Page "Thomas Edison" Paragraph 34

Edison did not invent the first electric light bulb, but instead invented the first commercially practical incandescent light.

Many earlier inventors had previously devised incandescent lamps, including Henry Woodward and Mathew Evans.

Others who developed early and commercially impractical incandescent electric lamps included Humphry Davy, James Bowman Lindsay, Moses G. Farmer, William E. Sawyer, Joseph Swan and Heinrich Göbel.

Some of these early bulbs had such flaws as an extremely short life, high expense to produce, and high electric current drawn, making them difficult to apply on a large scale commercially.