[This collection is currently being edited. For that reason, not all of the names and subjects will appear if the "Show Documents" button is used. Images are not currently available for some of the documents. Additional images will be added later in 2010.]

This collection contains photographs and a few other items that appear as documents in The Papers of Thomas A. Edison, Volumes 1-7. Most of the photographs are patent and production models of Edison's inventions. Included are numerous printing and automatic telegraphs, as well as models of his vote recorder, inductorium (an electromedical device for administering electric shocks), telegraph recorder and repeater, electric pen, telephone, and phonograph. There are also models of dynamos for isolated and central stations and an electric consumption meter. The artifacts are primarily from the Edison National Historical Park and the Henry Ford Museum and Greenfield Village Research Center. There are also items from the Smithsonian Institution and the private collection of Charles Hummel of Wayne, New Jersey, as well as a few artifacts that appeared as illustrations in scientific journals and other published works.

In addition, there are several documents published in Volumes 1-7 that do not fit elsewhere in the digital edition. These include an official report regarding the Union School of Port Huron, Michigan, which Edison attended around 1858; newspaper notices regarding Edison's intention to depart for South America (1866) and his marriage to Mary Stilwell (1872); a transcription and partial facsimile of an 1881 letter written by Samuel Insull shortly after he became Edison's personal secretary; and a transcription of an 1884 letter from Edison to businessman Erastus Wiman.