Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1885-11-11
THE TELEPHONE CONTROVERSY.
The Hearing Before Secretary Lama,
To-day.

The hearing in the telephone case was re-
sumed this morning before Secretary Lamar
and Assistant Secretaries Muldrow and jerks
of the Interior department. This is an appeal
of several telephone organizations to the Sec
rotary of the Interior to advise the Attorney
General to direct that proceedings be instituted
In the name of the United States to set aside
the patents granted to the Bell Telephone COM
pany. The case naturally attracts great atten'
ton among all persons interested i'm telephone
matters. Able counsel represent the several
parties to the case. Messrs. Humphrey and
Beckwith appear for the Globe Telephone COM
pany and the Muercci and eastman and other
patents; Col. CAN'T and ex-Congressman Casey
Young appear for the citizens of Memphis and
the Pan Electric Telephone company; Messrs.
Starrow, Dickerson, and Smith represent the
American Bell company, and Gen. Bradley T.
Johnson represents the Washington and Balti-
About quarter past 10 a. m, Secretary Lamar
and Assistant Secretaries Mulorow entered the
room and took their seats.
COL CAN'T read a summarized statement of the
testimony he proposed TO submit. 1t consisted
scientists going to show that Prof Bell was
not the original inventor of apparatus for the
transmission of sound by electricity. One affi-
that since 1874 he had been in possession of an
instrument for the transmission of sound by
electricity; that he had in operation at the
smithsonian institution one OF Reese'S inven-
lions for transmitting sounds.
THE PITH AND POINT OF THE VARIOUS AFFI-
DAvITS
were in substance that Reese Vanderweyd
and Pickering antedated Bell in the discovery
OF the system of transmitting sound by cleo
tricity. In connection with statement of his
evidence Col. CAN'T said they proposed TO show
that the Bell patents were procured through
fraud and colluSion; that there was collision in
the Patent office with Bell, which enabled him
TO learn the secrets OF other and rival inventors,
ana that the Bell patents were rushed through
IN an Unfair, improper and illegal manner.
An affidavit of Prof Pickering, of Harvard
college, was read, stating that in 1869 he in
vented an apparatus for transmitting sound,
ana that he showed it in public lectures. An
TO the effect that he had invented, as far back
as 1865 an apparatus for the transmission of
sounds: These atfidavits recited that in 1870
Pr0fs. Pickering and Nanderweyd delivered
lectures on sound before the American associa-
ton for the advancement of science, in Troy,
New York, and that they then described their
respective appliances. A report of the lectures
published in the Troy Times, and of the descrip-
lions given by the lecturers OF their inventions,
was also submitted.
A LETTER OF u s. DISTRICT ATTORNEY
M'CoRREY,
of tennessee, to the Attorney General, was also
submitted. 1t stated that the writer had exam
ined all the papers, and had also examined the
original inventions, or fac SMILES of them and
that he recommended that in justice to public
interests, the suit to annul and set aside the
Bell patents be instituted.
Col. Can't, upon the conclusion of his read
Ing, had taken from box the original inven-
tons OF Pickering, Vanderweyd and others, or
In some cases fac Smiles OF them. and eX-
hibited them. There was very primitive look
to the receivers and transmitters when COM
pared with the latest improvements; but it is
contended that the principle of transmission is
the same, and that it was in use before the Bell
patents were granted. This is the question of
contest.
AT noon a recess of half an hour was taken.
After the recess Col. CAN'T explained and en-
larged upon the testimony he had offered, and
he declared that the inventions he had estab-
1ished, which ante-dated Bell, contained all the
essential principles OF the modern telephone or
that now in use. He read from documents and
affidavts to show that as far back 1868
telephone through which words could be con-
YeYed was invented.