The evening times. [volume] (Grand Forks, N.D.) 1906-1914, 1906-03-30
1893 81
BIRTHDAY OF THE
TELEPHONE.


Boston, March 22.-The telephone
is celebrating its thirtieth anniversary,
for 1t was In March 1876, on the top
floor OF boarding house in this city,
that A. Graham Bell, as he was called
In those days spoke to his associate.
Thomas A. Watson, the first words
ever transmitted electrically by wire.
The occasion was not intended for
historical picture. There was none
of the pomp and circumstance that
attended the sending of the first
message by telegraph. The two young
enthusiasts, one the theorist who
evolved the idea of transmitting ar
ticulate sounds by electricity, the other
practical electric mechanician, were
the only witnesses. A. little more
than year before Mr. Bell had dis
covered that his theory of the tele-
phone was practical, and since that
time they had worked night and day
to develop instruments that would
make that discovery useful. But still
they were far from satisfied; and on
this March day, in 1876, they were
prepared for further experiments.
Watson was listening at the instru-
ment in his room. Suddenly. almost
unexpectedly, for it seemed almost
too marvellous a thing to be true. he
heard Bells voice. Family, vet dis
tinctly, these words came over the
wire to him: "Mr. Watson, come here.
l. want you" That was the first
message ever delivered bytelephone.
Though informal. it was decisive. It
lifted telephony high out of the realm
OF theory and experiment into that
practical realities.
Mr.. Bell and Mr.. Watson first met
In 1874. At that time Mr.. Bell was
professor of vocal physiology at Bos-
ton university, and Mr. Watson was n
young workman in the shop of a maker
OF electrical apparatus at 100 Court
street, in this city. Mr.. Bell visited
the shop to have made for him some
apparatus required in his experiments
with multiple telegraphy, or the idea
of transmitting several telegraph mess
ages simultaneously without inter
ference with one another; and the
work of constructing this apparatus
was assigned to Mr.. Watson. That is
how the two men made the acuuaint-
ance of each other.
Bell one day confided to Watson his
belief that it was possible to devise
apparatus by means of which the most
complex sound vibrations, even those
OF the human voice, could be trans
formed into electrical vibrations at
one end of a telegraph wire, trans
mitted over the wire and he changed
back at the other end of the wire into
the original sounds without loss of
their most delicate over-tones. In
brief, his belief was that telegraph
instrument that would talk could be
devised
1t was on June 2, 1875, while they
were engaged in experimenting with
the multiple or harmonic" telegraph,
that the accident happened which con-
WINGED Bell that his idea of telephony
was capable of realization. Mr.. Bell
was engaged in returning one of the
springs of the receiver in his room,
and to ascertain if the pitch was cor
rect he had pressed it against his ear
and was listening to the faint sound
of the intermittent current passing
through the magnet. All at once the
spring of the receiver in the other
room stopped vibrating. and, to start
1t, MIR. Watson snapped it with his
finger. With shout of excitement
Mr.. Bell came rushing out and asked
wAdI udu ueeH uOne. Mr.. watson eX-
planned. DO it again." said Bell, and
Watson spent the rest of the day
swapping Springs.
This is what had happened: The
spring that Mr.. Watson had snapped
had become permanently magnetized
by long use near its magnet, and con-
sequently was in a condition to gen.
crate by its vibration the undulatory
electric current which forms the basic
principle of telephony Bell had heard,
not mere rattle, but the exact sound
made by the spring as it vibrated,
and now he realized that it was
practical to transmit and reproduce
other sounds in the same fashion.
Such an undulatory current had un-
doubtedly been generated many times
before, but, as Mr. Watson says, never
before had it reached the ear OF a
man whose mind had been prepared by
years of thought and training to, per-
ceive instantly what it meant The ac-
cident simply confirmed and corrobor-
ated Bells preconceived idea, just as
the falling of an apple converted