JANUARY, 2020
BRITAIN ON THE LINE:
THE HISTORY OF THE TELEPHONE IN BRITAN
By: Liese Sherwood-Fabré
The instru-
ment carrying
Alexander
Graham Bell‟s
cry for help to
his assistant
( “Watson,
come here, I
need you,”) made its appearance
in Britain a year after the famous
call. Its history in England, how-
ever, was rockier than in the US.
When Bell patented this de-
vice in 1876, he included not
only the instrument, but the sys-
tem to link them. At the begin-
ning, the structure involved non-
insulated wires similar to tele-
graph wires connecting the de-
vice to a central point, or ex-
change, where a switchboard
operator would connect the
caller to the receiver‟s wire using
a short cable. The increase in the
number of users and the poor
transmission quality of the wires
made it difficult for the signal to
carry as long a distance as a tele-
18
graph line until the invention of
hand-drawn copper wire. (1)
Within a year of the patent,
the telephone was presented
around the world as a curiosity.
It first appeared in Britain in
1877 when Sir William Preece,
chief engineer for the British
Post Office, demonstrated the
instrument. He famously noted
to the House of Commons two
years later that the telephone was
not necessary in Britain because
they had plenty of messenger
boys. (2) Regardless, following a
demonstration to the Queen in
1878, Bell created the Telephone
Company Ltd. to sell his instru-
ment in Britain, and soon had a
number of subscribers. (3)
Graham‟s company, how-
ever, faced stiff competition
from the Edison Telephone
Company of London Ltd. be-
cause the second offered lower
rates. Ironically, an 1880 court
decision gave control over the
budding service to the British
Post Office, noting that tele-
phone conversations could be
considered a form of telegram,
which this government agency
already controlled. Following the
creation of Britain‟s Telephone
Company, some telegraph ex-
changes were converted into
telephone exchanges, as well as
creating public call offices in
railway stations and general
stores. (4)
The original call offices were
small wooden huts where any-
one could make a call for a
“tuppence.” In 1921, the Post
Office introduced a kiosk spe-
cifically designed for the tele-
phone, but the iconic red tele-
phone kiosk did not appear until
1926. (5) While the cell or mo-
bile phone has reduced the num-
ber of public phones available,
these red kiosks remain an image
of British culture.
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