Thomas Edison (right) works on a film camera with George Eastman. In addition to the light bulb, phonograph, and electric generator, Edison developed film technology and later synchronized moving pictures with recorded sound to produce primitive "talkies".

James Clerk Maxwell (1831 to 1879) lived to the age of  about 48 years. His greatest work was  electricity and magnetism (1873).  They say that his work paved the way  for the investigations of

Heinrich Hertz (1857 to 1894) who lived to the age of  about 37 years.  It is published that Hertz produced electromagnetic waves in the atmosphere in 1887. Hertz studied the properties of electromagnetic waves and showed experimentally that they possessed many of the properties of light. It is also published that his discoveries later led to the development of radio.

Thomas A Edison made a note in his laboratory  notebook on November 22, 1875 (Maxwell was 44 years old at the time) “In experimenting with a vibrator magnet consisting of a bar of stubbs steel fastened at one end and made to vibrate by means of a magnet, I was astonished to see peculiarly bright, scintillating sparks issuing from the core of the magnet”. He did further experiments with it.  Later his notes said “This is simply wonderful, and a good proof that the cause of the spark is a true unknown force.”

The New York  press shortly after released a story under the heading “EDISON’S DISCOVERY OF A SUPPOSED NEW FORCE”.  The reporter evidently quoting Edison made prophecies concerning communication systems of the future:

The cumbersome appliances transmitting ordinary electricity, such as telegraph poles, insulating knobs, cable-sheathings, may be left out ... and a great saving of time and labor accomplished. Ocean cables may be operated by etheric force.

The Scientific American also opened its pages to discussion pro and con in its issue dated  December 25, 1875.

Edison himself appeared before the association of New York to demonstrate the etheric Force.

Edison was ridiculed worldwide by the scientific community.

On January 14, 1876, Edison filed a caveat and drawings with the U.S.A. Patent Office for a speaking telegraph design (telephone) exactly a month before Alexander Graham Bell and Elisha Grey applied for a patent covering the telephone on February 14, 1876.  (A modern model  of Edison’s telephone design has been used to transmit speech.)  His deafness caused him to abandon his application.

Edison was known worldwide prior to this time for his improvements to the telegraph .

When reports of his perfected quadruplex  telegraph were published in newspapers and technical journals in the autumn of 1874, his reputation began to spread worldwide among the scientific community.

Edison had used the most elaborate circuits combining strong and weak currents with rapid changes in the direction of their flow. The quadruplex telegraph was an ingenious system of sounders, circuits, condensers, batteries, relays of both differential and polarized type, and “pole changers” effecting high speed reversals of polarity.  At a time when telegraph messages were sent over the wire one at a time, only one way at a time, Edison’s telegraphic paraphernalia could send two messages both ways at the same time on a single wire precisely and unfailingly.  Eight operators could be kept busy sending or receiving using only a single wire.

James Maxwell credited with the development and clarification of the theory of electromagnetic waves is conspicuous in his failure to endorse Edison’s etheric force.

I have included an attachment containing Thomas Edison’s Patent (APPLIED FOR NOV 2, 1883) of the electronic valve that lets a secondary circuit regulate a different circuit.

I have also included Thomas Edison’s patent (APPLIED FOR ON May 14, 1885) as a means for transmitting and receiving signals electrically.

These two patents are the basis of electronic communication.  I will venture to say that if a person took all the time in the world to read and listen to everything that Maxwell and Hertz had to say about electronics during their lifetimes, they would fail to have ten percent of the comprehension of electronics available to them by simply reading and studying the seven pages of the two attached patents