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Bell was Born
Alexander Graham Bell was born in Edinburgh, Scotland. Alexander is born to Professor Alexander Melville Bell and Eliza Grace Symonds. His father was a famous elocutionist or speech expert and teacher. -
First Invention
His first invention ever was at the age of 12. He created a machine that could clean wheat grains and remove the husks. -
Interest in Speech Machines
Alexanders father took him to see an "automation machine" that imitated the sound of the human voice. He became interested in speech and language. In order to pursue this interest, he translated a German book by another famous scientist so that he could build a machine with the help of his brother that would produce speech electronically. -
The Move to England
The Bell family moved to London, however, Alexander stayed in Scotland and became a teacher of elocution and music when he was 16. -
The Start of College
Alexander joined his older brother Melville as a student at the University of Edinburgh. Alexander suffered illness from exhaustion and his health kept him bedridden most of the time. His younger brother Edward was also sick with tuberculosis. -
Buckle Down to Study
After Alexanders brother Edward died, he returned home to Scotland. His older brother Melville married and moved away to open his own school of elocution. Alexander spent much of his spare time during these days studying. -
Another Death in the Family
Alexanders brother Melville died from tuberculosis. His father also became sick but traveled to Newfoundland to recuperate. Alexanders parents decided to move to Canada. Alexander also became sick but a journey to the "New World" that had a different climate saved his health. -
The Move to the U.S.
Alexander moves to Boston to teach others his method of Visible Speech System, which is to help the deaf and speech-impaired people. Link Text -
School for the Deaf
Alexander oped a school in Boston called the "Vocal Physiology and Mechanic of Speech for deaf students." Helen Keller was one of his famous students. Link Text -
Invention of the Telephone
Alexander starts experimenting on the phonautograph, a machine that helps plot sound waves. In the summer of this year, he came up with the idea of a telephone. Alexander also hired an assistant by the name of Thomas Watson. -
Telephone Works
Watson happened to pluck one of the metal reeds that formed Alexander's phonautograph machine. Due to this accidental move, it showed that a telephone could transmit sounds. Link Text -
Patents Idea
Alexander receives the U.S. Patent Office patent number 174,465. This number allowed him to have his machine transmit sound waves telegraphically without others copying his ideas. -
First Long-Distance Call
Alexander received a long-distance voice message from a town called Brantford, about four miles away. After this major event, Bell began to demonstrate and speak about his new invention to the public. -
First Telephone Company
Alexanders "Bell Telephone Company" was formed. Even with this company, he was still teaching because the telephone was not profitable for him yet. Link Text -
Marriage
Alexander got married to Mabel Hubbard, who was from Cambridge, Massachusetts. They had a 10 year age difference between the two of them but they did not let that bother them. His wife was also deaf, which had a major influence on his work. -
Other Inventions
Alexander also invented the metal detector, a metal jacket that helped people breathe, and an audiometer that helped detect hearing problems. He eventually had 18 patients given in his name. He received many honors and there are many awards that are still given today in his name. -
Designing a Speadboat
Alexander began experimenting in aviation in the 1890s, even developing giant manned tetrahedral kites. His dreams of airplanes that could take off from water led him to work on the designs of winged hydrofoil boats that skipped across the water surface at high speeds. The HD-4 model on which he collaborated reached a speed of more than 70 miles per hour during a 1919 test on a lake in Nova Scotia, a world water-speed record that stood for more than a decade. -
National Geographic Society
Alexander became the President of the National Geographic Society. Even to this day, his family members are still playing an important part in this organization. Link Text -
First Trans-Atlantic Phone Call
For the first time ever, Alexander called up his assistant Watson from across the continent. 38 years before this call, Alexander and Watson had talked on the phone only about 4 miles away, however. This phone call was much better and the quality was clear and crisp to hear. -
Passing of Alexander
Alexander Graham Bell died but his legacy is still with us today. If it wasn't for him and his inventions who knows where we would be with technology. -
Suspension of the Telephone
Two days after Alexander's death all telephone service in the United States and Canada was suspended for a full minute at the precise moment when Bell was lowered into his grave. An army of 60,000 telephone operators stood silently at attention and did not connect any new calls as the continent’s 13 million telephones went quiet. -
Decibels
To honor Alexander's contributions to acoustical science, the standard unit for the intensity of sound waves was named the “bel” in the 1920s. The decibel, one-tenth of a bel, is the most commonly used metric for measuring the magnitude of noise.
