“ALECK” the GreatAlexander Graham Bell

Inventor

“The most successful men in the end are

those    whose

success is the result of steady

accretion “

• Born in Edinburgh, Scotland

• March 3, 1847– August 2, 1922

• 2 Brothers: Melville James & Edward Charles Bell

• Father- Professor of Elocution, Alexander Melville Bell

• Mother- Eliza Grace Bell

• His mother and wife were both deaf, encouraging his

experimenting with the telephone

• Attended Royal High School in Edinburgh Scotland at an early age

• Left at age 15 to travel with his grandfather

• Became a “Pupil Teacher of music in Weston House Academy in Scotland

• The following year he attended the University of Edinburgh

Childhood Inventions• While helping his friend at his family’s mill, young Aleck

invented a homemade device that combined rotating paddles with sets of nail brushes, creating a simple wheat de-husking machine

• He learned a manual finger language so he could sit at his mother’s side and silently tap out the conversations swirling around the family parlor. • He also developed a technique

of speaking in clear, modulated tones directly into his mother's forehead wherein she would hear him with reasonable clarity

• Young Bell also taught speech

to the family dog.

• Bell married a deaf woman, former speech pupil, Mabel Hubbard.

• They had 4 children together: 2 daughters– Elsie May & Marian Hubbard Bell

& 2 sons who died in infancy.

• Their family resided in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

INVENTOR

TEACHER

SCIENTIST

PHILANTHROPIST• Bell became

professor of Vocal Physiology and Elocution at the Boston University School of Oratory

• 1872 Alexander Bell opened his "School of Vocal Physiology and Mechanics of Speech" in Boston

Telephone, Metal Detector, Hydrofoils, etc.

• He experimented

with deaf people,

heredity, sleeping, and

water & air travel

• Not only did Bell dedicate his whole

life to experimenting with deaf people, he

founded deaf education facilities

and contributed money.

Telephone

Metal Detector

HydrofoilsAeronautics

Bell begins work on Harmonic telegraph, and got

support for his idea of telephone

Met Thomas Watson which allowed him to have the equipment necessary for

experimenting

2 June 1875, Watson accidentally plucked one of

the reeds and Bell, at the receiving end of the wire, heard the overtones of the reed; overtones that would

be necessary for transmitting speech.

“Watson, come here I need you,” were the first words heard over the telephone. Bell

had spilled liquid on the testing table.

Elisha Gray vs. Alexander Graham Bell

• There is considerable debate about who arrived to the U.S. Patent Office First

• Gray filled a caveat with the US Patent Office for a telephone design that used a water transmitter.

• That same morning, Bell’s lawyer filed his patent application.

• There is considerable debate about who arrived

first.

• Gray later challenged the validity of Bell's patent.

CompetitorsOver a period of 18

years, the Bell Telephone Company

faced over 600 lawsuits posing legal challenges concerning the rights to the telephone, but none

was successful in establishing priority over the original Bell

patent.

On 13 January 1887, the United States Government moved to annul the patent issued to Bell. By the time the case surfaced, the patents were expired and the case was dropped by the US Attorney General.

Italian inventor Antonio Meucci also claimed to have created the first working model of a telephone in Italy in 1834.

Bell was a firm believer in EUGENICS

• A widely held belief in the early 20th century that handicapped couples and couples in poverty should have no children.

• Even possibly should be sterilized.

• He observed that congenitally deaf parents are more likely to produce deaf children.

• He suggested that couples in which both were deaf should not marry.

• Toward the end of his life, Bell

investigated heredity,

beginning with deafs.

• Invented an electromagnetic device called an

induction balance and a telephone probe, a metal

vaccum jacket that is breathable, and

an audiometer.• Most of his effort,

however, went

towards the

challenge of flight.

• Bell spent the last decade of his life improving hydrofoil designs, and in 1919 he and Casey Baldwin built a hydrofoil

that set a world water-speed record that was not broken until 1963

• Bell died of diabetes on August 2, 1922, at his private estate, Beinn Bhreagh, Nova Scotia, at age 75.