Got your cellular telephone yet? Last year that would have been a toss away line at a party. Two years ago it would have been a joke. Three years ago it would not have been understand by many people in the conversation. And I'll bet in his wildest dreams Alexander Graham Bell never once dreamed of people tucking a phone into a brief case or a pocket and carrying it with them wherever they went.

-- Louis Forsdale. Historical Time Capsule 331. A Telephone in Every Purse (1990).

From his Boston laboratory at 5 Exeter Place, Scottish-Canadian inventor and scientist Alexander Graham Bell conducted the first successful telephone call, summoning his assistant Thomas Augustus Watson from another room. On March 10th, 1876,  he put to test the telephone, using the simple words, "Mr. Watson — come here — I want to see you."

Bell had officially received the patent for his telephone only three days earlier, and his invention would forever change the way people communicated, allowing them to connect, whatever the distance. His strong commitment to education led him to teach the hearing impaired, inspired by his mother who was also hard of hearing. Bell's work on the telephone, which enabled the transmission of sound through an electrical current, laid the foundation for modern communications, including the development of the cell or mobile phone, as his support for oral education impacted the way deaf children were taught, without signing. In the early 1960s, the teletypewriter (TTY) and acoustic coupler made it possible for deaf people to use the telephone.

The following articles are drawn from Proquest Historical Newspapers, which informs and inspires classroom teaching and learning.

• Carpenter, F. (1895, Oct 20). The Telephone: Alexander Graham Bell Tells How It Was Invented. Detroit Free Press (1858-1922)
• Alexander Graham Bell: A Friend of the Deaf: The Telephone Inventor Comes to Michigan to Help Pass a Legislative Measure. (1899, Apr 10). Detroit Free Press (1858-1922) 
• Telephone's Inventor Is 60: Alexandre Graham Bell Still a Comparatively Young Man. (1907, Mar 31). The Sun (1837-) 
• History of the Telephone: It Was Patented Thirty-Five Years Ago by Alexander Graham Bell.  (1911, Mar 19). The Washington Post (1877-1922) 
• Alexander Graham Bell Once Instructor Here: Inventor of Telephone at American School in 1872 -- Demonstrated Method of "Visible Speech". (1922, Jan 15). The Hartford Courant (1887-1922) 
• Hill, E.F. (1926, Mar 07). Evolution of the Telephone here: Semicentennial Anniversary of This Important Adjunct to Modern Life Will Be Celebrated Wednesday -- Some of the Improvements That Have Been Made on the Crude Instrument Devised by Alexander Graham Bell in 1876, Which Enable the Present-Day Business Man to Converse Across the Continent. The Washington Post (1923-1954) 
• Tapley, R. (1929, Jan 06). The Inventor of the Telephone: Alexander Graham Bell: The Man Who Contracted Space. New York Herald Tribune (1926-1962) 
• Keller, J. (1992, May 18). Bell's Baby Alexander Graham Bell's Proudest Invention Wasn't the Telephone. Wall Street Journal (1923-) 
• Business Person of the Millennium: No 26: Alexander Graham Bell (1847-1922 ). (1999, Aug 29). The Observer (1901- 2003) 
• Hello, Again, Alexander Graham Bell: Inventing the Phone. (2001, Mar 11). The Washington Post (1974-) 

Tips:

• Bell, A. G. (1907). The Mechanism of Speech; Lectures Delivered Before the American Association to Promote the Teaching of Speech to the Deaf, to Which Is Appended a Paper Vowell Theories Read Before the National Academy of Arts and Sciences. Illustrated with Charts and Diagrams, by Alexander Graham Bell. Funk & Wagnalls Company, 1907. e-book.
• Bell, A. G. (1917). The Growth of the Oral Method in America. [Place uknown]. e-book.
• Forsdale, L. (1990). The Telephone. Louis Forsdale Collection, Teachers College Digital Collections.
• Lewis, C. C. (1991). Hello, Alexander Graham Bell Speaking : a Biography. Dillon Press.  Curriculum ; TK6143.B4 L49 1991
• Pasachoff, N. (1996). Alexander Graham Bell : Making Connections. Oxford University Press, Incorporated. e-book.
• Silverman, S. R., Kricos, P. B., Alexander Graham Bell Association for the Deaf. (1990). The Alexander Graham Bell Association for the Deaf : A Centennial Review. Alexander Graham Bell Association for the Deaf. Stacks ; HV2545 .A47 1990

Images:

• Bell System 1877. Courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
• Poster Image: Bell's First Telephone, Courtesy of Canva.

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