Mobile Experiment and Enterprise

The train left the depot every morning at 7:00 a.m., arrived in Detroit by 10:00 a.m. and returned to Port Huron at  approximately 9:30 p.m. During the layover, Edison spent his time reading at the Detroit Library.

 Not wanting to waste time during his daily train trips to Detroit, "Al" Edison stashed his wares in the baggage car's unused smoking compartment. Soon, he equipped it with a chemistry lab and a galley proof printing press.

In the baggage car, Edison continued the chemistry experiments, which he had begun in his home cellar. With the printing press, he filled in gaps that he saw among the papers he handled, creating a newspaper called the Weekly Herald, aimed specifically at the train's passengers. Before long, over four hundred subscribers were buying the Herald at eight cents per month. The newspaper was the first in the world to be printed on a moving train.