Edward Ernst Kleinschmidt (September 9, 1876 – August 22, 1977) was one of the inventors of the
teleprinter
A teleprinter (teletypewriter, teletype or TTY) is an electromechanical device that can be used to send and receive typed messages through various communications channels, in both point-to-point and point-to-multipoint configurations. Initia ...
, and was a prolific inventor who obtained 118 patents in the course of his 101-year life.
Career
Born in
Bremen
Bremen (Low German also: ''Breem'' or ''Bräm''), officially the City Municipality of Bremen (german: Stadtgemeinde Bremen, ), is the capital of the German state Free Hanseatic City of Bremen (''Freie Hansestadt Bremen''), a two-city-state consis ...
, Germany, in 1876, Kleinschmidt immigrated to the United States at the age of 8.
[
Kleinschmidt began working with nascent communications technology in 1893 while still in his teens. He first patented a Morse keyboard transmitter, in 1895 (Patent No. 964,372; filed February 7, 1895; issued January 11, 1910) and later a Morse keyboard perforator. Keyboard perforators were a development from ]Charles Wheatstone
Sir Charles Wheatstone FRS FRSE DCL LLD (6 February 1802 – 19 October 1875), was an English scientist and inventor of many scientific breakthroughs of the Victorian era, including the English concertina, the stereoscope (a device for di ...
's perforator of 1858, a hand-operated device which produced a punched paper tape for use in automatic telegraph transmitters.
Soon after, he set up the Kleinschmidt Electric Company.[
In 1916 he filed a patent application for a typebar page printer. In 1919, shortly after the ]Morkrum
Joy Sterling Morton (September 27, 1855 – May 10, 1934) was an American businessman and entrepreneur best known for founding Morton Salt and establishing the Morton Arboretum in Lisle, Illinois.
Biography
He was born on September 27, 1855 in D ...
company obtained their patent for a start-stop synchronizing method for code telegraph systems, which made possible the practical teleprinter, Kleinschmidt filed an application titled "Method of and Apparatus for Operating Printing Telegraphs" which included an improved start-stop method.[
Instead of wasting time and money in patent disputes on the start-stop method, Kleinschmidt and the Morkrum Company decided to merge and form the ]Morkrum-Kleinschmidt
The Teletype Corporation, a part of American Telephone and Telegraph Company's Western Electric manufacturing arm since 1930, came into being in 1928 when the Morkrum-Kleinschmidt Company changed its name to the name of its trademark equipment. ...
Company in 1924. The new company combined the best features of both their machines into a new typewheel printer for which Kleinschmidt, Howard Krum, and Sterling Morton jointly obtained a patent.[
In December 1928, the company name was changed to Teletype Corporation, and in 1930 Teletype Corporation was sold to the ]American Telephone and Telegraph Company
AT&T Inc. is an American multinational telecommunications holding company headquartered at Whitacre Tower in Downtown Dallas, Texas. It is the world's largest telecommunications company by revenue and the third largest provider of mobile tel ...
for $30 million.