Lancaster daily intelligencer. [volume] (Lancaster, Pa.) 1864-1928, 1889-09-21


known rs the "carbon telephone
which is constructed on the same princi'
pie as the Blake transmitter. Some OF
these instruments. counsel said. were
made as early as 1867.
Prior To the war Drawbaugh invented
machine that was largely used for ag.
ricultural purposes in the south, and
when the war broke out he had large
amount of money owing TO him that he
was not able to collect. He was, there.
fore, obliged to go into bankruptcy.
From 1869 to 1880 he was in extreme
poverty, with large family; his only
source Of income was payment for the
doing of odd mechanical work in the
houses and on the farms of his neigh.
bors The latter said of him that his
hobby was electricity, and that he was
n man of great inventive genius, but II
was frequently very hard work for him
to borrow dollar from any of them.
He has made an electric clock which
is of no value save rs "A curiosity, and
invented nail making machine, only to
find. as uneducated inventors often do,
that another man had long ago applied
the same principle. He claims that he
first designed the telephone in 1856, and
had made it Il success four years before
the Bell patent was taken out. Since
the decision of the supreme court went
against him he has been at work on a
transmttcr which is to give warning of
the approach of enemies by land or sea.
He claims that with this the soldier can
sleep in his tent, and can tell by its pc
culiar motion if the enemy is near and
prepare to give him warm reception.
The commander of n war vessel can also
tell the approach of any vessel, hostile
or otherwise, the resistance of tile water
on the approaching vessel causing sutli-
ciont friction to establish n current that
will cause the indicator to sound the
alarm.
OF course the crude mechanism of this
new thing, which he calls the Electrical
Paradox" has been in Use from time i'm.
memorial for the idea Of putting a stout
string around house at some distance,
for, any one approaching to run against
and start an attached bell or other alarm,
is one that would suggest itself to the
rudest intellect. Fugitive negroes in
southern swamps often employed this de.
vice to guard their lairs against stealthy
approach, and in arranging the strings
ON rollers SO as to insure free action they
often displayed much ingenuity. The
use of electricity and making contri.
vance of extreme sensitiveness are of
course recent.
The trial and its main facts are fresh
in the public mind, but some of the pc
culiar phases of it may be repeated. -Four
of the justices of the supreme court ruled
for Bell, and point made much of in
their opinions was that the facts set up
by the Drawbaugh interest were so ex-
traordinary that, if true. they must have
become notorious. One judge set aside
the testimony of many witnesses with
these words: "Drawbaugh was silent so
far as the general public was concerned,
when, if he had really done what these
witnesses now think he did, he would
most certainly have spoken"
The minority report was signed by
Justices Bradley, Field and Harlan, and
it adds not "A little 10 the uncertainty of
the case to learn that but seven justices
were sitting and that they divided four
to three. 1t was only natural that such
division should leave in the public mind
an impres sion that Mr.. Drawbaugh's case
was really lost on account Of his poverty
and comparative ignorance, which caused
his slow and awkward methods. 1t is to
be noted also that the aiority of four,
as the court was, is minority Of full
court of nine.
The renewed suit was begun In the
ff%deerr9al lS,o3prt in Boston on hshan Of the
Telephone company, and the representa-
tions of the government allege fraud in
the obtaining of the patents, and that
seventy witnesses testified to hearing ar
ticulate speech through Drawbaugh's
telephone as early as 1871 The court
ruled against the preliminary pleas of
the Bell company, so she case is virtu-
ally reopened. Meanwhile one James
Lowth claims to have invented what he
calls stetho-telephone, dispensing with
the mouthpiece and sound waves of the
Bell instrument
Mr, Bells patent was granted March
!, 1870, and the alleged monopoly" will,
therefore, continue till that date in 1893
unless the new trial results differently
from the first. The application was filed
in the patent Office Feb. IA, 1876, and in
two hours thereafter Elisha Gray filed a
caveat alleging that fraud had been used
in getting knowledge of his instrument
previously placed in the examiners
room. Daniel Drawbaugh's application
was filed July 81, 1880, and alleged that
he began his experiments In 1862 and
had perfect working instrument in OPP
Grafton in January, 1875, year before
DIR. Bell claimed to have done so Alto
gether it is curiously complicated case
which full supreme court must wrestle
with,