Who Invented Telephone? The Invention of One Man or a Race Against Time?

The phone is one of humanity's most revolutionary inventions, transforming the way humans talk to each other from far away and defining the evolution of contemporary society. Yet who was responsible for this revolutionary technology? The response revolves around the genius work of Alexander Graham Bell, whose last name is eternally connected with the first working telephone.

The Inventor: Alexander Graham Bell

Alexander Graham Bell (1847–1922) was a Scottish-born scientist, inventor, and engineer. Motivated by a lifelong passion for speech and sound, he partially encouraged by his work with deafness, both his mother and wife being deaf, Bell was motivated to try transmitting spoken words electronically.

Development of the Telephone

Bell's road to the telephone started with studies in telegraphy, particularly experiments to transmit several messages on one wire (the "harmonic telegraph"). As he continued to work on that, Bell became more and more interested in transmitting the human voice itself.

By 1875, working with aide Thomas Watson, Bell was able to transmit vibrations of sound over a wire.

The turning point arrived on March 10, 1876, when Bell spoke to Watson over his machine for the first time, "Mr. Watson, come here—I want to see you." Those were the first words to be sent over the telephone, and Watson, in a separate room, picked them up clearly.

The Patent Race and Recognition

Bell was not the sole innovator working on the concept. A similar device was being developed by an American inventor by the name of Elisha Gray. There was a race, Bell submitting his patent application on February 14, 1876, hours earlier than Gray filed his own caveat (statement of intended invention). Bell Patent No. 174,465 was issued on March 7, 1876, by the U.S. Patent Office--and since that time, it has emerged as one of the most coveted patents ever.

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Despite rival assertions and high profile litigation, Bell had a patent. The invention by Bell was commercialized in the following decades (via the Bell Telephone Company, later AT&T) and it transformed the manner in which the world interacted.)

By June 1876, Bell had already demonstrated his telephone to the wider world, at the Philadelphia Centennial Exhibition, and soon after that, made the world’s first long-distance telephone call in Ontario, Canada.

Impact and Legacy

• The invention of the telephone was soon to effect a communications revolution:

• It offered real time, reliable voice communication over a distance.

• Businesses, governments and families all over the world were networked in a way never before seen.

The invention by Bell led to the emergence of telecommunications which saw the introduction of mobile and digital gadgets which are the current ones in our lives.

Bell himself later contributed to other fields- optical telecommunications, aviation and even the founding of the National Geographic Society, however his most famous legacy is the telephone.

Alexander Graham Bell is attributed with the invention of the telephone whose original practical incarnation was patented and displayed in 1876. Not only had his creativity, determination, and technical expertise changed the manner in which people communicate but also linked the world in a manner that had never before been thought of to be a possibility. 

The history of the telephone, an invention out of curiosity, competition and invention, is a measure of what human resource can potentially be.

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