Patrick Garners as Thomas Edison Stewart and Stratford school’s 2nd and 3rd graders were treated to Broadway veteran, Patrick Garners’ portrayal of Thomas Edison on October 15 at Stewart school. The program is a hands-on motivational exploration of the life and the many inventions of this extraordinary inventor.

The one man show took the children on a journey from Edison’s humble beginnings as a mostly home schooled youngster through his career as the inventor and developer of the automatic telegraph machine, the phonograph, the motion picture camera and the long-lasting light bulb.

The children learned that “The Wizard Of Menlo Park” (Edison, New Jersey), as he was called by the media of the time, had over 1000 patents to his name and was credited with the implementation of electric power generation and distribution. They learned that Edison surrounded himself with gifted scientists in his first lab in Menlo Park. Mr. Garner, playing Edison, picked students from the audience to play their parts.

While this was highly entertaining for the students, Mr. Garner stressed what he called the “Four” Lessons of Thomas Edison. The four lessons are 1. work hard and play hard (the students liked that one), 2. there are no mistakes as long as you learn from them, 3. when you have a seemingly insurmountable problem, look at it from a different angle and finally, 4. find something you love to do and do it.

Mr. Garner is an accomplished and polished performer who kept the children completely engaged by his combination of theatrics and science.

This program was coordinated by the Arts in Education Committee of the Garden City PTA and the GCUFSD Administration. It was funded by the Garden City Union Free School District.