When I was up in Greenfield Village at the Henry Ford Museum I was able to walk through Thomas Edison’s Menlo Park Lab.  The Village has done a beautiful job of maintaining the lab.  The lab was much larger and had a bigger scale that I had anticipated.  There were machine works, photography studios, glass shops, an administrative office with associated library.  At the heart of the complex is the lab building.  On the first floor of the lab building there were 19^th century heaters and generators.  A Chemical lab was located in the back for the work that Edison did in ore extraction.

Walking up the steps to the second floor where the central part of the lab was located the visitor notices a machine that is housed in glass.  The docent makes note that this is Edison’s first invention, the Electronic Vote Counting machine.  The reason that this machine was important to  Edison was not because of its importance, like the phonograph or light bulb were, but rather what it taught him about inventing.  When Edison presented the machine to the Massachusetts State Legislator, they hated it.  It was too fast!  It did not allow the politicians to politic while they were working on the bills and laws. 

Edison got a lot of “egg in his face” over the lack of success in this invention.  While technically sound there was no market for the electronic voting machine.  Being his 1^st proposed, the sting of the lack of success was even greater. Edison took to heart that you should not invent unless you are sure that it is want the customer wants. If the customer wants the invention then there is a market for it and you can make money off of your inventive skills. 

How do you as inventor know if your invention has a market?  Please note that many of the great inventor/entrepreneurs have their secrets for knowing how to focus the inventive activity for successfully marketing their inventions.   RArnold