The Birmingham age-herald., 1913-08-03
An Intimate Life Story of Alexander Graham Bell

copyrighted 1913. by Frank G. Carpenter
Washington, D. c.
WANT to tell you something about the
intellectual methods of one of the
greatest men of all times, to give you
peep, as it We're, into that wonderful
mind which, as far as human speech Is
concerned, has annihilated distance and
brought the hundreds of millions of the
human race mouth to ear. l refer to
DR.. Alexander Graham Bell, whose in
Vention of the telephone has wrapped a
network of quivering iron nerves about
the globe and brought mems souls to-
gether
The actions of DR.. Bells mind that cuI-
minated in the telephone were completed
more than a generation ago. That in
vention was patented in 1876, and the
concept then brought forth will continue
to work and grow as long as time shall
last
Ever since then the same mind has
been working along inventive and scen-
tific lines 1t has created many new
things which are known and has pro-
duced others which will come to light
when its wonderful records are published.
In 1883 DR.. Bell was one of the prime fac
tors in the creation of the graphophone.
A little later on he organized the move-
ment for the teaching of speech to the
deaf along the lines of visible speech. in
vented by his father, DR.. Alexander Mel
vile Bell, and to certain extent those of
his eminent grandfather Alexader Bell.
who was an authority on phonetes and
defective speech.
Later stil DIR. Bell took up the investi-
cation of matters relating to aerial flight.
bringing forth new basic principles of
construction which have been of great
value to aviation. In addition he has
made Investigations and discoveries along
many other lines. his work concerning
which has never been published. His
mind, In short, is an intellectual dynamo
driven at an enormous voltage by what
seems TO be perpetual motion.
have seen some of the first workings
of this mind in a model which Alexander
Graham Bell made when boy of wax
and rubber mouth, which would speak
ana pronounce the word Mamma" He
was working at an invention of multiplex
telegraphy with wires attuned to the oc-
taVes or the piano. when he disvocered
the telephone, and his mental activity
has continued from that time until now.
He is now half dozen years beyond that
age at which DR.. Osler says all working
mind today is brighter and better than
ever.
The records OF mind like this are of
inestimable value. DR.. Bell began TO
make them when he was inventing the
telephone, and 1t was the dated records
he had kept which enabled him to es
tablish beyond doubt his priority of inven-
tion This showed him the value of such
records. and from then until now his
mind has as it were. been before the
moving picture camera of his note hooks.
and its actions are filed away for the fu
ture. He has kept records and notes of
everything that he has thought or exper-
lmented upon since that time and these
notes now fill several hundred vilumes.
giving the complete story, as It were. Of
his intellectual life.
4 spent a great part of last night with
DR.. Bell in his library, and during NV
stay took look at these books. They are
full of photographs, diagrams. sketches
and figures. Some of the work has been
taken down by his secretary and written
out by typewriter from these stenogra phic
notes. but there are thousands of pasas
IN the fine penmanship of Dr. Bell him
self.