The History of the Telephone | Page 8

borrowed the price of a return ticket from Sanders and arranged to stay with a friend in Washington, to save a hotel bill that he could not afford. At that time Professor Joseph Henry, who knew more of the theory of electrical science than any other American, was the Grand Old Man of Washington; and poor Bell, in his doubt and desperation, resolved to run to him for advice.
Then came a meeting which deserves to be historic. For an entire afternoon the two men worked together over the apparatus that Bell had brought from Boston, just as Henry had worked over the telegraph before Bell was born. Henry was now a veteran of seventy-eight, with only three years remaining to his credit in the bank of Time, while Bell was twenty-eight. There was a long half-century between them; but the youth had discovered a New Fact that the sage, in all his wisdom, had never known.
"You are in possession of the germ of a great invention," said Henry, "and I would advise you to work at it until you have made it complete."
"But," replied Bell, "I have not got the electrical knowledge that is necessary."
"Get it," responded the aged scientist.
"I cannot tell you how much these two words have encouraged me," said Bell afterwards, in describing this interview to his parents. "I live too much in an atmosphere of discouragement for scientific pursuits; and such a chimerical idea as telegraphing VOCAL SOUNDS would indeed seem to most minds scarcely feasible enough to spend time in working over."
By this time Bell had moved his workshop from the cellar in Salem to 109 Court Street, Boston, where he had rented a room from Charles Williams, a manufacturer of electrical supplies. Thomas A. Watson was his assistant, and both Bell and Watson lived nearby, in two cheap little bedrooms. The rent of the workshop and bedrooms, and Watson's wages of nine dollars a week, were being paid by Sanders and Hubbard. Consequently, when Bell returned from Washington, he was compelled by his agreement to devote himself mainly to the musical telegraph, although his heart was now with the telephone. For exactly three months after his interview with Professor Henry, he continued to plod ahead, along both lines, until, on that memorable hot afternoon in June, 1875, the full TWANG of the clock-spring came over the wire, and the telephone was born.
From this moment, Bell was a man of one purpose. He won over Sanders and Hubbard. He converted Watson into an enthusiast. He forgot his musical telegraph, his "Visible Speech," his classes, his poverty. He threw aside a profession in which he was already locally famous. And he grappled with this new mystery of electricity, as Henry had advised him to do, encouraging himself with the fact that Morse, who was only a painter, had mastered his electrical difficulties, and there was no reason why a professor of acoustics should not do as much.
The telephone was now in existence, but it was the youngest and feeblest thing in the nation. It had not yet spoken a word. It had to be taught, developed, and made fit for the service of the irritable business world. All manner of discs had to be tried, some smaller and thinner than a dime and others of steel boiler-plate as heavy as the shield of Achilles. In all the books of electrical science, there was nothing to help Bell and Watson in this journey they were making through an unknown country. They were as chartless as Columbus was in 1492. Neither they nor any one else had acquired any experience in the rearing of a young telephone. No one knew what to do next. There was nothing to know.
For forty weeks--long exasperating weeks-- the telephone could do no more than gasp and make strange inarticulate noises. Its educators had not learned how to manage it. Then, on March 10, 1876, IT TALKED. It said distinctly--
"MR. WATSON, COME HERE, I WANT YOU." Watson, who was at the lower end of the wire, in the basement, dropped the receiver and rushed with wild joy up three flights of stairs to tell the glad tidings to Bell. "I can hear you!" he shouted breathlessly. "I can hear the WORDS."
It was not easy, of course, for the weak young telephone to make itself heard in that noisy workshop. No one, not even Bell and Watson, was familiar with its odd little voice. Usually Watson, who had a remarkably keen sense of hearing, did the listening; and Bell, who was a professional elocutionist, did the talking. And day by day the tone of the baby instrument grew clearer--a new note in the orchestra of civilization.
On his twenty-ninth birthday, Bell received his patent, No. 174,465--"the most valuable single patent ever issued" in any country.