On October 21, 1879, Thomas A. Edison invented the incandescent lamp at Menlo Park, New Jersey. The lamp was constructed of carbonized cotton in one-millionth of an atmosphere and burned for 45 hours. Edison tested 6,000 vegetable fibers before settling on carbonized bamboo, which lasts 1,000 hours. Nine years later, tungsten will satisfactorily replace bamboo. Already financed by J. P. Morgan, a master of vertical organization, and other financiers eager to cash in on any Edison invention and quickly buyout most competition in the incandescent lighting bonanza. The only holdout is George Westinghouse who established the Westinghouse Corporation in 1886. With J. P. Morgan's guidance, the Edison Company becomes the General Electric Company, and the two companies bought the competition and divided patents and territories. Without laws to prevent unfair competition or monopolies, smaller companies are absorbed or go broke. One of these companies, Chas. F. Brush, was manufacturing and installing arc lighting in cities like Boston, Cleveland, San Francisco and Wabash, Indiana, the first town in America to be completely lit by electric light.

The Hotel Vendome on Commonwealth Avenue, at the corner of Dartmouth Street, was built in two sections. The first in 1871, the second by architect J. F. Ober in 1882, was Boston's first commercial building with electric lighting. The Bizou Theatre is lit by 650 bulbs for a performance of Gilbert and Sullivan's opera, "Iolanthe," in December, 1882.

In 1885, the Illuminating Company of Boston was organized with a capital of $100,000. Using an Edison direct current generator, which powered a three-wire system of distribution, it began generating power for its first customer, the Bizou Theatre.

In June, 1887, the first district station was opened on Boylston Street, operating with Edison patented two-pole dynamos, driven by horizontal engines and belts. A second station was opened in December 1887 on Hawkins Street to accommodate customers in that neighborhood. On August 27, 1892, the third district station was opened on Atlantic Avenue. The boiler room of this facility is on the spot where the Tea Party Wharf stood in 1773. Some of the planks from the wharf were removed during construction. Edison's competition during this time was Boston Electric Light Company, which provided arc street lighting for Boston businesses. In 1902, Edison bought their generating station on L Street, South Boston, now called Station #4. It was equipped with alternating current generators and Chas. Brush arc machines, which supplied the street lighting of Boston. In order to accommodate additional business, a turbine station was built next to #4 on L Street and started generating in 1904. this new station handled demand until Edgar Station was built in Weymouth in 1925.

In 1887, several horse-drawn transportation companies merged to form the West End Company seeking to use the new electricity to power trolley cars to move people. Boston became the first American city to build an electric street trolley system using an overhead trolley and underground conduit system between Brookline and Boston. It was completed in 1896.

The underground conduit system was fault and the complete overhead method was the state of the art for other cities by 1900.