a Continuum of engineering excellence from Scotland

Alexander Graham Bell with teachers and students of the Scott Circle School for deaf children, Washington DC,1883

Alexander Graham Bell with teachers and students of the Scott Circle School for deaf children, Washington DC,1883

Alexander Graham Bell

1847 – 1922

Alexander Graham Bell

engineer and inventor of the telephone

Engineering Achievements

Bell's experiments on voice transmission in 1874-75 led to his Telegraph patent being accepted on 7 March 1876. It was defended over 600 times over the next 18 years. The Bell Patent Association of 1875 was the forerunner of the American Telegraph and Telephone Company (AT&T) (incorporated 1885).   By 1886 more than 150,000 people in the US owned telephones.

He founded the Volta Laboratory in Washington where he continued experiments in communication, medical research and in techniques for teaching speech to the deaf.

Bell and his assistant Charles Sumner Tainter jointly invented a wireless telephone, named a photophone, which transmitted speech over a beam of light and was a precursor to fibre-optic communication systems. Bell considered this his most important invention.

Bell's Aerial Experimental Association was a pioneer in early aviation, and his hydrofoil held the world marine speed record.

His Life

  1. 1847 Born at 16 South Charlotte Street, Edinburgh on 3 March, the son of Alexander Melville Bell, speech therapist, and Eliza Grace Symonds
  2. 1857-62 Age: 10-15 Educated at James MacLaren's Hamilton Place Academy and the Royal High School, Edinburgh
  3. 1863-64 Age: 16-17 Pupil teacher at Weston House, Elgin, Scotland
  4. 1864-65 Age: 17-18 Studied music, elocution, Latin and Greek at the University of Edinburgh
  5. 1865 Age: 18 Assistant master, Weston House, Elgin
  6. 1866 Age: 19 Master at Somerset College, Bath
  7. 1867 Age: 20 Joined his father's elocution practice in London and studied physiology and anatomy at the University of London
  8. 1870 Age: 23 Emigrated with his parents to Brantford, Ontario, Canada
  9. 1873 Age: 26 Professor of vocal physiology and elocution at Boston University, Massachusetts, USA
  10. 1874 Age: 27 Became a naturalised US Citizen
  11. 1874-75 Age: 27-28 Worked on harmonic telegraph and membrane diaphragm voice transmitting device
  12. 1875 Age: 27 On 27 February, Bell Patent Association formed with finance from Gardiner G Hubbard, his future father-in-law, and T Sanders, a leather merchant
  13. 1876 Age: 28 In January, set up workshop with assistant Thomas A Watson at 5 Exeter Place, Boston.
  14. 1876 Age: 29 Patent granted on 7 March, which became the fundamental telephone patent
  15. 1876 Age: 29 on 10 March with a liquid transmitter and tuned reed receiver, Bell transmitted to Watson, 'Mr Watson, come here. I want you.'
  16. 1876 Age: 29 On 25 June with membrane transmitter and receiver, demonstrated speech could be transmitted over wires
  17. 1877 Age: 30 On 11 July married Mabel Gardiner Hubbard
  18. 1880 Age: 32 French government awarded Bell the Volta Prize of 50,000 Francs for the invention of the telephone
  19. 1880 Age: 32 Founded the Volta Laboratory with Charles Sumner Tainter and worked on developing the photophone
  20. 1907 Age: 60 Formed, with associates, the Aerial Experimental Association developing the Oionos triplane, the Silver Dart (first powered flight in Canada) and the Bell HD-4, a world marine speed record holding hydrofoil
  21. 1915 Age: 68 Bell was invited to make the first transcontinental phone call from New York to San Francisco
  22. 1919 Age: 72 The Bell Hydrofoil, HD-4, set a world marine speed record of 70.86 mph.
  23. 1922 Age: 75 Died on 2 August at Beinn Bhreagh, Baddeck, Cape Breton Island, Nova Scotia, Canada
  24. 1922 Buried on 4 August on top of Beinn Bhreagh at 6.25pm when all telephone traffic in the USA was stopped for 1 minute

His Legacy

Bell's greatest legacy was the establishment of enhanced person-to-person communication over distance. 

The Bell Telephone Company and its various transformations into, ultimately, AT&T Inc, remains one of the largest telecommunications corporations in the world.

In 1888, Bell was one of the founding members of the National Geographical Society, serving as its President from 1896 to 1904 and helping to establish its journal.

Bell has been ranked among the 100 Greatest Britons (2002), Top Ten Greatest Canadians (2004), the 100 Greatest Americans (2005) and one of the Ten Greatest Scottish Scientists.

More Information

Bell, Alexander Graham. Lectures upon the mechanism of speech. Funk & Wagnall, 1906

Bell, Alexander Graham. The Bell Telephone Company: The deposition of Alexander Graham Bell, in the suit brought by the United States to annul the Bell patents. Boston, 1908.

Grosvenor, Edwin S and Wesson, Morgan. Alexander Graham Bell: The Life and Times of the Man Who Invented the Telephone.  Harry N. Abrams, Inc. 1997

Alexander Graham Bell by RW Burns in Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (free to UK library subscribers)

There is one artwork of Alexander Graham Bell in the Scottish National Portrait Gallery

  • Bell aged 14 or 15

    Bell aged 14 or 15

  • First Bell telephone, 1875

    First Bell telephone, 1875

  • Bell's Telephone Patent drawing, 1876

    Bell's Telephone Patent drawing, 1876

  • The Photophone transmitted speech on a beam of light, first demonstrated by Bell and Tainter in 1880

    The Photophone transmitted speech on a beam of light, first demonstrated by Bell and Tainter in 1880

  • Bell making the first telephone call from New York to Chicago, 18 October 1892

    Bell making the first telephone call from New York to Chicago, 18 October 1892

  • Bell on receiving an Honorary LLD from the University of Edinburgh, 1906

    Bell on receiving an Honorary LLD from the University of Edinburgh, 1906

  • The Silver Dart biplane in 1909, the first powered aeroplane in Canada, here flying over the frozen Bras d'Or Lake on Cape Breton Island

    The Silver Dart biplane in 1909, the first powered aeroplane in Canada, here flying over the frozen Bras d'Or Lake on Cape Breton Island

  • The Bell Oionos Triplane, 1910

    The Bell Oionos Triplane, 1910

  • The Bell HD-4 Hydrofoil, 1919, which once held the world's marine speed record.

    The Bell HD-4 Hydrofoil, 1919, which once held the world's marine speed record.

  • Bell Telephone Memorial, Alexander Graham Bell Park, Brantford, Ontario, Canada

    Bell Telephone Memorial, Alexander Graham Bell Park, Brantford, Ontario, Canada

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