With more than 1,000 patents to his name Thomas Alva Edison was perhaps the most creative inventor in the history of mankind. Yet, as so often happens with 'textbook names' we know very little about him.
Edison was the incarnation of the All-American Dream, of the country boy who made good, who chewed tobacco, talked dirty, ridiculed scientific theory and in his time committed some truly remarkable blunders. In 70 years' active working life of often 15-20 hours a day he made invention a commercial proposition, changed the course of science, and made a decisive contribution to how we all live today.
Horizon presents a study of this often outrageous genius whose story is a complex mixture of myth and reality.