The public ledger. [volume] (Maysville, Ky.) 1913-1968, 1916-03-14
FORTIETH BIRTHDAY OF
THE TELEPHONE


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Boston, March Alt was Just forty
years ago last Friday, March 10, 1876,
that the telephone first transmitted
Ineligible words. The men on both
ends of the wire on that important oc-
casion are living They have seen the
great invention spread it's way around
the world; they have seen the expan-
sion of distance transmission until
the American continent was crossed
! by wires over which San Franciscans
can talk with New Workers. They
have seen wireless telephony devel-
oped as another wonder of their day.
But no event in their lives will sur
pass in importance the quiet scene in
an attic workshop at 109 Court street,
in Boston. forty years ago when Alex
ander Graham Bell spoke into his
mechanism and his assistant, listen
ing at the other end of the wire i'm the
next room, heard the inventors voice
clearly and distinctly. The listening
man was Thomas A. Watson, now a
noted ship builder, who was Bells aid
and confidential assistant in the long,
painstaking experiments that had led
up to victory.
Mr. Watson has told the story him
self.
81 was the only witness to Bells
accomplishment. heard the first
words ever transmitted distinctly over
a wire by an electric current. These
words were my own name.
"The first time that the telephone
ever uttered ineligible words was on
March 10, 1876, and it is certainly to
be regretted that on so epochal am
occasion the instrument was not on
dress parade. There is nothing in the
history of the telephone to match the
famous first message of the Morse tel
egraph What hath God wrought
THE first recorded message of the
telephone was commonplace in the ex-
tremc. 1t was simply Mr. Watson,
come here, want you Probably if
Mr.. Bell at that time had thought that
he was making history he would have
been better prepared.
THE occasion was merely one of an
extensive series of experiments in
which some small Improvement in the
instruments or our increased expert
ness in using them just made the diff
ference between indistinctness and
distinctncss.
after this first communication, the
Improvement was more rapid, and in
the early summer of 1876, it had be-
come possible to converse fiuently be-
tween two rooms.
1T was my good fortune to have
been associated with Mr.. Bell during
the whole of his famous experiments
by which the telephone was developed
from the crude and imperfect form in
to a commercial success. | was en-
ployed to embody in practical form
his ideas. assisted in the tests.
"On the afternoon of June 2, 1876,
an accidental discovery during our eX-
pcriments confirmed Mr.. Bells the
cries that exact sound could be trans
mitted. Bells grand idea of a current
Of electricity which shall vary in in
tcnsity as the air varies in density
during the production of a sound was
nearer practical realization by our
heaven-sent accident.
MI Bell, in an endeavor to inn
prove the working of the receivers,
Mas returning one of their springs to
ascertain if the pitch was correct. He
lad pressed 4 against his ear and was
listening to the faint sound of the in
ermittent current passing through
ne magnet. All at once the spring
If the transmitter I'm my room stopped
.ibrating, and l snapped it with my
niger to start it, Instantly an ex-
cited shout came from the other room
and Mr.. Bell rushed in demanding
What | had done. l explained, and he
asked me to do IT again / snapped
tie spring the rest of that afternoon
and so late in the evening that the
iahitor, forgetting us, locked us in.
what happened was this: The
spring that | had plucked had become
permanently magnetized and was I'm
condition by its vibration to generate
100 sought-for undulatory electric cur
rtRt This IL did when | snapped it
lhd when the current passed through
Il magnet Of the receiver which was
pissed against Mr. Bells ear, il set
inf vibration the spring of that in
81 ument which spring, being con
I'm Pa against his ear, was In a condl-
tib TO yibrate as a diaphragm and
nd merely as a free reed.
The trained acoustician at once
petceiyed that he heard loudly and
'ldrly, not merely the pitch due TO
thq length of the spring that I was
plgcking. but the peculiar soft twang
Of that Identical spring. and recog-
niz'd instantly that the current car