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Happy Birthday Mr. Bell!

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Alexander Graham Bell c1904
Alexander Graham Bell c1904

Alexander Graham Bell, a successful business man, scientist, innovator and engineer was born on this date in 1847.

In 1876, at the age of 29, Alexander was awarded the first U.S. patent for the telephone (patent # 174,465). Soon afterward in 1877 he formed the Bell Telephone Company.

With the financial success of the telephone, he was able to further his research and experiments. He influenced many other areas of life, often a reaction to daily events. One such invention was an electromagnetic device called an induction balance to try and locate a bullet lodged in President Garfield in 1881 – the attempt was not successful. Later, after his son died from respiratory problems, he designed a metal vacuum jacket that would help with breathing – the forerunner to the Iron Lung.

A little bit of Bell trivia:

  • In 1898 he became the president of the National Geographic Society
  • His mother and his wife were both deaf
  • He met Helen Keller when she was 6 years old
  • Bell & Casey Baldwin’s HD-4 hydrofoil boat set a world marine speed record in 1919

There are a number of books and graphics in our collection. These can be discovered with a subject search for Bell, Alexander Graham. Additional information may also be found in The Alexander Graham Bell Family Papers at the Library of Congress, part of our American Memory collection.

Comments (6)

  1. Mr. Bell a true intervator-inventor his accomplishments paved the road which leeds us to todays comunication accomplishments-and he did ispired others in the medical field, and within his comunity-Happy Birthday. Mr. Bell im sure your amazed and proud of were we have come today in comunications its because of your presents on this Earth. If you could here me i would sayThank you for the isperation you have givin me and all of us in learning about new things and using our imagination to build things when i was a young boy. Sean Brewer

  2. I agree, Mr. Bell would be amazed at the advancements we have made in technology. Happy Birthday, Alexander Graham Bell!

  3. I am wanting to see if there are any Spalding families still livivg in Perthshire.
    Our son, who is a descendent of the Spalding line will be in scotland in June and would like to make contact.

    • We have staff at the Library who specialize in genealogical questions and maybe they can help – see https://www.loc.gov/rr/genealogy/

  4. Hello Alexander Graham Bell (Mr. Bell),

    Wish you happy birthday and long togetherness with Marla & family in heaven. It’s 2023 and many years passed since 3rd March 1876 and you had done marvelous research & given such a tool – medium to communicate that many spend their days with “telephone” – and its advanced form like wireless telephone, smartphone, TV, internet for either Natural Communication or Virtual Communication (many times it’s within virtual loop with virtual stories).

    Even financial transaction of real currencies as well as virtual currencies and many more are through further advancement in your wired telephony.

    So, Mr. Bell what do you want to talk to your Mother & Wife? I think, every talk using telephone technologies are one-way or other must be connected to you via your research and to spiritual personalities via “panch-tattva” i.e. 5 basic elements of life.

    HAPPY BIRTHDAY !

    by the way, how you innovated a mic & a speaker that turned to telephone? What was magnetic attraction for your inspiration? paper-magnet-wire-coil-electricity (Speaker) & vice-versa (Mic)? Change in current due to voice at mic lead to change in current at speaker to produce sound but the sound would be “kurkurahat – farfarahat of paper” but not the exact voice as said.

    How the signal was processed?

    Why any extra signal processing was required? I suppose magnet-paper-coil-electricity were not enough to convey emotion, isn’t it?

    Mouth (1) to Ears (2) others
    to
    Ears (2) from Mouth (1) other internal communication need brain, throat, nose, eyes other than neural networks but how you made everything within MIC (so tiny) to receive voice and speaker to broadcast voice?

    I believe you made two small artificial brains for a mic & a speaker respectively.

    New brains !

    Happy 176th Birthday to Alexander Graham Bell !

    I wish you to visit earth and let one to travel to the places where he or she can communicate via telephone-wireless phones-wired telephones, and from where – ever one can send & receive signals on their own (by own means) at-least.

    – Abhishek Singh

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