Chichester Alexander Bell (1848–1924) was an American chemist and inventor. He was a

first cousin Most generally, in the lineal kinship system used in the English-speaking world, a cousin is a type of familial relationship in which two relatives are two or more familial generations away from their most recent common ancestor. Commonly, ...

of Alexander Graham Bell, and instrumental in developing improved versions of the phonograph.American History Museum
Charles Sumner Tainter Papers
, Smithsonian American History Museum website, Washington, D.C. Retrieved 14 July 2011.

Life

Bell was born in

Dublin Dublin (; , or ) is the capital and largest city of Ireland. On a bay at the mouth of the River Liffey, it is in the province of Leinster, bordered on the south by the Dublin Mountains, a part of the Wicklow Mountains range. At the 2016 c ...

, Ireland in 1848 to Professor

David Charles Bell Professor David Charles Bell (4 May 1817 – 28 October 1902), was a Scottish-born scholar, author and professor of elocution. He was an elder brother to Alexander Melville Bell and uncle to Alexander Graham Bell. Professor of Elocution Bell w ...

(1817–1903) and Ellen Adine Highland.Chichester Alexander Bell
, Recording Pioneers website. Retrieved 13 August 2011. David Charles was an elder brother to Professor Alexander Melville Bell, the renowned British authority on elocution and speech. Bell received his ''Baccalaurei in Medicinâ'' degree in Medicine and Surgery from

Trinity College Trinity College may refer to: Australia * Trinity Anglican College, an Anglican coeducational primary and secondary school in , New South Wales * Trinity Catholic College, Auburn, a coeducational school in the inner-western suburbs of Sydney, New ...

, University of Dublin, Ireland, on 30 June 1869. Prior to moving to Washington, D.C. to join his cousin Alexander Graham Bell's

Volta Laboratory The Volta Laboratory (also known as the Alexander Graham Bell Laboratory, the Bell Carriage House and the Bell Laboratory) and the Volta Bureau were created in Georgetown, Washington, D.C. by Alexander Graham Bell.(19/20th-century scientist an ...

, Chichester was Assistant Professor of Chemistry,

University College London , mottoeng = Let all come who by merit deserve the most reward , established = , type = Public research university , endowment = £143 million (2020) , budget = ...

. In 1881 Chichester Bell began working with Alexander and their associate Charles Tainter on addressing the drawbacks to

Thomas Edison Thomas Alva Edison (February 11, 1847October 18, 1931) was an American inventor and businessman. He developed many devices in fields such as electric power generation, mass communication, sound recording, and motion pictures. These inventi ...

's phonograph. The three men created the Volta Laboratory Association to be the holder of their patents. Their successful development of the

Graphophone The Graphophone was the name and trademark of an improved version of the phonograph. It was invented at the Volta Laboratory established by Alexander Graham Bell in Washington, D.C., United States. Its trademark usage was acquired successively ...

led to the formation of the ''Volta Graphophone Company'' of

Alexandria, Virginia Alexandria is an independent city in the northern region of the Commonwealth of Virginia, United States. It lies on the western bank of the Potomac River approximately south of downtown Washington, D.C. In 2020, the population was 159,467. ...

in February 1886 by the principals, along with Chichester's brother, lawyer and banker, Charles B. Bell (born 1858). While living in

Washington, D.C. ) , image_skyline = , image_caption = Clockwise from top left: the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall, United States Capitol, Logan Circle, Jefferson Memorial, White House, Adams Morgan, ...

, Chichester Bell was one of the founding members of the Chemical Society Washington Chapter. He then returned to University College, London to continue his scientific research. In 1887, he published "Sympathetic Vibration of Jets" in the Philosophical Transactions of the

Royal Society The Royal Society, formally The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge, is a learned society and the United Kingdom's national academy of sciences. The society fulfils a number of roles: promoting science and its benefits, re ...

. Chichester Bell also helped establish the

Edison Bell Edison Bell was an English company that was the first distributor and an early manufacturer of Phonograph, gramophones and gramophone records. The company survived through several incarnations, becoming a top producer of budget records in Englan ...

company. The Edison Bell company was established on 30 November 1892 in London to sell phonographs produced by the Edison United Phonograph Company.When Is A Bell Not A Bell?
/ref> Bell was awarded the

John Scott Medal John Scott Award, created in 1816 as the John Scott Legacy Medal and Premium, is presented to men and women whose inventions improved the "comfort, welfare, and happiness of human kind" in a significant way. "...the John Scott Medal Fund, establish ...

The Franklin Institute The Franklin Institute is a science museum and the center of science education and research in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It is named after the American scientist and statesman Benjamin Franklin. It houses the Benjamin Franklin National Memori ...

in 1900. He married Antoinette Ives in 1889, in

Montreal, Quebec Montreal ( ; officially Montréal, ) is the second-most populous city in Canada and most populous city in the Canadian province of Quebec. Founded in 1642 as '' Ville-Marie'', or "City of Mary", it is named after Mount Royal, the triple-pe ...

, Canada and died at Radcliffe Infirmary, St Giles, Oxford, Oxfordshire, England, on 11 March 1924.

Patents

* ''Transmitter for Electric Telephone Lines'', filed May 1884, issued February 1886 * ''Jet Microphone or Apparatus for Transmitting Sounds by Means of Jets'', filed May 1884, issued February 1886 * ''Telephone Transmitter'', Filed April 1885, issued February 1886 * ''Reproducing Sounds from Phonograph Records'' (without using a stylus or causing wear), filed November 1885, issued May 1886 (with Alexander Bell and Charles Tainter) * ''Transmitting And Recording Sounds By Radiant Energy'', filed November 1885, issued May 1886 (with Alexander Bell and Charles Tainter) * ''Recording and Reproducing Speech and Other Sounds'' (improvements include compliant cutting head, wax surface, and constant linear velocity disk), filed June 1885, issued May 1886 (with Charles Tainter)

References

External links

Story of the Graphophone
{{DEFAULTSORT:Bell, Chichester 1848 births 1924 deaths American manufacturing businesspeople Irish emigrants to the United States (before 1923) 19th-century American inventors Scientists from Washington, D.C. Alexander Graham Bell Scottish chemists

Life

Patents

See also

References

External links