, but as a man of staggering variety — Edison the botanist, naval strategist, iron-ore miner, chemist, telegrapher, audio producer and publisher.