Who Invented The Telephone? Why Bell, of course.

[Editor's note. A man named Pizer recently claims the Italian Meucci invented the telephone. Pizer has e-mailed me several times, questioning my research supporting Bell, yet each time failing to supply any kind of proof for Meucci. The respected telephone historian Edwin S. Grosvenor has also recently e-mailed me and supplies these facts:]

 

Tom:

 

Thanks for your great site, and your response to Russell Pizer's ideas about Meucci.

 

You might be amused to know that Meucci was recently honored by a resolution Congress claiming he was the true inventor of the telephone, that Bell committed fraud in obtaining his patent, and that there exists a question as to who the true inventor of the telephone was. (The full text of HR 269 is at http://www.alecbell.org/HR269.html (external link) [Link now dead](This shows how silly our Congressmen can be.)

 

Contrary to the implications in HR 269, the courts have looked into these claims extensively and were very unequivocal in their findings. Meucci was a defendant in American Bell Telephone Co. v. Globe Telephone Co. and others. (The court's findings, reported in 31 Fed. Rep. 729, are at http://www.alecbell.org/BellvGlobe.html (external link, now dead)

 

The judge was scathing in his criticism of Meucci's claims and his behavior, and concluded that Meucci was deliberately involved in attempts to defraud investors. The question of whether Bell was the true inventor of the telephone is perhaps the single most litigated fact in U.S. history, and as you pointed out the Bell patents were defended in some 600 cases. Bell never lost a case. HR 269 directly contradicts findings of courts in New York, Massachusetts, Louisiana, Ohio, Maryland, and numerous others states. (See among others American Bell Telephone Co. v. Dolbear, 15 Fed. Rep. 448; American Bell Telephone Co. v. Spencer, 8 Fed. Rep. 509, and American Bell Telephone Co. v. Molecular Telephone, 32 Fed. Rep. 214.)

 

Despite the claims of Meucci's supporters, his actions had little or nothing to do with the court case in which it was alleged that Bell committed fraud in obtaining his patent. That action, known as the "Government case," led to one of the largest scandals of the Grover Cleveland administration. By 1885, eight years after Bell had patented the telephone, the only way to beat his patent was to allege it had been obtained by fraud. The US government joined with the Pan-Electric Telephone Company and several other would-be infringers and brought suit to try to have the patents annulled.

 

Joseph Pulitzer's New York World revealed that millions of dollars worth of shares in Pan-Electric Telephone were owned by the US Attorney General Augustus Garland (whose office brought the case), another member of the Cleveland cabinet, two senators and a former member of Congress. The case against Bell ended when President Cleveland ordered Garland not to continue.

 

The U.S. Congress itself has already investigated these matters, and HR 269 in effect overturns the findings of the Congressional committee appointed by the Speaker of the House on March 4, 1886, which met from March 12 until May 27 and produced "1,278 closely printed octavo pages of testimony." The implications in HR 269 directly contradict both the report for the majority and the report for the minority. HR 269 contains significant misstatements of fact, is contrary to the findings of numerous court cases, and contradicts the evidence cited by a Congressional committee appointed to investigate related matters. Further information can be found in my memo setting forth the evidence at http://www.alecbell.org/MeucciMemo.html (external link, link now dead)

 

Thanks,

 

Edwin S. Grosvenor

 

p.s. As a footnote, the above writing is not boilerplate exactly, but my numerous cousins among the Bell descendants are pretty worked up over the Congressional resolution, so I've been sending out emails to interested parties. What drives me nuts is everyone clips junk from other's Web sites accepting the silliest fictions and garbled misunderstandings as if they were fact. As a historian, you might want to read the judge's ruling in the Meucci case -- it actually is rather entertaining. There are some subtle lines of 19th judicial humor. Bell's attorney's called Meucci "the silliest and weakest imposter who has ever turned up against the patent." And Pizer and Basilio Catania should be ashamed of their "scholarship."

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Resources

 

Brooks, John. Telephone: The First Hundred Years. New York: Harper and Row, 1975: 41(back to text)

 

Fagen, M.D., ed. A History of Engineering and Science in the Bell System. Volume 1 The Early Years, 1875 -1925. New York: Bell Telephone Laboratories, 1975, 6 (back to text)

 

Grosvenor, Edwin S. and Morgan Wesson. Alexander Graham Bell :The Life and Times of the Man Who Invented the Telephone. New York: Abrams, 1997: 55 (back to text)

 

 

Rhodes, Beginning of Telephony 4-5, 13-14 Bell develops the idea for the telephone.