Antonio Meucci, 1854, constructed telephone-like devices.

the Italian-American inventor and businessman Antonio Meucci has

been recognized by the U.S. House of Representatives for his
contributory work on the telephone.
 Johann Philipp Reis, 1860, constructed prototype 'make-and-break'
telephones, today called Reis' telephones.
In Germany, Johann Philipp Reis is seen as a leading telephone
pioneer who stopped only just short of a successful device.
 Alexander Graham Bell was awarded the first U.S. patent for the
invention of the telephone in 1876.
 Elisha Gray, 1876, designed a telephone using a water microphone
in Highland Park, Illinois.
 Tivadar Pusks invented the telephone switchboard exchange in
1876.
 Thomas Edison, invented the carbon microphone which produced a
strong telephone signal.
 The following is a brief summary of the history of the
development of the telephone:

A French Gower telephone of 1912 at the Muse des Arts et Mtiers

in Paris
1667: Robert Hooke invented a string telephone that conveyed
sounds over an extended wire by mechanical vibrations.
1753: Charles Morrison proposes the idea that electricity can be
used to transmit messages, by using different wires for each letter.
1844: Innocenzo Manzetti first mooted the idea of a speaking
telegraph (telephone).
 1854: Charles Bourseul writes a memorandum on the
principles of the telephone. (See the article: "Transmission
lectrique de la parole", L'Illustration, Paris,26 August 1854.)
1854: Antonio Meucci demonstrates an electric voice-
operated device in New York; it is not clear what kind of
device he demonstrated.
1861: Philipp Reis constructs the first speech-transmitting
telephone
December 28,1871: Antonio Meucci files a patent caveat
No. 3353 at the U.S. Patent Office for a device he named
"Sound Telegraph".
1872: Elisha Gray establishes Western Electric
Manufacturing Company.
 July 1, 1875: Bell uses a bi-directional "gallows" telephone that
was able to transmit "voicelike sounds", but not clear speech.
Both the transmitter and the receiver were identical membrane
electromagnet instruments.
1875: Thomas Edison experiments with acoustic telegraphy and
in November builds an electro-dynamic receiver, but does not
exploit it.
1875: Hungarian Tivadar Puskas (the inventor of telephone
exchange) arrived in the USA.
April 6, 1875: Bell's U.S. Patent 161,739 "Transmitters and
Receivers for Electric Telegraphs" is granted. This uses multiple
vibrating steel reeds in make-break circuits, and the concept of
multiplexed frequencies.
 January 20, 1876: Bell signs and notarizes his
patent application for the telephone.
February 11,1876: Elisha Gray designs a liquid
transmitter for use with a telephone, but does not
build one.
March 7, 1876: Bell's U.S. patent No. 174,465 for
the telephone is granted.
March 10, 1876: Bell transmits the sentence: "Mr.
Watson, come here! I want to see you!" using a
liquid transmitter and an electromagnetic receiver.
 January 30, 1877: Bell's U.S. patent No. 186,787 is granted for an
electromagnetic telephone using permanent magnets, iron
diaphragms, and a call bell.
April 27, 1877: Edison files for a patent on a carbon (graphite)
transmitter. Patent No. 474,230 was granted on May 3, 1892, after a
15-year delay because of litigation. Edison was granted patent No.
222,390 for a carbon granules transmitter in 1879.
1877: First long-distance telephone line
1915: First U.S. coast-to-coast long-distance telephone call,
ceremoniously inaugurated by A.G. Bell in New York City and his
former assistant Thomas Augustus Watson in San Francisco,
California.
 The Invention of Automatic Switching
Almon B. Strowger was an undertaker in Kansas City, USA. The story goes
that there was a competing undertaker locally whose wife was an operator at the
local (manual) telephone exchange. Whenever a caller asked to be put through to
Strowger, calls were deliberately put through to his competitor. This obviously
frustrated Strowger greatly and he set about devising a system for doing away with
the human part of the equation !
Strowger developed a system of automatic switching using an
electromechanical switch based around electromagnets and pawls. With the help of
his nephew (Walter S. Strowger) he produced a working model in 1888 (US Patent
No. 447918 10/6/1891). In this selector, a moving wiper (with contacts on the end)
moved up to and around a bank of many other contacts, making a connection with
any one of them.
 Strowger did not invent the idea of automatic switching; it was
first invented in 1879 by Connolly & McTigthe but Strowger was the
first to put it to effective use. Together with Joseph B. Harris and
Moses A. Meyer, Strowger formed his company 'Strowger
Automatic Telephone Exchange' in October 1891.
In the late 1890's Almon B. Strowger retired and eventually
died in 1902. In 1901, Joseph Harris licenced the Strowger
selectors to the Automatic Electric Co. (AE); the two companies
merged in 1908. The company still exists today as AG
Communications Systems, having undergone various corporate
changes and buyouts along the way.
 Selector Theory
A selector starts in the 'home' position and with each 'impulse'
the wiper contacts would progress round the output bank to the
next position. Each output would be connected to a different
subscriber, thus the caller could connect to any other subscriber
who was connected to that bank, without any manual assistance
from an operator.

Diagram of a simple Selector

 In Figure(above), the selector has 10 outputs, so a caller can choose to
connect to any of 10 different subscribers by dialing any digit from 1 to 0 (0=10).
This sort of automatic selector is known as a Uniselector, as it moves in just one
plane (rotary).
By mounting several arcs of outlets on top of each other, the number of outlets
can be increased significantly but the wipers are then required to move both
horizontally to select a bank and then vertically to move around that bank to the
required outlet. Such a selector is known as a Two-Motion Selector. Two-motion
selectors typically have 10 rows of 10 outlets, thus 100 possible outlets altogether. A
two-motion selector can therefore accept two dialed digits from a subscriber and
route the call to any of 100 numbers. The selector 'wipers' always start in their
resting 'home' position. The first digit moves the selector vertically up to the
corresponding level and then the second digit moves the wipers around the contacts
of that level. This is shown in figure below.
A Two-Motion "Final" Selector
 The Rotary Dial
In Strowger's system, selecting digits to dial was done by a complicated
system involving five separate wires. Later, the system of Timed Pulse (TP)
dialing was invented using a rotary dial. With TP dialing, only one pair of wires
is required for a telephone, the speech pair. To dial a digit, the circuit is
interrupted according to the number dialed so, for example, if you dialed a '4'
then the line would be pulsed four times, quickly in succession. After a
moment, it was assumed that the digit was complete and that any further
pulses belonged to the next digit. In order to ensure that successive digits
didn't come too soon and thus be mistaken for pulses belonging to the
previous digit, the finger stop on the dial was put some way round so that after
removing your finger from the dial, there was a minimum time taken for the
dial to return to the home position. It is important to note here that for the
purposes of dialing, the digit '0' sends TEN pulses for dialing - i.e. the selector
will step around to the 10th position.
 Progress Tones
With manual switching systems, there had always been an operator to advise
the caller of the current status. Having removed the need for an operator, a system
was required to indicate call progress to the caller. A series of distinctive tones was
developed which were produced by a machine called a Ring Generator. The ring
generator was entirely electromechanical; different cadences and tones were
produced by rotating cams connected to a generator. As well as generating the
tones, the Ring Generator machine also provided timed pulses which were used by
various processes throughout the exchange. The progress tones produced were as
follows :

Dial Tone (DT). This is a 33 c/s continuous note and is applied to the line after the
subscriber has lifted his handset and the switching equipment has allocated him an
available outlet for this call to proceed. There would have been a physical limit on the
number of calls an exchange could handle so if all equipment was already in use, the
subscriber would not get dial tone. The actual pitch of the dial Tone varied from
exchange to exchange depending on the adjustment of the ring generator.
 Busy Tone (BT). A higher pitched note of 400 c/s interrupted to give a
cadence of 0.75 seconds on, 0.75 seconds off. Busy tone indicated either
that the called subscriber is already off-hook (busy) or that the route to the
called subscriber is congested. In later systems, a slightly different
cadence was introduced in order to distinguish between these two
scenarios.
Number Unobtainable Tone (NUT). Identical pitch to the busy tone but
continuous. This tone is used to indicate that a number is out of service,
faulty or that a spare line has been dialed.
Ring Tone (RT). A tone of 133c/s which interrupted in the same cadence as
the ring current which rings the telephone's bell at the called party's end :
0.4 seconds on, 0.2 seconds off.
 The first public automatic telephone exchange in the UK opened in Epsom,
Surrey (England) in 1912. As mentioned previously, manual switching required an
operator for every call and thus was expensive on manpower, however, when first
developed, automatic switching systems were comparatively expensive and in the
Post-war period (1914 onwards) female labor was cheap, so the advantages of
moving to an automatic system were not great.
The photo is of a working Strowger exchange; it was working until July 1995 at
a public building in Catford and then replaced by a modern exchange. This Strowger
exchange took up a large room - its replacement was the size of a filing cabinet. The
complete working exchange was carefully removed by members of the Telecomms
Heritatge Group who intend to preserve it and reassemble it as a working exhibit
somewhere
 In the for ground of the photo are the lead acid batteries; all Strowger exchanges had
battery power supplies to protect them in the event of a power cut.
In the rest of the picture you can see the racks of selectors. This exchange was
actually a PABX (Private Automatic Branch Exchange) which is an internal exchange used for
handling calls within a building, rather than across the PSTN. Outside access onto the PSTN was
provided of course, normally by dialing a '9'. All Strowger exchanges were very noisy places with
hundred of selectors constantly clicking away.
 There were many different versions of Strowger type exchanges. The
smallest ones, serving small remote villages would handle just a few
subscribers. The larger exchanges in urban districts could handle thousands of
subscribers. In a small village, there might be just 50 subscribers and so three
digits would be plenty to identify them all. For example, subscribers on a very
small rural exchange might be allocated numbers in the range 200-299 - on the
final selector, level 2. Of course, numbers of just two digits would have been
enough to cover 50 subscribers, but three digits were used to allow for special
codes (Operator, Emergency, Telegrams etc.) and also to separate payphones
onto other 'levels'. On larger exchanges, four or five digits were used, allowing a
theoretical maximum of 10000 or 100000 subscribers. The range was limited of
course because there were no subscribers on levels '0' or '1' as they were
reserved for trunk and operator calls respectively.
 The Director System
Note : The Director System is considerably more complex than is detailed here so some aspects have
been ignored, notably the system of initial digit grouping.
Calls made to other subscribers within the same exchange were obviously routed locally within
the exchange however many larger towns had many exchanges, each within the same area. To
connect to another exchange, its code could be dialed and the selectors would route accordingly, but
that dialing code would have to vary depending on where the call originated from because obviously
routes would vary. From the subscriber's point of view, it would be unacceptable to have to dial a
different number depending on where you were. To get around this, a set of uniform dialing codes was
introduced so that a subscriber could dial the same exchange from any other exchange always using
the same dialing code. Because the actual routing would vary depending on where the call originated
from, a piece of equipment called a Translator was introduced. This took the uniform dialing code as
the subscriber dialed it and translated it into the necessary impulse trains so that selectors could be
routed accordingly.
The translator was electromechanical of course. The translator also includes 'digit absorption'
facilities so that if a subscriber dials someone on the same exchange, the exchange code is ignored
and the call routed locally. When the subscriber dials the exchange code, the translator cannot start
'translating' until it has all three digits, then it can get to work, but in the meantime, the subscriber may
dial the rest of the number. To allow for this, the translator must have Digit Storage facilities so that it
can store the rest of the digits dialed by the subscriber and repeat them to the remote exchange once
the connection has been established.
 The Mnemonics System
It was thought that people would have problems remembering seven digit
numbers (3 exchange + 4 subscriber) so a system of allocating letters to the dial to
make area mnemonics was developed. Each exchange was then given a code
according to the location, as closely as possible. The original British lettering scheme
was as follows:
 This 'letter to number' scheme varies between countries
and nowadays even between manufacturers, particularly with
mobile telephones. The letter 'O' was mapped to the digit '0' in
order to avoid confusion. The letters Q and Z were not used in
the original scheme to avoid confusion with 'O' and '2'. When
the scheme was first devised, the letters were black and the
figures in red (all phones were owned by the Post Office).
It is interesting to note that whilst the authorities of the day
considered that people would be unable to remember 7 digit
numbers, current proposals in the UK today are to extend the
entire numbering scheme to eight digit subscriber numbers.
 Automatic Telephone Exchanges
The required features of any automatic switching system are as follows :
 Subscriber's Line Circuit
Every subscriber is connected to his local exchange by one pair of wires; this single pair carries the voice
in both directions and the ring current to ring the bell when a call is received. Within the subscriber's premises, in
the UK, the line is actually then split into three wires to allow for an anti-tinkling circuit but it's important to bear in
mind that only two wires run from exchange to subscriber (known as a & b). Once at the exchange, an additional
one or two wires is added to the line. These are used for internal signalling are known as P (or Private) and M (or
Meter).
At the exchange, every subscriber's line terminates into its own Subscribers Line Circuit (SLC). This
consists of a pair of relays dedicated to that subscriber; if there are 1000 subscribers on that exchange, then there
are 1000 SLCs. All other equipment onwards in the chain is shared between all subscribers - otherwise if there
were 1000 of everything the cost and size of an exchange would be astronomical and wasteful. It would only be
necessary if it was expected that every subscriber was going to place a call at exactly the same time, and that
would never happen. As such, when an exchange is designed, cosndideration is given to the maximum amount of
traffic that would ever need to be carried at one time, and equipment is therefore provided to allow for that.
Overflow meters are also installed so that if it can be seen that all available equipment is regularly in use,
additional capacity can be added. Although SLCs normally consist of two relays (called 'LR' & 'K' or 'L' & 'K'), on
unattended exchanges (ones without an engineer on-site 24 hours) a third relay (Called 'P') was provided to 'park'
the line should a fault occur, to avoid tieing up common equipment for a long period.
 Line Finder & Allotter
When the subscriber lifts his handset, current start to flow on the line; this is detected by
the SLC. As you will recall, dialling of the digits causes selectors to step up or round the
corresponding number of pulses. As there are many subscribers, but only a few selectors, there
has to be a method for (1) Finding a free (available) selector and (2) Connecting the calling
subscriber to that selector. Step (1) is done by the Allotter. Step (2) is done by the Linefinder.
 Although the linefinder is shown looking like a Uniselector
in the diagram it is in fact normally a two-motion selector
which means that it can serve up to 100 or 200 subscribers.
The Allotter, on the other hand is usually a uniselector, with 25
or 50 outlets, thus allowing access to 25 or 50 first group
selectors. n.b. the Subscriber's Line Circuits are not shown in
the diagram, but would be in the line between the subscribers'
telephones and the linefinders. Another function of the SLC is
to 'mark' the caller's line as 'busy' so that incoming calls will
detect that the line is in use. A fully working simple Strowger
type exchange is shown in the next section.
 Charging
With the introduction of automatic exchanges, the need arose for automatic charging. Every
subscriber was allocated a digit counter (meter) in the exchange. This consisted of an electromagnet
which closed with every metering 'pulse'. The electormagnet's armature drove a set of numerical decimal
cams (just like a car trip counter). For every meter pulse, the meter clicked one unit. At the end of each
billing period, a photographer would take a photograph of all subscribers' meters. These photographs
were then sent to the billing department to be read, and bills sent out accordingly. Meters typically had
four or five digits, wrapping round to '0000' after '9999'.
The first meter pulse was generated as soon at the called subscriber answers the call. This pulse
is generated by the final selector and sent back down the chain of selectors to the caller's meter to
register one 'unit'. For local calls, a piece of equipment called a Local Call Timer (LCT) was in circuit
between the final selector and previous group selectors. After the initial 'answering' pulse, the LCT starts
rotating, clicking round once from each timed pulse. These timed pulses are generated by the Ring
Generator. After 10 clicks round, the LCT is back to it's original position and if the call is still active, it
sends another metering pulse, and another unit is charged to the caller. The LCT only stops rotating
when the calling party clears. If the called party hangs up, then metering continues (See 'CSH', later).
For non local calls, a system of multi-metering was introduced. A meter pulse generator produced
different pulse rates and the appropriate one of these would be applied to the call timer depending on the
destination of the call.
 Alarms
In order to facilitate efficient operation of an exchange, all Strowger type exchanges
are fitted with a number of alarms to alert the engineer to any problems. Some alarms
indicate equipment failure, whereas other alarms just indicate unusual operation which
might be cause for concern. The most important alarms are as follows :
Permanent Glow (PG) : This alarm indicated that a subscriber's phone was offhook and
that a call was not in progress. This is not necessarily a fault; a subscriber could have just
forgotten to replace their handset properly or deliberately taking their phone off the hook to
avoid calls. Doing this meant that the subscriber could be holding onto exchange
equipment, thus preventing other subscribers from using it. If enough subscribers left their
phone off the hook, no-one else could make any calls. If an engineer spotted a PG alarm,
he would work out which selector it was one and release that selector from the subscriber.
In unattended rural exchanges(where no engineer was permanently on-site) the
subscribers line circuit differed slightly in that a 'parking' relay was provided so that a PG
condition was automatically cleared. The term 'Permanent Glow' originates from the days
of manual switchboards when a subscriber being off hook would be shown by his light
'glowing' on the board.
 Called Subscriber Held (CSH) : This condition occurs when the called party hangs up his
phone but the caller still remains active. A CSH alarm is not harmful, and is common - for
instance, if someone puts the phone down to go and take the call in another room, a CSH
condition will occur whilst their phone is back on the hook. As soon as a CSH condition is
detected, a timer starts. If a period of (say) 3 minutes elapses without the called subscriber
picking their handset up again then the call is cleared down and charging ceases.

Release Alarm (RA) : The release alarm is the important one ! The earth supply to most
selector electromagnets is connected via the release alarm. As these electromagnets are
intended to operate for brief moments only (to drive the selectors), then if current is drawn
for more than a few seconds, then it is assumed that the selector has jammed. In order to
avoid burning out the selector, the PG alarm is raised, drawing the engineers attention to
the particular rack at fault and he can rush round and clear it. In an unattended exchange,
circuitry is provided to automatically lower the current to the faulty selector in order to stop
it burning out until the engineer arrives.