The electric light is certainly one of the most important inventions of all time, emerging from scientific discovery to practical technology to real business in less than a hundred years. As early as 1801 Sir Humphrey Davy showed that when electricity was run through a strip of platinum, the excited material gave off electrons in the form of light. Over the next 80 years others sought a more efficient filament and an oxygen-free chamber that would sustain the glow. In 1875 Woodward and Evans created the light bulb, a glass enclosure from which the oxygen had been pumped out. Sir Joseph Swan focused on carbon filaments in a tightly sealed bulb and filed for a patent in 1878. But now Thomas Edison (1847-1931), who had experimented with thousands of different filament materials, saw Swan's achievement and perfected it, filing for a patent himself in 1879. He made a persistent and comprehensive survey of all filament materials and all vacuum methods until he had a lightbulb that burned for several months, and even though his patents were disputed, he took the last crucial step. Edison invented the screw base that would standardize the lightbulb for decades. He invented the power plants, circuit breakers, sockets, fuses and switches that made household electricity a reality. He bought out competing patents, accepted a competing technology (alternating current), and joined with Swan to create Ediswan, now General Electric. More than a wizard, Edison was a realizer.

PS: In 1912 the Nobel Prize committee announced that Edison and Nikola Tesla, inventor of alternating current, had been chosen to share the award in physics. Tesla turned it down, saying he alone was the scientist and Edison was merely an inventor of appliances. So the prize went instead to the man who invented gas-light regulators.