Northern Wisconsin advertiser. [volume] (Wabeno, Wis.) 1898-1925, 1906-11-29

cheapest they could find The line
crossed the estate of Longfellow, on
Brattle street, and the argument that
secured the poets consent to this
part of the enterprise was that the
wire would be almost invisible. The
boys were so proud of their work
/ that they organized as the Stove Pipe
Telephone Company. 1t is worth
recording that the president of the
company, whose home served as
kind of central exchange, adopted
telephony as profession, and is now
prominently connected with the Amer
lea Telephone and Telegraph Com
pany.
The instrument made in 1878 and
rented to subscribers of the first Bell
company in Boston, differs from the
present receiver only in the fom and
substance of the casing. The earlier
instrument was cased in mahogany,
and weighed altogether eleven ounces.
The receiver used today is cased in a
rubber composition, vulcanite, and
weighs some fifteen ounces. Even
the little screw-eye near the binding
posts, which permitted the first tele-
phone users to hang the instrument
up, is retained in the present re-
ceiver
The early receivers are reminders
of the days when the telephone had
no separat transmitter; when the
same instrument was used for both
speaking and listening. Those who
could afford double rental used
pair of telephones, holding one to the
ear and the other to the mouth. There
was also a box transmitter in use in
the early days of telephony, but its
action was based on precisely the |
same principle as the instrument now
known as the receiver, The original |
telephone was magnetic in action 1t |
was possible to speak through it over !
distance of 500 miles, but not with .
the distinctness required to make the
instrument valuable for general com
mercial purposes.
The necessity of making speech
the result of the fast-;ncreasing pop
ularity of the new utility, took form
on October 1, 187S in the Blake
transmitter. Later the Bell companies
adopted the improved form of trans.
mitter now in general use, which
serves as well for propelling speech
over two thousand as over a few
miles. This instrument is the inven-
ton of the late A. C. White, in his
day one of the most brilliant men in
the service of the national system,
and it is known to the profession as
the "solid back" transmitter. It's
great virtue is that, owing to it's firm
construction, it seldom gets out of
adjustment.
The instrument made by the Bell
company in 1878 was intended for
local use entirely. Professor Bell
had in the previous winter, tried to
telephone from New York to Boston
over telegraph circuit but had
failed. In fact, the first attempt to
telephone from Boston to Lowell,
Mass, a distance of but 20 miles, was
fruitless. though later attempt was
successful, and made the beginning
of new chapter in telephone history.
But for local or short distance tele-
| phoning the instrument put out in
1878 served every purpose. Over
short distances it transmitted as well
| as it received, just as the receiver
| can do now.
How well the early telephone did
| its work, and how simple and un-
changing is it's makeup, was shown
lately when telephone Official here
in Boston substituted the instrument
made % years ago, and referred to in
this article, for the receiver of the
/ he could hear as well through the
one as through the other.
More than 1000 patents bearing on
telephone Improvement have been is
sued at Washington in the last thirty
years, and this does not include the
number of patents relating to under.
ground apparatus; but the essentials
/ of telephony as discovered by the
| famous friend of the deaf and dumb
remain unaltered. Nor, though its
! operation has been described in
minutest detail, has any one ex-
planned why the telephone talks.
Even the thick metal .hulls of ocean
liners have been used as diaphragms,
the vibrations being converted into
the undulating electric current which
] formed the handspring of Bells in
| yention. The theory is that mus
cular vibrations are important ele
me1ts, of the mysterious side of tele-
! phony.
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