Edison Botanic Research Corporation business check, 8.25 x 3, filled out in another hand and signed by Thomas Edison, "Thos. A. Edison," payable to William H. Hand for $40.02, stamp-dated December 18, 1928. In fine condition.
A former assistant to Edison, Hand was not exactly impressed with his time with the 'Wizard of Menlo Park,' remembering him as much more of a businessman than an actual inventor: 'I worked for Edison when, in 1924, I was 24 years old, and he was 77. I produced a 'suspensoid' of lead in distilled water, which remained in suspension many months. Now that is important because when I was with Edison, the American Medical Society asked him if he could make a suspensoid—the Medical Society was using it as an injection for cancer: They injected a water solution of lead in the system, and that apparently blocks certain areas off from radiation, so that those areas wouldn’t be deteriorated. And Edison couldn’t do it, and he didn’t have any ideas about it, and he asked me if I could do it. Well, I had done it in high school, so I said yes I could do it. At that time, the lead suspensoid was maintained in suspension about 5 weeks, the suspensoid that I made stayed in suspension about 8 months. The interesting part here is, that, although I did it Edison claimed it as his work. Edison only had three months of education, he knew nothing about mathematics, he knew nothing about physics or chemistry. He had a large number of assistants and they would come out with these ideas and he would be shrewd enough to see that people were valuable, and then he would immediately take a patent out under his name. He had 1,400 patents, but none of them were his, they were all his assistants.'
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