{"id":33428,"date":"2020-01-17T23:50:59","date_gmt":"2020-01-18T04:50:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.myedme.com\/login\/?p=33428"},"modified":"2020-01-17T23:51:35","modified_gmt":"2020-01-18T04:51:35","slug":"two-inventors-bell-telephone-edison-light","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/myedme.com\/login\/two-inventors-bell-telephone-edison-light\/","title":{"rendered":"Two Inventors: Bell (Telephone) & Edison (Light)"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

From:<\/strong> OpenStax’s U.S. History College Textbook<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

ALEXANDER GRAHAM BELL AND THE TELEPHONE<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
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Alexander Graham Bell\u2019s patent of the telephone was one of almost 700,000 U.S. patents issued between 1850 and 1900. Although the patent itself was only six pages long, including two pages of illustrations, it proved to be one of the most contested and profitable of the nineteenth century. (credit: U.S. National Archives and Records Administration)<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Advancements in communications matched the pace of growth seen in industry and home life. Communication technologies were changing quickly, and they brought with them new ways for information to travel. In 1858, British and American crews laid the first transatlantic cable lines, enabling messages to pass between the United States and Europe in a matter of hours, rather than waiting the few weeks it could take for a letter to arrive by steamship. Although these initial cables worked for barely a month, they generated great interest in developing a more efficient telecommunications industry. Within twenty years, over 100,000 miles of cable crisscrossed the ocean floors, connecting all the continents. Domestically, Western Union, which controlled 80 percent of the country\u2019s telegraph lines, operated nearly 200,000 miles of telegraph routes from coast to coast. In short, people were connected like never before, able to relay messages in minutes and hours rather than days and weeks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One of the greatest advancements was the telephone, which Alexander Graham Bell patented in 1876. While he was not the first to invent the concept, Bell was the first one to capitalize on it; after securing the patent, he worked with financiers and businessmen to create the National Bell Telephone Company. Western Union, which had originally turned down Bell\u2019s machine, went on to commission Thomas Edison to invent an improved version of the telephone. It is actually Edison\u2019s version that is most like the modern telephone used today. However, Western Union, fearing a costly legal battle they were likely to lose due to Bell\u2019s patent, ultimately sold Edison\u2019s idea to the Bell Company. With the communications industry now largely in their control, along with an agreement from the federal government to permit such control, the Bell Company was transformed into the American Telephone and Telegraph Company, which still exists today as AT&T. By 1880, fifty thousand telephones were in use in the United States, including one at the White House. By 1900, that number had increased to 1.35 million, and hundreds of American cities had obtained local service for their citizens. Quickly and inexorably, technology was bringing the country into closer contact, changing forever the rural isolation that had defined America since its beginnings.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

THOMAS EDISON AND ELECTRIC LIGHTING<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Although Thomas Alva Edison is best known for his contributions to the electrical industry, his experimentation went far beyond the light bulb. Edison was quite possibly the greatest inventor of the turn of the century, saying famously that he \u201choped to have a minor invention every ten days and a big thing every month or so.\u201d He registered 1,093 patents over his lifetime and ran a world-famous laboratory, Menlo Park, which housed a rotating group of up to twenty-five scientists from around the globe.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Edison became interested in the telegraph industry as a boy, when he worked aboard trains selling candy and newspapers. He soon began tinkering with telegraph technology and, by 1876, had devoted himself full time to lab work as an inventor. He then proceeded to invent a string of items that are still used today: the phonograph, the mimeograph machine, the motion picture projector, the dictaphone, and the storage battery, all using a factory-oriented assembly line process that made the rapid production of inventions possible.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 1879, Edison invented the item that has led to \nhis greatest fame: the practical incandescent light bulb. He allegedly \nexplored over six thousand different materials for the filament, before \nstumbling upon carbonized cotton thread as the ideal substance. By 1882,\n with financial backing largely from financier J. P. Morgan, he had \ncreated the Edison Electric Illuminating Company, which began supplying \nelectrical current to a small number of customers in New York City. \nMorgan guided subsequent mergers of Edison\u2019s other enterprises, \nincluding a machine works firm and a lamp company, resulting in the \ncreation of the Edison General Electric Company in 1889.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The next stage of invention in electric power came about with the contribution of George Westinghouse. Westinghouse was responsible for making electric lighting possible on a national scale. While Edison used \u201cdirect current\u201d or DC power, which could only extend two miles from the power source, in 1886, Westinghouse invented \u201calternating current\u201d or AC power, which allowed for delivery over greater distances due to its wavelike patterns. The Westinghouse Electric Company delivered AC power, which meant that factories, homes, and farms\u2014in short, anything that needed power\u2014could be served, regardless of their proximity to the power source. A public relations battle ensued between the Westinghouse and Edison camps, coinciding with the invention of the electric chair as a form of prisoner execution. Edison publicly proclaimed AC power to be best adapted for use in the chair, in the hope that such a smear campaign would result in homeowners becoming reluctant to use AC power in their houses. Although Edison originally fought the use of AC power in other devices, he reluctantly adapted to it as its popularity increased.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Questions<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

From: OpenStax’s U.S. History College Textbook ALEXANDER GRAHAM BELL AND THE TELEPHONE Advancements in communications matched the pace of growth seen in industry and home life. Communication technologies were changing quickly, and they brought with them new ways for information to travel. In 1858, British and American crews laid the first transatlantic cable lines, enabling […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-33428","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/myedme.com\/login\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33428","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/myedme.com\/login\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/myedme.com\/login\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/myedme.com\/login\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/myedme.com\/login\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33428"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/myedme.com\/login\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33428\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":33430,"href":"https:\/\/myedme.com\/login\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33428\/revisions\/33430"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/myedme.com\/login\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33428"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/myedme.com\/login\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33428"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/myedme.com\/login\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33428"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}