The Telegraph-courier. [volume] (Kenosha, Wis.) 1888-1946, 1915-01-28
FIRST TELEPHONE USED HERE
President Wilson Talks to San Francis
co and Great Praise is Given Inven-
tor of Phone but Name of Elisha
Gray is Not Mentioned.

Way back in the early seventies
over at the old Unitarian Church on
Chicago street, little party of Keno
sha people saw the birth of the tele
phone. Yesterday President Wilson at
Washington talked with President
Moore of the Panama Exposition at
San Francisco. More than that Theo-
dore Vail, the president of the Ameri-
can Telephone and Telegraph Company
from his winter home way down on
Jekyl Island off the southern Atlantic
coast, talked with Thomas A. Watson
in San Francisco, his voice travelling
over more than forty-four hundred
miles of wire. Monday was the day of
triumph for the telephone as these
messages were the longest telephone
messages ever recorded. With the an
nouncement of the completion of serv-
ice between New York and San Fran
cisco the entire history Of the telephone
is being rehearsed.
The interesting little chapter of the
origin of transmission of the spoken
voice in Kenosha is not included in the
story that is being sent out by the
press agent of the American Telephone
and Telegraph Company. DR.. Alex
ander Graham Bell, who has been given
the credit of being the inventor of the
telephone, had large part in the days
triumph and the old instrument which
he had used way back in 1875 at his
boarding house in Boston, was also in
evidence. Kenosha people, however,
will be more interested in the telephone
which came before the time of the
Bell patents.
In the late sixties the late 2. G..
Simmons was president of the Chicago
and Milwaukee Telegraph lines and it
was over these lines that the first tele-
phonic communication known to man
kind was ever held Elisha Gray, a
poor Highland Park inventor, first
worked out the problem of transmitting
sounds over wire and he came to Ke-
nosha and got the consent of Mr.. Sim
mons to use the telegraph wires for the
test Of his invention. He used them
for several years while he was perfect
ing transmitters to send musical sounds
from one place to another, but it never
occurred to Elisha Gray that the in
strument might be used for carrying
the human voice. When the operators
at the telegraph keys began to object
to the usical sounds which interered
with regular business, Gray gave up
the use Of the lines. He came to Ke-
nosha and long before Bell had made
his success in Boston, Gray strung
wire between the Unitarian Church and
the home Of A. B. Truesdell and there
are many people living in Kenosha to-
day who sat in the church and heard
the first telephone conversations. They
were musical notes, but they carried
ali of the great principle that Bell has
been honored for. Gray took his in
vention to New York only to find that
David Graham Bell had sought
patent on similar device. The two
men merged their interests and the
Highland Park man sold his invention
for a million dollars.
Operators of the Kenosha exchange
of the Wisconsin Telephone Company
just naturally butted in on the CONVEX
sations between Washington and San
Francisco and they heard through Mil
waukee the text of the message of
President Wilson and of the other men
who had part in the great day of talk
ing. Probably not one of the operators
along the line had ever heard the real
story of the invention of the telephone
and none knew that the first real tele-
phone conversation had taken place
at Kenosha.