![]() German inventor Johann Philipp Reis had invented a workable telephone in 1861, 15 years before Bell. So it seems that Elisha Gray should have been acknowledged as the inventor and patent holder of the first telephone. Of course, Gray had no way of knowing that Bell had seen his caveat and had amended his application at the time he was submitting it to Wilber, and that the notary seal was therefore not valid for Bell’s amendment. 20, 1876, nearly a month prior to filing it, and Gray was advised to give up because he had no equivalent proof of an earlier date. However, Bell had his application notarized on Jan. When Gray filed his full application, it became clear that both inventors were claiming the same invention. Gray illustrated two needles that caused a change in circuit resistance as they were made to plunge more or less deeply into a conductive fluid by the vibrations of the diaphragm to which they were attached.īell amended his application on the spot, hand writing a description of Gray’s invention in the margin of his application, and Wilber accepted the application as though it had been submitted without the surreptitious knowledge of Gray’s caveat. In any event, Bell and attorney Bailey showed up at the patent office and convinced Wilber to show them Elisha Gray’s caveat. His payback was the expediting of patent applications for Bailey, rather than cash-certainly unethical if not altogether fraudulent. Zenas Wilber, the patent examiner, was an alcoholic who borrowed money from Marcellus Bailey, a patent attorney an old Army buddy. Gray’s caveat essentially was a placeholder that established his date of invention and his intent to file his full application within the 90-day grace period granted by the caveat. At that time, the first to invent was declared the true inventor, not the first inventor to file. 14, 1876, but apparently discovered that Elisha Gray, an American physicist, had filed a caveat on the same day. ![]() More important was the lack of power that prevented the Bell invention from being useful over practical distances.īell filed for a patent on his invention on Feb. Both microphone and receiver were identical, and a person using the system had to transfer the device from mouth to ear, and ear to mouth-which was awkward when carrying on a conversation. The vibration of the armature caused a magnetic field to vary that, in turn, caused the current flowing to the receiving telephone to vary. Bell’s microphone was a diaphragm coupled to an iron armature. The key path to the telephone was the development of a practical microphone-or transmitter, as most telephone technologists preferred to call it. Also, inventors became aware that the “vibrations” of the dots and dashes sent over wires might be a basis for transmitting the vibrations of the human voice, and the race was on to invent the first telephone. ![]() For the first time, we had rapid communication over long distances.Īs telegraphy became commonplace, inventors strove to develop improvements such as the duplex system that permitted transmitting to and from a location simultaneously over the same wire. That success drove rapid expansion, and it wasn’t long until telegraphy connected much of the country. ![]() It was between Washington, D.C., and Baltimore, Maryland. Morse strung the first telegraph line in the United States. He had only a limited understanding of electricity, which was and is the basis for telephone technology.īefore getting into the technical details of Bell’s invention, consider the spirit of the time in which inventors were experimenting with electricity. He worked with patients who had hearing deficits. We all know the story of how Alexander Graham Bell invented the telephone. Confusing history shows Bell may be least deserving of distinction, Meucci the most.
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