In the history of science and technology few rivalries have been as intense and defining as that starred Alexander Graham Bell and Elisha Gray. This contest not only defined who would be remembered as the inventor of the phone, but also exemplifies … How, sometimes, the fate of a revolutionary invention can be decided for hours … or even minutes.
It ran the 1870s and the world was experiencing a true revolution in communications. Samuel Morse’s telegraph had transformed the way people communicated at a long distance, but both Bell and Gray shared a more ambitious vision: creating a device capable of transmitting the human voice through electrical cables.
Alexander Graham Bell, born in Scotland in 1847, had arrived in the United States as a professor of vocal physiology and elocution. His work, with deaf people, had sensitized him towards communication problems. For his part, Elisha Gray, born in Ohio in 1835, was a talented electrical engineer who had already founded Western Electric Manufacturing Company and had more than 70 patents in his name when he began working in telephony.
At first glance, Gray seemed to have all the advantages: more experience, better resources and a deeper knowledge of electricity. Bell, on the other hand, was an outsider in the field of electrical engineering. However, as is usually the case in the history of innovation, sometimes fresh and unconventional perspectives are those that generate the most important advances.
The race towards the patent office
The culminating point of this rivalry occurred on February 14, 1876, a date that would go down in history not because it was Valentine’s Day, but for being the day it was defined who would be remembered as the inventor of the phone.
That morning, in Washington DC, Bell submitted a patent application for a “telegraphic improvement” device that, in reality, described the fundamental principle of the phone. Interestingly, just a few hours later – some sources suggest that only two hours later – Elisha Gray presented in the same office a warning – a kind of warning of intention to patent – for a very similar device.
And this is where the story becomes really fascinating and somewhat controversial. For decades, it has been debated if Bell had access to the Gray Caveat before perfecting his own design. What we know with certainty is that the lawyer of Patents of Bell -Marcelus Bailey- visited the patent office that same day and that, subsequently, there were changes in the original Bell request that suspiciously brought her closer to the description made by Gray.
A curious and not well -known anecdote is that the patent office official who handled these requests (Zenas Fisk Wilber) confessed years later, in a sworn statement, that he had shown Gray’s warning to Bell, even suggesting that Bell had offered a part of the benefits of the patent. Although this statement was subsequently retracted, it throws a mantle of doubt about the cleaning of the process.
The decisive experiment
While the legal battle was brewing, Bell continued to perfect his invention. On March 10, 1876, Bell made the first successful telephone broadcast in history by pronouncing the famous words to his assistant Thomas Watson: «Mr. Watson, come here, I need it ».
This moment, which Bell meticulously documented in his laboratory notebook, became the turning point that finally inclined the balance in his favor. Gray never managed to build a functional prototype before Bell demonstrated the viability of his invention.
The concession of the patent to Bell (Patent No. 174,465) on March 7, 1876 did not end the controversy. In the following decades, more than 600 litigation related to this patent were fought, including several presented by Gray and Western Union, the company that had acquired the rights of its technology.
In the midst of these legal battles, an anecdote circulates that illustrates the tension atmosphere: during one of the trials, Bell took his phone to the court and made a live demonstration for the judges, transmitting music from another building. Gray, present in the room, would have commented bitterly: “That is my phone.”
The rivalry between Bell and Gray offers us several valuable lessons. First, in the world of innovation, sometimes the difference between eternal fame and historical footnote can be a matter of hours. Second, success does not always favor the most expert or the one who has more resources, but to whom he manages to virtually demonstrate his ideas and sail them successfully by the legal system.
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