Evening star., 1922-08-03

| during the utterance of speech with
the object of developing an apparatus
that would enable my deaf pupils to
see and recognize the forms of vibra-
tion characteristic of the various ele-
ments of speech. Various instruments
were devised employing loaded
stretched membranes, all based upon
the we'll known phonautograph OF
paved the way for the appearance OF
the first membrane telephone, the an
cestor Of all the telephones OF TO-DAY.
ut will thus be seen that the work
of my father had a great and impor-
tant influence in fitting me to crap
pie with the problems of the tele-
phone.
| communicated to Mr.. Ellis my discoV-
cry that in uttering the vowel ele-
ments of speech faint musical tones
, could be heard accompanying the
sound of the voice.
These feeble tones seemed to be
characteristic Of the different VOW
els. and had the same pitches as the
resonance tones of the various cavi-
| ties formed in the mouth when the
vowel positions were silently assumed
and the resonance tones brought out
by tapping a pencil held against the
| cheek or throat.
Experiments of Helmholtz.
"Mr. Ellis expressed great interest.
but informed me that I had been an
ticipated by Helmholtz. who had not
| only analyzed vowel sounds into their
constituent musical elements. but had
actually produced vowel sounds by a
synthetical process by combining mu-
| sical tones of the required pitches
and relative intensities. He had pro-
| duced these musical tones by means
| of tuning forks which were kept in
vibration by an electrical current and
had controlled the relative intensities
| by resonators applied to the forks.
AT this time l knew nothing what
ever about electricity, and found my
self quite unable to understand. from
Mr.. Ellis explanation. how tuning
forks could be made to vibrate by an
electrical current.
"Helmholtz's work had not then
been translated into French or Eng
| lish, and I was unable to read it in
| the original German. / therefore took
up the study of electricity, and be-
gan to experiment with electrical ap-
| paratus in the hope that l might ulti-
| mately be able to construct Helm
holtz's vowel apparatus and repeat
| his experiments.
America. ! succeeded in vibrating tun-
! ing-forks. and tuned plates and reeds
by electrical means, I made a num-
Der Of electrical inventions based upon
the utilization of musical notes as
| telegraphic signals. and these led
gradually to the invention of the
| telephone itself
DIR. Bells First Invention.
IT have often been asked whether I
| can recall the nature of my first in
vention and how I came to make it.
| So far as 1 can recollect 1T came
about in this way:
when 1 was quite a little fellow, 1t
| so happened that my father had pupil
| of about my own age with whom I used
| to play. He was the son of a Mr.. Herd
| man. who owned large flour mills near
Edinburgh, and. of course. 1 went over
| to the mills pretty often to play with
| him there We romped about and got
into all sorts Of mischief. until at last
one. day Mr.. Herdman called US into his
office for a very serious talk.
Why can't you boys do something
useful he said. instead Of always get
| ting into mischief
| II mildly asked him to tell us some
putting his arm into a bag and pulling
out a handful Of wheat. He showed US
! that the grains were covered with husks,
and said: II you could only take the
husks off that wheat you'd be doing
something useful indeed
upon my mind, and I began to think,
why couldn't we take the husks Off by
| brushing the seeds with a nailbrushT
| Test Proves Successful.
| 1--WE tried the experiment and found
It successful, although it involved a
good deal of hard work from the two
mischief makers. We persevered
however, and soon had a nice little
| sample Of cleaned wheat to show to
Mr.. Herdman. 1 then remembered
1 that during our explorations at the
| mill we had come across a large vat,
or tank, with q paddle-wheel ar
raneement in it that whirled round
| and round in a casing Of quite rough
material, brushes or fine wire net
| ting. or something of that sort.
"If we could only put the wheat into
that machine, thought, the whirling
! Of the paddle should cause the seeds