History of the electricity industry

As a result, electrical devices like motors, light bulbs and batteries are just innovative inventive products designed to harness and use electricity.
The first discoveries about electricity come from ancient Greece. Greek philosophers found that when rubbing amber with a cloth, light objects clung to it. This is the basis of static electricity.
Over the centuries, there have been many inventions about electricity. We’ve all heard of celebrities like Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Edison, but there are many other inventors in history that have contributed to the development of the electricity industry that many people don’t know.
Electric industry celebrities
Benjamin Franklin
Franklin is an American writer, journalist, scientist, and diplomat involved in drafting the famous American Declaration of Independence and working with Washington to build the US Constitution. Through experiments he proved that electricity generated when lightning strikes and electricity produced by workers in the factory are essentially the same.
On an afternoon of heavy rain and wind in June 1752, Franklin took advantage of this weather condition to fly kites for experiments. Because kite flying experiments in the rain and lightning, he used silk instead of paper kite. From the top of the kite, he tied a metal wire that sharpened his head like a needle to attract electricity. Kite string as electrical conductor. The end of the wire is connected with silk wire as an insulator. Between the kite string connection with Franklin silk cord hung a key. Then without a thunder and lightning storm, he launched a kite into the air. Kites and strings are soaking wet. But when the sky was clearer, the thunder had faded away, and the lightning still rattled in the sky, he found that the strings on the kite string were all up. And this is electricity.
Galvani and Volta
In 1786, Luigi Galvani, an Italian medical professor, discovered that when a metal knife was inserted into the leg of a pecking frog, its leg twitched. Galvani thinks that frog muscles must contain electricity. By 1792, Alessandro Volta – another Italian scientist – thought that when moisture appeared between two different metals, electricity was generated. So he created the first chemical battery – a voltaic pile – made of thin copper and zinc plates separated by a moist pasteboard.
In this way, a new kind of electricity was born, electricity flowing steadily like a stream of water instead of discharging itself. Volta points out that electricity can be generated when traveling from one place to another thanks to wires. And this is an important contribution to the science of electricity. His name is given to a unit of voltages called Volt (V).
Michael Faraday
Michael Faraday is a famous English scientist. He was very interested in inventing electromagnet. If electricity can produce magnetism, why can’t magnetism produce electricity?
In 1831, Faraday found a solution. Electricity can be generated via a magnetic motion. He discovered that when a magnet was moved in a copper coil, a small current flowed through the coil. After many nights of hard work with magnets and coils, Michael Faraday completed the first generator he thought. So he fulfilled his dream of turning from being the most popular and clean electricity-source of energy today.
Thomas Edison and Joseph Swan
Nearly 40 have passed since Thomas Editon (American) created the direct current (DC) generator. People also know many inventions of the Edition such as phonograph, telegraph. In 1878, Joseph Swan, an English scientist, created an electric light using coal fiber in a vacuum. 12 months later, Edison made a similar discovery in the US.
Later, Swan and Edition jointly formed a company to produce the first electric light.
The Edition used direct current (DC) generators to light up his lab and then illuminated New York City in September 1882. However, other scientists in Europe and the US recognizes that DC has many disadvantages.
George Westinghouse and Nikola Tesla
Westinghouse is a famous American inventor and industrialist who bought and developed Nikola Tesla’s engine to create alternating current (AC). The work of Westinghouse, Tesla and many others has gradually convinced American society to accept that the future is for AC rather than DC.
James Watt
James Watt (born 1736) is the inventor of the Scottish steam engine. When Edison’s generator combined with Watt’s steam engine, large-scale power became a practical task. His steam engine innovations were patented for more than 15 years, starting in 1769 and his name was taken as the name of an electric unit, Watt (W).
Watt’s engines used reciprocating pistons, but today’s power stations use steam turbines, following the Rankline cycle developed by William J.M Rankine (another famous Scottish engineer) in 1859.
Andre Ampere and George Ohm
Andre Marie Ampere, a French mathematician who devoted his life to studying electricity and magnetism, was the first to explain electro-dynamic theory. Today, Ampere’s name is given to a unit of electricity in his memory.
George Simon Ohm, German mathematician and physicist, was a teacher of a university in Cologne. His doctrines were not accepted by German scientists but his research was recognized by the British and in 1841 he received the Copley medal. His name is also given to the resistor unit.
Excerpt from Hiendaihoa, 02/22/06