Alexander Graham Bell

Alexander Graham Bell was born in Edinburgh, Scotland, on March 3, 1847. When he was only eleven years old, he invented the machine that could clean wheat.

In 1871, he began working with deaf people and published the system of Visible Speech that was developed by his father. Visible Speech illustrated how the tongue, lips, and throat are used to produce vocal sounds. In 1872, Bell founded a school for the deaf, which soon became part of Boston University. Bell’s mother and wife were both deaf, and this had a major influence on his work.

Alexander Graham Bell is best known for his invention of the telephone. While trying to discover the secret to transmitting multiple messages on a single wire, Bell heard the sound of a plucked string along some of the electrical wire. After hearing the sound, Bell believed he could send the sound of a human voice over the wire. After receiving a patent on March 7, 1876, for transmitting sound along a single wire, he successfully transmitted human speech on March 10. Bell’s telephone patent was one of the most valuable patents ever issued.

Alexander Graham Bell died on August 2, 1922. On the day of his burial, in honour of Bell, all telephone service in the US was stopped for one minute.