Everyone must have heard about the Scottish-born inventor, engineer, and scientist who invented and patented the first-ever functional telephone.Alexander Graham Bell was a known personality, and he even co-founded the American Telephone and Telegraph Company (AT&T) back in 1885. The phone has become such an integral part of everyone’s lives that people cannot live without it in today’s world. We can give credit to the start of this technological advancement to Alexander Bell.Alexander Graham Bell’s father, brother, and grandfather were all in the same work of speech and elocution. Bell’s mother and wife were deaf, and this made Bell develop in this profession. This even drove Bell’s life work. The research Bell began with speech and hearing made him experiment with many hearing devices, and this led to him being awarded the first US patent on March 7, 1876, for the telephone. However, Alexander Graham Bell continued with his scientific research and refused to keep the telephone in his study. He considered the invention an intrusion on his real work. Alexander Graham Bell invented a lot of things, including hydrofoils, aeronautics, and optical telecommunications. Graham Bell served as the second president of the National Geographic Society from 1898-1903. He was not only one of the 33 founders of the National Geographic Society, but he was also highly influential to the magazine.Let’s dive a bit into the early life of Bell. Alexander Graham Bell was born in Edinburgh in Scotland to professor Alexander Melville Bell, a phonetician, and Eliza Grace Bell. He was born on March 3, 1847, at his family home in South Charlotte Street. There is a stone inscription at this place marking it as his home. He had two siblings, Melville James Bell and Edward Charles Bell, but unfortunately, both of them died of tuberculosis. Young Alexander wanted a middle name like his two brothers, and at the tender age of 10, Bell spoke to his father regarding it. On his 11th birthday, Bell’s father allowed him to take the middle name ‘Graham’ with respect to Alexander Graham, a patient from Canada that his father was treating and was a Bell family friend. He was still called Aleck by friends and close relatives.Bell demonstrated a knack for science from a young age when he collected botanical specimens and started running experiments on them. For Bell’s first invention, he combined rotating paddles with sets of nail brushes, creating a simple dehusking machine for his friend and neighbor’s flour mill. His friend Ben’s father was so happy with this invention at such an early age that he gave the boys a small workshop for them to invent in. Alexander Graham Bell’s education was mostly imparted by his father, similar to his brothers. At the age of 15, he left the Royal High School after only four forms. He did not treat all subjects equally and had a special attraction to science subjects, especially biology. After a few years, Bell, at the age of 16, became a pupil-teacher of music and elocution at Weston House Academy at Elgin, Moray, Scotland. He later joined the University of Edinburgh and enrolled at University College, London.Alexander Graham Bell also had a deep interest in the emerging science of heredity, apart from his usual engineering works.If you enjoy this article, why not also read some Albert Einstein facts and facts about Donald Trump here on Kidadl?Alexander Graham Bell Inventions Alexander Graham Bell’s main invention is the telephone, and that is what he is known for all over the world. However, there are other inventions to his name that many people don’t know about.The first goal of Alexander Graham Bell was to help deaf students communicate. His grandfather was also in the same profession, working as an elocutionist, while his father developed Visible Speech. Visible Speech was a collection of written symbols that helped the deaf while speaking. As both his mother and wife were deaf, Bell focused on resolving the issue once and for all.Mabel Hubbard (his eventual wife) was his pupil and the daughter of a wealthy Massachusetts family. Mabel’s father, Gardiner Greene Hubbard, was a lawyer and the first president of the National Geographic Society. He opposed their marriage due to Bell’s poor finances. Bell soon established the Bell Telephone Company after securing the telephone patent. Bell’s patent took a lot of competition to get, and once the patent office chose him, Bell’s investors got him a lot of financial help, and he soon married Mabel. It is said that Bell invented the telephone for her and even wrote that on the back of a photo found on the desk in his study at Baddeck.Bell also invented a photophone with the help of his assistant Charles Sumner Tainter. A photophone is a wireless telephone that allows for the transmissions of sound and human voice on a beam of light. It was such a good invention that the photophone that Bell developed, along with his assistant, could transmit wireless voice signals without a telephone line 19 years before the first voice radio transmissions. Bell even believed that the principles used in his photophone triumph his achievements in the telephone. Before Bell died, he said that the photophone was the greatest invention he ever made.After US President James A. Garfield was shot in 1881, Bell is known to have developed one of the earliest versions of a metal detector using an induction balance. The metal detector is said to have worked flawlessly in tests but could not find the bullet. This was due to the metal bed frame where the president was kept, which created disturbances in the device. Bell’s requests were not heard by the surgeon, Doctor Willard Bliss, to move the president to another bed. The surgeon only permitted Bell to search the body on the right side for the bullet. After Garfield’s death, it was found that the bullet was actually on the left side.Bell even ventured into heavier than air flight, and Bell’s design was modified into constructing the modern-day aileron. Bell also built fast hydrofoil boats.Alexander Graham Bell’s Early LifeAs both his mother and wife were deaf, it made Alexander Graham Bell interested in the field that he ultimately went into. His research and inventions using sounds eventually made him want to send sound signals using a telegraph wire, and that is how we got our first telephone.When his interest piled up, he hired his famous assistant, Thomas Watson, after getting some funds. Together, Bell and Thomas Watson were able to come up with the idea for the telephone. The first words over the telephone were spoken by Bell: ‘Mr. Watson, come here, I want to see you’.Before all this, he was a simple boy in a family of five living in Scotland. He was home-schooled in his early days by his father, but he left school soon after. Bell’s mother was deaf, and it made him want to solve this problem for her. It influenced him. Eventually, Bell attended high school and also the University of Edinburgh. He was a genius from birth, with his first invention being a dehusking machine for his neighbor’s mill. Unfortunately, his brothers died of tuberculosis.Bell was committed to understanding the physiology of speech and educating deaf students. He was known to teach at the Boston School For Deaf Mutes, the American School for the Deaf in Hartford, Connecticut, and the Clarke School for the Deaf in Northampton, Massachusetts. He even invented techniques that helped in teaching speech to deaf people. Bell became a professor of vocal physiology at Boston University, and this is the place he met his wife, Mabel Hubbard.How Long It Took Alexander Graham Bell To Invent The TelephoneUsing a telegraph line, a single wire, to send voice signals between places was a genius stroke from Bell, and it earned him the place of one of the pioneers of change.Bell studied the human voice and worked in many schools for the deaf. He worked with devices like the harmonic telegraph and phonautograph. He even worked with his assistant on acoustic telegraphy. It was on the same day on February 14, 1876, that Bell and an American electrical engineer, named Elisha Gray, filed patents with the US Patent Office on the telegraphical transmission of sound. The patent was given to Bell, and after a few days, he got the telephone working. By 1886, around 150,000 people in the US owned a telephone.On July 9, 1877, the Bell Telephone Company was organized. The Bell Company faced a lot of challenges in court regarding the patent, but none were successful in taking it down.On January 15, 1915, Alexander Graham Bell made the first transcontinental telephone call to Watson from New York City. Watson was in San Francisco. So, the call was made from New York to San Francisco.Why did Alexander Graham Bell invent the telephone?Bell was poor, and the father of the girl he fell in love with opposed their marriage due to his poor finances. Bell then got some funding and later married the girl. Later, Bell himself wrote on the back of a photo in his study mentioning that the telephone was invented because of her.Bell was always interested in this field as his wife and mother were both deaf. He researched a lot on sound and telegraphic sound transmission and later succeeded in utilizing it to make the telephone with a little help from Elisha Gray’s water transmitter.Investors Thomas Sanders and Gardiner Hubbard shared the US profits with Bell as they tried to improve the harmonic telegraph. Bell spent days and nights perfecting this device, and while doing so, he got the idea to send voice notes or human voices instead of messages through these wires. Hence, the idea of the telephone arrived.Here at Kidadl, we have carefully created lots of interesting family-friendly facts for everyone to enjoy! If you liked our suggestions for ‘Alexander Graham Bell facts’, then why not take a look at ‘Christopher Columbus facts’ or ‘facts about Rosa Parks’?
Everyone must have heard about the Scottish-born inventor, engineer, and scientist who invented and patented the first-ever functional telephone.
