Profiles in History

by Ashley Wiggers

Samuel Morse sent the first telegraph message in 1844. This changed everything. For over 50 years the telegraph was the most important step forward in communication. In order to send a telegram, you would have to travel to the nearest telegraph office, which in some cases was many miles away. You would then write out your message, being careful to use the fewest amount of words possible, because each word was very costly. For these reasons, people only sent telegrams when absolutely necessary.

With the invention of the telephone came instant communication. Not ticks and dashes translated into letters, but simply using your voice. I imagine that at first people felt strange talking into a machine and then expecting a reply. Now, we don’t think twice about it, but during Alexander Graham Bell’s time it was borderline insanity.

by Ashley Wiggers

Samuel Morse sent the first telegraph message in 1844. This changed everything. For over 50 years the telegraph was the most important step forward in communication. In order to send a telegram, you would have to travel to the nearest telegraph office, which in some cases was many miles away. You would then write out your message, being careful to use the fewest amount of words possible, because each word was very costly. For these reasons, people only sent telegrams when absolutely necessary.

With the invention of the telephone came instant communication. Not ticks and dashes translated into letters, but simply using your voice. I imagine that at first people felt strange talking into a machine and then expecting a reply. Now, we don’t think twice about it, but during Alexander Graham Bell’s time it was borderline insanity.

Dr. Bell was an inventor, professor, and visionary. Born in 1847 in Edinburgh, Scotland, Aleck showed signs of a great mind when he was just a boy. He created his first successful invention at the age of nine. It was a machine that removed husks from grain. Aleck, as he was called, was taught at home by his mother until the age of eleven. Being almost completely deaf, she gave him more than just a basic home education. Eliza was an accomplished pianist despite her inability to hear. She passed her knowledge of the piano on to Aleck, along with a sense that just because something seems unlikely, that means little when compared to human innovation.

Bell’s future was shaped by his childhood, beginning with his love for music. He understood the way instruments worked, and had the capacity to hear a piece of music and then play it perfectly right afterward. At one time, he thought about devoting his life to being a musician. Another aspect of his family life that left an impression on young Aleck was that two generations of elocution experts came before him. His grandfather was a professor of elocution, and his father created a system of visible speech that Aleck would later use to teach the Deaf how to speak. He was always fascinated with sounds and the vibrations of speech, seeing them in a way that no one else did.

In April of 1871, Bell moved to America. He had accepted a teaching position at the Boston School for the Deaf. Within just days, Aleck made a huge impact on the school. Using the knowledge his father had passed down to him, he was a very successful teacher. Next, he began tutoring Deaf children. This gave him more time to focus on his inventions. At the time, he was working on something he called the harmonic telegraph. It was the idea that if you used varying tones, you could send multiple messages along the same wire.

Alexander Graham Bell framed portrait by Cheryl Ellicott

One of his students was Mabel Hubbard. She had lost her hearing at the age of four from scarlet fever. Although she was able to speak and read lips, her father hired Mr. Bell to make Mabel’s speech even clearer. She was able to learn quickly, and didn’t need Aleck’s tutoring for long. The connection between them grew to much more than just tutor and student though. Aleck had found the partner of his life in Mabel. Always supportive, at times she believed in the telephone more than Aleck.

Think about the idea for just a moment, and pretend that you’ve never used or heard of a telephone before. Now think of the concept, talking through a wire. Does that sound a little crazy to you? It did to most people. It took a special kind of bravery to pursue such an extraordinary idea. Even after he proved that the invention worked, people thought it would never become common, that it was just a toy. So he proved them wrong again.

Tele means distance, or from afar. Phon means sound. Put them together, and telephone means sound from afar.

“The inventor looks upon the world and is not contented with things as they are. He wants to improve whatever he sees, he wants to benefit the world; he is haunted by an idea.”

— Alexander Graham Bell

It was during his research for the harmonic telegraph that Aleck became obsessed with the question: could the human voice be transmitted through wire? One day, while working on the method of sending multiple telegraphs, Aleck and his assistant, Mr. Watson, happened upon a very important discovery. It was June 2, 1875, and Mr. Watson accidentally transmitted a twanging sound along a wire. It occurred when one of his instruments was stuck, and he plucked it with his finger. At the other end of the wire, Bell’s trained ear heard a sound that was unlike anything he had ever heard before. With this, he knew instantly that if this sound could be transmitted, a human voice could too.

His idea for the telephone was possible. Experiments soon began. Alexander Graham Bell’s mind was constantly turning. He moved fast, and thought even faster. Exploring his ideas, he devoted himself to his inventions, sacrificing everything, at times, even food. He and Watson lived together in a low-rent attic. What little money they had went to supplies. Often, Mr. Watson would be wakened in the middle of the night by an excited Bell who couldn’t wait until morning to try out a new theory. It was after many attempts and much work that the first phrase was spoken clearly through the telephone on March 10th, 1876. A frantic Bell said, “Mr. Watson, come here, I want you.” Calling to his friend, Aleck had just spilled acid on himself. Watson came running breathlessly in and told Bell that he had heard his words as clearly as if he were standing in the room. After that, Aleck cared little about the burning acid.

He had created two important inventions in one—the microphone and the loudspeaker. The microphone is a device that turns your voice’s sound waves into an electrical signal. The signal then travels through a wire that is connected to the loud speaker. Finally, the loud speaker takes the electrical signal and converts it back into sound waves.

It would take a little time, and a lot more work before the telephone became acceptable to the public. Bell and Watson travelled to various cities making demonstrations of their invention. People began to see what the future could be. They thought of how much less complicated it would be to communicate with a friend, or call on the doctor. They felt safer knowing that it would only take a phone call for the fire department to dispatch help. Four years after the first phone call, over sixty thousand phones had been installed in America.

On January 25th of 1915, Alexander Graham Bell and Thomas Watson made history once again. A network of telephone lines had finally been built from one end of the country to the other. Using the familiar instrument before him, Aleck spoke from New York to his faithful assistant who was more than 3,000 miles away. With a clever wit, and a feeling of nostalgia, Bell used the same fateful words that had changed his life thirty-nine years before, “Mr. Watson, come here, I want you.” Watson’s reply: “It will take me five days to get there now!”

“Don’t keep forever on the public road, going only where others have gone, and following one after the other like a flock of sheep. Leave the beaten track occasionally and dive into the woods.”

–Alexander Graham Bell

Mr. Bell did not stay on the public road. He did not follow others. He blazed his own trail, changing the world with his ideas. We thank you Dr. Bell, for the courage of your innovation. Because of your work, the door to communication has been opened wide.

“The achievement of one goal should be the starting point of another.”

— Alexander Graham Bell

Discussion

Alexander Graham Bell stood by his ideas even when the majority of people told him they would never work. They said that even if they did work they would never catch on. What do you think helped him to keep going? If you were in a similar situation, what do you think would give you the strength to carry on?

Activity

The telephone changed the way people communicated. Talk with your family about the way you think cell phones have changed the way people live now. What does your family do differently because of cell phone use? Keep track of how often you and your family use the cell phone compared to how often you use your home phone for one day and then for one week. Do you think the need for home phones will change in the future?

To download activity pages for this profile that include a word search, crossword, map and writing assignment, click here.

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shley Wiggers grew up in the early days of the homeschooling movement. She was taught by her late mother, Debbie Strayer, who was an educator, speaker, and the author of numerous homeschooling materials. It was through Debbie’s encouragement and love that Ashley learned the value of being homeschooled. Currently, Ashley is the co-executive editor of Homeschooling Today magazine, public relations director for Geography Matters, and the author of the Profiles from History series. Ashley makes her home in Somerset, KY, with her loving husband, Alex, and their precious sons, Lincoln and Jackson.

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