He's gone, now, but he didn't even learn to talk until he was almost 4. Didn't do so well in school either.

12 weeks into the first grade, his teacher called his mother and told him he wasn't smart enough for mainstream schooling.

When his mom complained to the superintendant, he laughed and said maybe her boy was empty headed. We weren't politically correct yet, then.

Before the pregnancy, Al's mom had been a teacher. Three schools later, Al's angry and indignant mother decided to home school him. 

At 12, she let Al take a job selling newspapers. One day, an angry man hit Al in the side of the head so hard that he fell to the ground. He started to lose his hearing after that. Al was deaf by 14.

At 15, Al was working at the railroad. One day, he saw a toddler playing on the tracks. A runaway boxcar was headed straight for the child. Without thinking, Al ran, grabbed the child and rolled out of the way. Ruined his only coat, but saved the boy.

The boy's grateful father taught Al to use a telegraph so he could get a better job. Later, he would nickname his daughter "Dot" in memory, but we're not quite there yet.

People didn't make life much easier for Al. He wanted to go to college, but was denied entry because he was home schooled.

When Al was 38, his beloved wife Mary died, leaving him to raise their kids alone. The youngest was only 8.

Somewhere along the way, Al learned that he had to make his own breaks.

Hailed world wide as "The wizard of Menlo Park", "The father of the electrical age," and "The greatest inventor who ever lived," Thomas Alva Edison filed his 1,093 patents in his lifetime.

He invented the phonograph, the movie camera, waxed paper, and made the incandescent light practical for home use. Because of his mind, we have heat, light, power, music and movies as we know them today.

In 1892, the little company he'd started, Edison General Electric, merged with another firm to become The General Electric Corporation.

"Al" filed his last patent within a year of his death.

The one thing no one could take away from him was his attitude.

He said going deaf helped him concentrate because noise wouldn't interrupt him.

He said every failure eliminates one more thing that doesn't work.

But, perhaps most poignantly, he said; "Many of life's failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up."

Times are hard. They might get harder before they get easier again.
Hang in there, okay?