The first automatic phone system was patented on this date

It would be almost impossible to envision life without the telephone. Most of us have one or more phones in our homes, and many have cell phones for every member of the family, which they keep with them wherever they go.

Many people had a hand in developing and perfecting the technology we now take for granted. Scotsman Alexander Graham Bell, who came to the United States in the early 1870s, taught in a school for the deaf in Boston. He gained interest in working with deaf children from his father, Alexander Melville Bell, a teacher of elocution. Alexander Graham Bell experimented with artificial reproduction of vowel sounds.

By accident, he discovered in 1875 how to produce a system that would transmit sound over a wire. As he and his assistant, Thomas Watson, experimented unsuccessfully with sending several telegraph messages at the same time from one room to the next, Bell heard a sound from Watson over the wire. This led them to turn attention to sending the human voice by wire--a step beyond the telegraph.

As with other communications devices such as radio and television, many people were experimenting with the telephone concept when Bell succeeded with voice transmission by wire in 1876. On March 10 of that year, Bell uttered the now-famous words into the speaker which his assistant heard in the next room: “Mr. Watson, come here. I want you.”

Inventors raced to get patents for various processes. For example, in February 1876, Bell applied for a patent on his concept. Within hours, Elisha Gray of Chicago filed a similar application.

Another example: On this day, December 5, in 1879, a little more than three years after Bell first communicated with Watson, three other men were granted a patent for the first automatic telephone system. They were Daniel and Thomas Connolly and Thomas McTighe. 

They exhibited an eight-line automatic telephone exchange at the Paris Exhibition, but their system did not strike fire. It was some 13 years later, in 1892, that the first successful system was put into use. 

A central element in our faith is the communication of the message of Christ. With the development of the telephone as an analogy, we can think of each day of Advent as part of the on-going process of communication, with each day adding new dimensions to our understanding of Christ’s coming to earth.  His message of love can come to us in surprising ways.

A Verse for Today

“This is the message we have heard from him and proclaim to you, that God is light and in him there is no darkness at all” (1 John 1:5).

Each day through New Year’s Day, January 1, 2013, inspirational thoughts will appear on this website, in keeping with Thanksgiving, Advent, Christmas, and New Year’s Day.  These are from my book, Reflections for the Festive Seasons.  © 2002.  All rights reserved.