[CHAPTER VIII.]
The Telephone.
[Preliminary Suggestions and Experiments of Bourseul, Reis and Drawbaugh]—[First Speaking Telephone by Prof. Bell]—[Differences Between Reis’ and Bell’s Telephones]—[The Blake Transmitter]—[Berliner’s Variation of Resistance, and Electric Undulations by Variation of Pressure]—[Edison’s Carbon Microphone]—[The Telephone Exchange]—[Statistics].
Τηλε (far), and φωνη (sound), are the Greek roots from which the word telephone is derived. It has the significance of transmitting sound to distant points, and is a word antedating the present speaking telephone, although this fact is generally lost sight of in the dazzling brilliancy of this latter invention. In the effort to hear better, the American Indian was accustomed to place his ear to the ground. Children of former generations also made use of a toy known as the “lovers’ telegraph”—a piece of string held under tension between the flexible bottoms of two tin boxes—which latter when spoken into transmitted through the string the vibrations from one box to the other, and made audible words spoken at a distance. These expedients simply made available the superior conductivity of the solid body over the air to transmit sound waves. The electro-magnetic telephone operates on an entirely different principle. It is a marvelous creation of genius, and stands alone as the unique, superb, and unapproachable triumph of the Nineteenth Century. For subtilty of principle, impressiveness of action, and breadth of results, there is nothing comparable with it among mechanical agencies. In its wonderful function of placing one intelligent being in direct vocal and sympathetic communication with another a thousand miles away, its intangible and mysterious mode of action suggests to the imagination that unseen medium of prayer rising from the conscious human heart to its omniscient and responsive God. The telegraph and railroad had already brought all the peoples of the earth into intimate communication and made them close kin, but the telephone transformed them into the closer relationship of families, and the tiny wire, sentient and responsive with its unlimited burden of human thoughts and human feelings, forms one of the great vital cords in the solidarity of the human family.
It is a curious fact that many, and perhaps most, great inventions have been in the nature of accidental discoveries, the by-products of thought directed in another channel, and seeking other results, but the telephone does not belong to this class. It is the logical and magnificent outcome of persistent thought and experiment in the direction of the electrical transmittal of speech. Prof. Bell had his objective point, and keeping this steadily in view, worked faithfully for the accomplishment of his object in producing a speaking telephone, until success crowned his work. He probably did not realize at first the full magnitude of the achievement, but looking at it from the end of the Nineteenth Century, he might well exclaim in the language of Horace: ““Exegi monumentum acre perennius”.”
Prof. Bell’s conception of the telephone dates back as far as 1874. His first United States patent, No. 174,465, was granted March 7, 1876, and his second January 30, 1877, No. 186,787. It is generally the fate of most inventions, even of a meritorious order, to languish for many years, and frequently through the whole term of the patent, before receiving full recognition and adoption by the public, but the meteoric brilliancy of this invention at its first public announcement astonished the masses, and inspired the admiration of the savants of the world. When exhibited at the Centennial Exhibition in Philadelphia, in 1876, it was spoken of by Sir William Thomson, and Prof. Henry, as the ““greatest by far of all the marvels of the electric telegraph.””
FIG. 55.—PHILIP REIS’ TELEPHONE.
It is always the fate of the author of any great invention to be compelled to defend himself against the claims of others. It is one of the failings of human nature to lay claim to that which somebody else has obtained, and is an old story which finds its first illustration in the squabbles of childhood. When a troop of prattling boys hunt butterflies among the daisies, and some sharp-eyed youngster has captured a prize, there are always others of his mates to cry, “I saw it first,” and men are but grown-up boys. So in the history of the telephone, Prof. Bell has found competitors for this honor, and it is astonishing to know how close some of these prior experimenters came to success without reaching it. In 1854 Bourseul, of Paris suggested an electric telephone, and in 1861 Philip Reis devised an electric telephone which would transmit musical tones. Daniel Drawbaugh, of Pennsylvania, is alleged to have made an electric telephone in 1867-1868, and his claims against the Bell interests were fought vigorously in the Patent Office, and in the courts, but without success. Elisha Gray’s claims perhaps came nearer to establishing for him a share in the honor of inventing the speaking telephone than any other, for he filed a caveat in the United States Patent Office upon the same day (February 14, 1876), upon which Prof. Bell’s application for a patent was made. But in the contest in the Patent Office with Gray, Edison, Berliner, Richmond, Holcombe, Farmer, Dolbear, Volker, and others, it was decided that Prof. Bell was the first to make a practically effective speaking telephone, and this conclusion has been sustained by the courts. Reis was a poor German school teacher at Friedrichsdorf, and in 1860 he took a coil of wire, a knitting needle, the skin of a German sausage, the bung of a beer barrel, and a strip of platinum, and constructed the first electric telephone. A typical form of his transmitter, see [Fig. 55], was a box covered with a vibrating membrane E, and provided with a mouth-piece at one side. A platinum strip F was attached to the membrane or vibrating diaphragm E, and a platinum pointed hammer G rested lightly on the platinum strip F. The hammer G and platinum strip F were connected to the opposite ends of a wire, which had in its circuit a battery and a receiver. Air vibrations in the nature of sound waves in the box caused the diaphragm E to vibrate, and a separating make-and-break contact between the platinum strip F and the platinum point of hammer G caused a series of separate and distinct broken impulses to traverse the battery circuit and be received upon the receiver, which latter consisted of an iron rod with a coil of wire around it. That Reis’ transmitter did alternately make and break the circuit, seems clear from his own memoir. A translation from this memoir, taken from the annual report (Jahresberichte) of the Physical Society of Frankfurt am Main for 1860-1861, reads as follows: