Thomas Edison the recordings could be played only a few times, the phonograph made Edison a celebrity. Joseph Henry, president of the National Academy of Sciences and one of the most renowned electrical scientists in the US, described Edison as "the most ingenious inventor in this country... or in any other". In April 1878, Edison traveled to Washington to demonstrate the phonograph before the National Academy of Sciences, Congressmen, Senators and US President Hayes. The "Washington Post" described Edison as a "genius" and his presentation as "a scene... that will live in history". Although Edison obtained a patent for the phonograph in
Thomas Leavitt (inventor) volumes of United States mail. Thomas Leavitt, who set off the stampede with his first design, was married to Martha Elizabeth Whittier of Cornville, Maine, in 1851. The inventor died in 1899 and his wife Martha died in 1910. The couple had four children. Thomas Leavitt (inventor) Thomas Leavitt (1827–1899) patented, along with his brother Martin Leavitt, the first machine in the U.S. that made machine-cancelled postal letters practicable, enabling the United States Post Office to increase the volume of mail it handled, quickening the pace of delivery and allowing customers to more easily send letters of various sizes. Leavitt,