CS378, History Of Computing
Week 5, Weekly Report
Due 2004 Sept 23

A look at Telephony

This report’s purpose is to give a history of the telephone, specifically looking at pre 1930’s phone systems. I will focus on three topics, who invented the telephone, how the telephone works and how the telephone was used.

Who Invented the Telephone?

This question is often answer with the response: “Alexander Graham Bell.” However many dispute Bell’s exaggeration of his device’s abilities. “Bell did not design this contrivance. Its specification had been deposited in a caveat—‘a description of an invention not yet perfected’ – in the Washington Patent Office nearly a month earlier on 14 February 1876 by Elisha Gray, the co-owner and chief scientist of a Chicago telegraphic equipment manufacturing company.” (1,30) It turns out that Bell and Gray were leaders of competing research groups that were being paid to find ways to expand the capabilities of the telegraph in order to have more “bandwidth.” These experiments led them both to start thinking about how voice might be transmitted. In the 1870’s their research almost simultaneously found solutions. Some say that though Bell was quicker to patent his idea, Gray offered a clear and better designed solution.(1,30) Before this “discovery” of electrical telephony, there are note worthy attempts at creating telephonic systems. “The word telephone, from the Greek roots tele, ‘far’, and phone, “sound,” was applied as early as the late 17th century to the string telephone familiar to children and was later used to refer to the megaphone and the speaking tube…”(2) These systems often were more experimental then practical. Though after the invention of the telephone was successful, the way in which it was modified is almost endless.

How does the telephone work?

This exploration of the how the telephone works will look at pre 1930 telephones. The first telephone designs were very crude and simple. They consisted of a transmitter and a receiver. The transmitter was usually a piece of thin material connected to some type of metal that when excited would produce electrical current. In the very first renditions of the telephones, the current would then be sent over an iron or steel wire to a receiver. The receiver’s job was the inverse of the transmitter, it would take a electrical signal and create a magnetic field with wires and magnets that were then connected to a thin diaphragm which produced sound waves. This basic phenomenon of voice transmission over wire was the way the very first telephones worked. One of the first obstacles brought upon telephones was the distance the signal had to travel. When electricity travels down wire resistance is created. This resistance thus causes a reduction in current and the signal is degraded. To counter act this problem, Bell and other inventors used batteries and other power sources to amplify the signal in order to travel far lengths. (2) From this point many modifications to the phone and phone systems were added to make the phone what it is today. Some notable modification from the pre 1930’s are: twisted pair cabling, copper cable, operator stations and pulse dialing.

How was the telephone used before 1930?

Ironically when use of the telephone was discussed among telegraph users such as Western Electric, it was heavily criticized. “For instance his (Gary) Western Electric partner, Enos Barton, went on record as saying: ‘I well remember my disgust when someone told me it was possible to send conversation along a wire’ (Brooks 1976: 83).” (1) At first the telephone was thought of as almost novelty, however it began to gain ground as financial backers pressed researchers to find uses. One of the first uses was a form of local communication among citizens. This use, though significant, was still novel. The introduction of the phone in the office is where the usefulness of the telephone began. “Bell himself, in seeking investors, downplayed the private home and pushed the telephone ‘as a means of communication between bankers, merchants, manufacturers, wholesale and retail dealers, dock companies, water companies, police offices, fire stations, newspaper offices, hospitals and public buildings, and for use in a railway offices, in mines and (diving) operations.’” (1,53) These uses are what the telephone is still used for today.

Conclusion

The telephone, much like many other technological devices, had a controversial beginning. Bell and Grays Research was cutting edge and did make a significant difference in the development of the phone as we know it today. The invention of the phone along with electricity has taken what we knew as mechanical computing devices and turned them into we know today as computing networks.

Notes

1. Winston, Brian, “Media Technology and Society: A History: From the Telegraph to the Internet. 1998 Publish by Routledge

2. "telephone" Encyclopædia Britannica. http://search.eb.com/eb/article?tocId=9071592&query=telephone&ct= ( Encyclopædia Britannica Online, accessed 2004 Sept 22). A web page.