The San Francisco call. [volume] (San Francisco [Calif.]) 1895-1913, 1895-04-06
A TELEPHONE RIVAL.

Conclrrently with the expiration of the
Bell telephone patents is the formation of
a powerful telephone corporation which
will revolutionize the business. 1t has
formidable array of wealthy hackers, in
Guiding leading representatives of the
Standard Oil Company, the American
Sugar Refining Company, the Pullman
Palace Car Company, the Croker estate of
San Francisco and many great financial
interests. The instruments to be used are
those devised by Allen I. Nye, who has
already had some fierce legal fights with
the Bell company. The parent company
is the Standard Telephone Company of
New York. The entire country is to be
covered by the organization of district COM
panies, each embracing one State or more
and controlled by local capitalists with the
cooperation of the parent company.
The main advances which the new enter
prise will make on the Bell telephone SER
vice are these: First, a rental of only $25
year will be charged for the instruments;
second, instead of furnishing the electric
current by means of batteries the new COM
pany will employ dynamos; third, the in
strument is no larger than mans hand
and connections are made automatically
1t seems to follow that this telephone will
supplant the telegraph. and such is the
prediction made by the company.
The importance of this enterprise is far
greater than appears at a glance. The
power of the Bell company has been so
invincible, both financially and politically,
that the use OF new inventions and i'm
proyements and the operation of rival
companies have been impossible There
never has been in America more power
full or autocratic monopoly than the Bell
telephone. Still, through its enterprise
the country has enjoyed an excellent tele-
phone service, and, although the company
is said to have made enormous profits, it
has furnished the people with service
that has become indispensable. Indeed, it
needed the wonderful prosperity of the
Bell company to spur on inventors to
higher achievements and capital to an
exhibition of enterprise. 1t will be i'm
possible for the Bell company to compete
with the new company, as the recent in
ventions are beyond its control. All that
is now left for it is to transfer its wires and
franchises to the new concern on the best
terms that it can make. It seems hardly
possible for it to buy out the new company.
But the telegraph as well as the tele-
phone companies are threatened, and
these two combined would probably con-
stitute the strongest financial and political
force that aggregated capital can exercise
in this country. 1t was doubtless this con-
sideration that led the new company to
organize with men representing $3.50 600, 900,
not including the local capital which will
go into the organization of the district
companies. 1t is particularly interesting
matter that although the Bell telephone
and the telegraph companies have been
rivals. the threat which the presence of the
new company creates necessarily makes
them partners in defense. 1t is claimed by
the new company that it can transmit
messages 5000 miles. This will render the
telegraph obsolete.
The fact that the presence in any COM
munity of two telephone services will re-
quire many users to have two sets of in
struments will be one of the strongest
factors in forcing the old company out of
I'll a field