| William J. Hammer (1858-1934)
Thomas Edison He did send one important invention to the hotel – in 1890 he sent a Thomas Edison “phonograph”. It was used at the hospital fair at the Casino with the following message: “I am a cute little thing invented by Thomas Edison in 1877, but was not born to perfection until 1888. I can talk, although not having a tongue; can hear without ears, and can think without brains. Ha! Ha!” O. D. Seavey also recorded his remarks about the 1890 Ponce de Leon celebration on a cylinder on Edison’s machine. Florida Times Union, March 11 and 18, 1890. was in Florida during this time period but it is not known if he supervised the construction of the Ponce de Leon plant. However, his 1888 superintendent on the job was William J. Hammer, only thirty years old when he supervised the final construction in St. Augustine. He was also in charge of the extensive electrical work in connection with Grover Cleveland’s visit, which included adding four hundred extra lights. Hammer also took President Cleveland, Henry Flagler, and Seavey on a tour of the artesian well with the generator producing electricity. He produced as many light shows as possible during the initial 1888 season even down to the small detail of making a baton for the conductor Thomas H. Joyce with a electric light on the tip. (It was connected to a battery in his pocket). His title for the year was the electrical expert for the Edison Company. William Joseph Hammer was born to William and Martha Hammer in Cressona, Pennsylvania February 26, 1858. In 1878 Hammer became an assistant to Edward Weston of the Weston Malleable Nickel Company, and in December 1879 he became lab assistant to Thomas Edison. By 1880 he was Chief Engineer of the Edison Lamp works. He experimented on the telephone, phonograph, and electric railway, is known primarily for work on lights. Hammer was in charge of testing early light globes in 1880-81 and noted a blue glow around the positive pole in a vacuum bulb and a blackening of the wire and the bulb at the negative pole. The unknown phenomenon was first called "Hammer's Phantom Shadow," but when Edison patented the bulb in 1883 it became known as the "Edison Effect." This discovery became the basis of electron tube theory, which was the foundation for the entire electronics industry. In 1881, Hammer went to London and built a 3,000 incandescent lamp, Holborn Viaduct Central Electric Light Station. This was the first central station ever constructed for incandescent electric lighting. He built a plant containing twelve Edison dynamos in 1882 at the Crystal Palace Electric Exposition in Paris and, in 1883 he installed electric plants in Germany. Returning to the United States, Hammer worked on exhibits for the International Electric Exhibition and in 1884 he became the chief inspector of central stations for the Edison Electric Light Company. He devised a system to control streetlights automatically by using a selenium cell in 1886. As an independent engineer in 1888, he was placed in charge of completing the 8,000-light plant of the Ponce de Leon . In 1896 Hammer was elected president of the National Conference of Standard Electrical Rules, which prepared and promulgated the "National Electric Code." In the early 1900s Hammer began to work with radium; he wrote the first book on radium and used radium to cure a tumor on his hand. His work with radium-luminous materials led to luminous dials for clocks, etc. William Hammer died of pneumonia on March 24, 1934. |