A Miracle of Communication Technology

Alexander Graham Bell

Recently, I was able to trial a phone captioning app with a hearing member of my family, and was surprised at how easy it was to use, even in noisy environments.

The app relies on Internet technology for speech recognition. If you are calling someone who already has the app installed on their smartphone, calls are free.

Using the phone captioning app for the first time made me appreciate afresh the wonders of modern communication technology. There is so much we can take for granted, especially the worldwide telephone network.

Exactly one hundred and fifty years ago this month, the Scottish-born inventor Alexander Graham Bell (1847-1922) demonstrated the first telephone call to his assistant in the United States, on 10th March 1876.

Bell’s mother and wife were both deaf, and his grandfather and father were all associated with work on elocution and speech. The family moved across the Atlantic to Canada in 1870, and Bell taught at Boston School for Deaf Mutes and several other institutions in the United States. While teaching, Bell worked on his inventions in the evenings – firstly the multiple telegraph and then the telephone.

Bell patented his telephone on 7th March 1876, in competition with other inventors like Antonio Meucci and Elisha Gray. His invention was perfected by Thomas Edison, who patented the carbon microphone in 1879. Thanks to Bell and Edison, the telephone network spread worldwide and is a blessing to millions.

As I understood what my brother was saying via captions in real-time for the first time, I could imagine the excitement of that day in 1876, as Bell and his assistant witnessed a miracle of successful voice communication across copper wires. The technology has changed since then, but the concept remains the same.

Captioning App