First Telephone Invented
The first telephone invented, the predecessor of the modern telephone systems, timeline is a interesting piece of history. To whom the invention is credited is also a heated debate. In the late 1800s there were several inventors working on developing a speaking telegraph. Each of these people had a important part in inventing the telephone as we know it. Each seemed to improve on the other.
The idea seemed to start in 1854 when Frenchman by the name of Bourseul wrote a paper stating his thoughts on how to transmit speech electrically. "Speak against one diaphragm and let each vibration make or break the electric contact. The electric pulsations thereby produced will set the other diaphragm working and it then produces the transmitted sound."
In 1857 Antonio Meucci an Italian probably invented the first phone. The Enciclopedia Italiana di Scienze, Lettere ed Arti, credits him with the invention of the telephone. The problem being that he evidently couldn’t follow up with the paperwork to make it official. In 2002 US House of Representatives passed a bill recognizing Meucci's accomplishment and stated that "if Meucci had been able to pay a $10 fee to maintain the caveat after 1874 no patent will could have been issued to Alexander Graham Bell.
In 1860, in Germany, Phillip Rees produced a working prototype telephone system transmitting proximately 100 m. It was produced on a small scale by a local company with only mediocre and inconsistent results.
We must also remember that it was only seen as a toy at that time. Money for such was short and foresight of the possibilities of the future modern telephone systems nonexistent. Foresight would never imagine that in years to come people would set down to eat and be bombarded by so many telemarketing calls that a national do not call directory would have to be implimented.
In 1876 Elisha Gray an American electrical engineer, later cofounder of Graybar electric which later became Western electric Company, developed of a telephone prototype in Highland Park, Illinois, U.S.A. Gray is considered by many to be the true inventor of the variable resistance telephone, despite losing out to Alexander Graham Bell for the patent. Burton H. Baker wrote a book "The Gray Matter: The Forgotten Story of the Telephone", which is a detailed revelation of how Gray's invention was copied by Alexander Graham Bell.
History books credit Alexander Graham Bell on February 14, 1876 with filing for the first patent for the telephone system. On March 7, 1876 his patent was granted, and three days later his invention carried the first intelligible sentence over wire. "Mr.Watson - come here- I want to see you".
Alexander Graham Bells invention gained him the title of being the first to mass produce the telephone which evolved into a working telephone, and which has evolved into our modern and intricate and complicated small business phone systems.
In 1860 Phillip Rees produced a working prototype, first telephone invented.