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.
Georgetown is a historic neighborhood, and commercial and entertainment district located in Northwest Washington, D.C., situated along the Potomac River. Founded in 1751 in the Province of Maryland, the port of Georgetown predated the establish ...
by
Alexander Graham Bell.
(19/20th-century scientist and inventor best known for his work on the telephone)
The Volta Laboratory was founded in 1880–1881 with
Charles Sumner Tainter and Bell's cousin,
Chichester Bell
Chichester Alexander Bell (1848–1924) was an American chemist and inventor. He was a first cousin of Alexander Graham Bell, and instrumental in developing improved versions of the phonograph.American History MuseumCharles Sumner Tainter Papers, ...
,
for the
research and development of
telecommunication
Telecommunication is the transmission of information by various types of technologies over wire, radio, optical, or other electromagnetic systems. It has its origin in the desire of humans for communication over a distance greater than that fe ...
,
phonograph and other technologies.
Using funds generated by the Volta Laboratory, Bell later founded the Volta Bureau in 1887 "for the increase and diffusion of knowledge relating to the
deaf
Deafness has varying definitions in cultural and medical contexts. In medical contexts, the meaning of deafness is hearing loss that precludes a person from understanding spoken language, an audiological condition. In this context it is written ...
", and merged with the American Association for the Promotion and Teaching of Speech to the Deaf (AAPTSD) in 1908. It was renamed as the Alexander Graham Bell Association for the Deaf in 1956 and then the
Alexander Graham Bell Association for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing in 1999.
[
Alexander Graham Bell Association for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing website. Retrieved on April 3, 2010.]
History
The current building, a U.S.
National Historic Landmark
A National Historic Landmark (NHL) is a building, district, object, site, or structure that is officially recognized by the United States government for its outstanding historical significance. Only some 2,500 (~3%) of over 90,000 places listed ...
, was constructed in 1893 under the direction of Alexander Graham Bell to serve as a center of information for
deaf and hard of hearing
Deafness has varying definitions in cultural and medical contexts. In medical contexts, the meaning of deafness is hearing loss that precludes a person from understanding spoken language, an audiological condition. In this context it is written ...
persons. Bell, best known for receiving the first
telephone patent in 1876, was also a prominent figure of his generation in the
education of the deaf
Deaf education is the education of students with any degree of hearing loss or deafness. This may involve, but does not always, individually-planned, systematically-monitored teaching methods, adaptive materials, accessible settings, and othe ...
. His grandfather, father and elder brother were teachers of speech and the younger Bell worked with them.
Born in
Edinburgh, Scotland
Edinburgh ( ; gd, Dùn Èideann ) is the capital city of Scotland and one of its 32 council areas. Historically part of the county of Midlothian (interchangeably Edinburghshire before 1921), it is located in Lothian on the southern shore of ...
, Bell moved to
Canada
Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...
with his family in 1870 following the deaths of his brothers, and a year later moved to Boston to teach at a special day school for deaf children.
Both Bell's mother and wife were deaf, profoundly influencing his life's work. He became a renowned educator by opening a private normal class to train teachers of speech to the deaf and as a professor of
vocal physiology and the mechanics of
speech at
Boston University
Boston University (BU) is a Private university, private research university in Boston, Massachusetts. The university is nonsectarian, but has a historical affiliation with the United Methodist Church. It was founded in 1839 by Methodists with ...
. During this time he also invented an improved
phonautograph
The phonautograph is the earliest known device for recording sound. Previously, tracings had been obtained of the sound-producing vibratory motions of tuning forks and other objects by physical contact with them, but not of actual sound waves ...
, the
multiple telegraph, the speaking telegraph, or
telephone
A telephone is a telecommunications device that permits two or more users to conduct a conversation when they are too far apart to be easily heard directly. A telephone converts sound, typically and most efficiently the human voice, into e ...
, and numerous other devices.
National Park Service
The National Park Service (NPS) is an agency of the United States federal government within the U.S. Department of the Interior that manages all national parks, most national monuments, and other natural, historical, and recreational propert ...
Washington, D.C. National Register of Historic Places: Volta Laboratory & Bureau
National Park Service, U.S. Department of the Interior, Washington. Retrieved from NPS.gov website December 2009.
In 1879, Bell and his wife
Mabel Hubbard, who had been deaf from early childhood, moved to Washington, D.C. The following year, the
French government
The Government of France (French: ''Gouvernement français''), officially the Government of the French Republic (''Gouvernement de la République française'' ), exercises executive power in France. It is composed of the Prime Minister, who i ...
awarded Bell the
Volta Prize The Volta Prize (French: ''prix Volta'') was originally established by Napoleon III during the Second French Empire in 1852 to honor Alessandro Volta, an Italian physicist noted for developing the electric battery.John L. Davis. Artisans and savan ...
of 50,000 francs (approximately US$ in current dollars) for the
invention of the telephone
The invention of the telephone was the culmination of work done by more than one individual, and led to an array of lawsuits relating to the patent claims of several individuals and numerous companies.
Early development
The concept of th ...
.
Bell used the money to establish a trust fund, the Volta Fund, and founded the Volta Laboratory Association, along with his cousin
Chichester A. Bell and
Sumner Tainter
Charles Sumner Tainter (April 25, 1854 – April 20, 1940) was an American scientific instrument maker, engineer and inventor, best known for his collaborations with Alexander Graham Bell, Chichester Bell, Alexander's father-in-law Gardiner Hub ...
.
The laboratory focused on research for the analysis, recording and transmission of sound. In 1887, the Volta Laboratory Association transferred the sound recording and phonograph
invention patent
A patent is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the legal right to exclude others from making, using, or selling an invention for a limited period of time in exchange for publishing an enabling disclosure of the invention."A ...
s they had been granted to the American Graphophone Company (later to evolve into
Columbia Records). Alexander Bell, bent on improving the lives of the deaf, took a portion of his share of the profits to found the Volta Bureau as an instrument "''for the increase and diffusion of knowledge relating to the deaf''".
The Volta Bureau worked in close cooperation with the American Association for the Promotion of the Teaching of Speech to the Deaf (the AAPTSD) which was organized in 1890, electing Bell as President.
The Volta Bureau officially merged with the Association in 1908, and has been known as the Alexander Graham Bell Association for the Deaf since 1956, and then as the
Alexander Graham Bell Association for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing since 1999. Informally it is also called the 'AG Bell'.
Transition from the Volta Laboratory to the Volta Bureau
![Volta Laboratory and Bureau nw22](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/0b/Volta_Laboratory_and_Bureau_nw22.jpg)
From about 1879 Bell's earliest physics research in Washington. D.C. was conducted at his first
laboratory
A laboratory (; ; colloquially lab) is a facility that provides controlled conditions in which scientific or technological research, experiments, and measurement may be performed. Laboratory services are provided in a variety of settings: physic ...
, a rented house, at 1325 L Street NW,
[
Bruce 1990, p. 336
] and then from the autumn of 1880 at 1221 Connecticut Avenue NW. The laboratory was later relocated to 2020 F Street NW sometime after January 1886.
With most of the laboratory's project work being conducted by his two associates, Bell was able to engage in extensive research into the causes of deafness as well as ways of improving the lives of the deaf, leading him to create the ''Volta Bureau'' in 1887. In 1889, Bell and his family moved from their Brodhead-Bell mansion to a new home close to his father,
Alexander Melville Bell. Between 1889 and 1893, the Volta Bureau was located in the
carriage house
A carriage house, also called a remise or coach house, is an outbuilding which was originally built to house horse-drawn carriages and the related tack.
In Great Britain the farm building was called a cart shed. These typically were open ...
to the rear of the home of Bell's father, at 1527 35th Street NW in Washington, D.C. The work of the Bureau increased to such an extent that in 1893 Bell, with the assistance of his father, constructed a
neoclassical yellow brick and sandstone building specifically to house the institution.
The new bureau building was constructed across the street from his father's home, where its carriage house had been its original headquarters.
On May 8, 1893, Bell's 13-year-old prodigy,
Helen Keller, performed the sod-breaking ceremony for the construction of the new Volta Bureau building.
[Schoenherr, Steven]
Recording Technology History: Charles Sumner Tainter and the Graphophone
, originally published at the History Department of, University of San Diego, revised July 6, 2005. Retrieved from University of San Diego History Department website December 19, 2009. Document transferred to a personal website upon Professor Schoenherr's retirement. Retrieved again from homepage.mac. com/oldtownman website July 21, 2010.
The 'Volta Bureau' was so named in 1887 at the suggestion of John Hitz, its first superintendent, and Bell's prior
researcher
Research is "creative and systematic work undertaken to increase the stock of knowledge". It involves the collection, organization and analysis of evidence to increase understanding of a topic, characterized by a particular attentiveness t ...
. Hitz remained its first superintendent until his death in 1908.
[
Bruce 1990, pp. 412–413
] Bell's former trust, the Volta Fund, was also renamed the Volta Bureau Fund when the Bureau was established, except for US$25,000 that Bell diverted to the
AAPTSD,
one of several organizations for the deaf that Bell ultimately donated some $450,000 (approximately $ in current dollars) to starting in the 1880s.
The building, a neoclassical
Corinthian Corinthian or Corinthians may refer to:
*Several Pauline epistles, books of the New Testament of the Bible:
**First Epistle to the Corinthians
**Second Epistle to the Corinthians
**Third Epistle to the Corinthians (Orthodox)
*A demonym relating to ...
''
templum in antis'' structure of closely matching golden yellow sandstone and
Roman brick
Roman brick can refer either to a type of brick used in Ancient Roman architecture and spread by the Romans to the lands they conquered; or to a modern type inspired by the ancient prototypes. In both cases, it characteristically has longer and f ...
with
architectural terracotta
Architectural terracotta refers to a fired mixture of clay and water that can be used in a non-structural, semi-structural, or structural capacity on the exterior or interior of a building. Terracotta pottery, as earthenware is called when not use ...
details, was built in 1893 to a design by
Peabody and Stearns of Boston.
[
] Its design is unique in the
Georgetown area of Washington, due to its
Academic Revival style. It was declared a
National Historic Landmark
A National Historic Landmark (NHL) is a building, district, object, site, or structure that is officially recognized by the United States government for its outstanding historical significance. Only some 2,500 (~3%) of over 90,000 places listed ...
in 1972.
[
and
]
While the Volta Bureau's assigned mission was to conduct research into
deafness
Deafness has varying definitions in cultural and medical contexts. In medical contexts, the meaning of deafness is hearing loss that precludes a person from understanding spoken language, an audiological condition. In this context it is written ...
as well as its related
pedagogical strategies, Bell would continue with his other scientific, engineering and inventive works for the remainder of his life, conducted mainly at the newer and larger laboratory he built on his
Nova Scotia
Nova Scotia ( ; ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada. It is one of the three Maritime provinces and one of the four Atlantic provinces. Nova Scotia is Latin for "New Scotland".
Most of the population are native Eng ...
estate,
Beinn Breagh. Although Bell self-described his occupation as a "teacher of the deaf" throughout his life, his foremost activities revolved around those of general scientific discovery and invention.
By 1887 the Volta Laboratory Association's assets had been distributed among its partners and its collective works had ceased.
In 1895 Bell's father, noted philologist and elocutionist Alexander Melville Bell, who had authored over 45 publications on elocution, the use of
visible speech for the deaf and similar related subjects, assigned all his publication copyrights to the Volta Bureau for its financial benefit.
[Reville, F. Douglas]
History of the County of Brant: Illustrated With Fifty Half-Tones Taken From Miniatures And Photographs
, Brantford, ON: Brant Historical Society, Hurley Printing, 1920, p.311. Retrieved from Brantford. Library.on.ca May 4, 2012. The Volta Bureau later evolved into the
Alexander Graham Bell Association for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing (also known as the AG Bell), and its works have actively continued to the present day under its own charter.
Laboratory projects
The Volta Laboratory Association, or Volta Associates, was created by formal legal agreement on October 8, 1881 (backdated to May 1 of the same year), constituting the Volta Laboratory Association to be the owner of its patents.
It was dissolved in 1886 when its sound recording intellectual property assets were transferred into the Volta Graphophone Company. The association was composed of
Alexander Graham Bell,
Charles Sumner Tainter and Bell's cousin, renowned British chemist Dr.
Chichester Bell
Chichester Alexander Bell (1848–1924) was an American chemist and inventor. He was a first cousin of Alexander Graham Bell, and instrumental in developing improved versions of the phonograph.American History MuseumCharles Sumner Tainter Papers, ...
.
During the 1880s the Volta Associates worked on various projects, at times either individually or collectively.
[
Encyclopedia of World Biography.]
Alexander Graham Bell
, Encyclopedia of World Biography. Thomson Gale. 2004. Retrieved December 20, 2009 from Encyclopedia.com.
Originally, work at the laboratory was to focus on telephone applications, but then shifted to phonographic research at the prompting of Tainter.
The laboratory's projects and achievements included (partial list):
* the 'intermittent-beam sounder' – used in spectral analysis and in the generation of
pure tone
Pure may refer to:
Computing
* A pure function
* A pure virtual function
* PureSystems, a family of computer systems introduced by IBM in 2012
* Pure Software, a company founded in 1991 by Reed Hastings to support the Purify tool
* Pure-FTPd, ...
s (1880);
[
Bruce 1990, p. 338
]
* the
Photophone
The photophone is a telecommunications device that allows transmission of speech on a beam of light. It was invented jointly by Alexander Graham Bell and his assistant Charles Sumner Tainter on February 19, 1880, at Bell's laboratory at 1325 ...
– an optical, wireless telephone, the precursor to
fiber-optic communications (February 1880);
* experiments in
magnetic recording
Magnetic storage or magnetic recording is the storage of data on a magnetized medium. Magnetic storage uses different patterns of magnetisation in a magnetizable material to store data and is a form of non-volatile memory. The information is ac ...
– attempts at recording sounds permanently fixed onto
electroplated
Electroplating, also known as electrochemical deposition or electrodeposition, is a process for producing a metal coating on a solid substrate through the reduction of cations of that metal by means of a direct electric current. The part to be ...
records (spring 1881);
* an
artificial respirator
A ventilator is a piece of medical technology that provides mechanical ventilation by moving breathable air into and out of the lungs, to deliver breaths to a patient who is physically unable to breathe, or breathing insufficiently. Ventilators ...
that Bell termed a "vacuum jacket", created after one of his premature sons died due to his immature lungs (1881);
[
Duchan, Judith Felson]
A History of Speech - Language Pathology: Alexander Graham Bell's Inventions
Department of Communicative Disorders and Sciences, University at Buffalo. Retrieved from th
University of Buffalo website
April 27, 2012.
* the 'spectrophone' – a derivative of the Photophone, used for
spectral analysis by means of sound (April 1881);
* an improved
induction balance – an audible metal detector created in a bid to save President
James A. Garfield
James Abram Garfield (November 19, 1831 – September 19, 1881) was the 20th president of the United States, serving from March 4, 1881 until his death six months latertwo months after he was shot by an assassin. A lawyer and Civil War gene ...
's life (July 1881);
* a 'speed
governor
A governor is an administrative leader and head of a polity or political region, ranking under the head of state and in some cases, such as governors-general, as the head of state's official representative. Depending on the type of political ...
' for record players (fall 1882);
* the 'air-jet
record stylus', an electric-pneumatic phonograph stylus designed to reduce background noise while playing a record, resulting in U.S. Patent # 341,212 granted on May 4, 1886 (known as the ''air-jet recorder'') (November 1885);
* an
audiometer
An audiometer is a machine used for evaluating hearing acuity. They usually consist of an embedded hardware unit connected to a pair of headphones and a test subject feedback button, sometimes controlled by a standard PC. Such systems can also be ...
– used in both telecommunications and to assist in studies of
deafness
Deafness has varying definitions in cultural and medical contexts. In medical contexts, the meaning of deafness is hearing loss that precludes a person from understanding spoken language, an audiological condition. In this context it is written ...
,
"... as well as several other important, and commercially decisive improvements to the
phonograph, during which they created the tradename for one of their products – 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 ...
(a playful transposition of ''phonograph'')."
Tainter's move to the laboratory
Earlier Bell had met fellow Cambridge resident,
Charles Sumner Tainter, a young self-educated
instrument maker who had been assigned to the
U.S. Transit of Venus Commission geodetic
Geodesy ( ) is the Earth science of accurately measuring and understanding Earth's figure (geometric shape and size), orientation in space, and gravity. The field also incorporates studies of how these properties change over time and equivale ...
expedition to New Zealand to observe the planet's
solar transit
In astronomy, a solar transit is a movement of any object passing between the Sun and the Earth. This mainly includes the planets Mercury and Venus. A solar eclipse is also a solar transit of the Moon, but technically only if it does not cover ...
in December 1874. Tainter subsequently opened a shop for the production of scientific instruments in
Cambridgeport, Massachusetts
Cambridgeport is one of the neighborhoods of Cambridge, Massachusetts. It is bounded by Massachusetts Avenue, the Charles River, the Grand Junction Railroad, and River Street. The neighborhood contains predominantly residential homes, many of the ...
. He later wrote of his first meeting with Bell: "... one day I received a visit from a very distinguished looking gentleman with jet black hair and beard, who announced himself as Mr. A. Graham Bell. His charm of manner and conversation attracted me greatly. ... ".
Shortly after the creation of the
Bell Telephone Company, Bell took his bride,
Mabel Hubbard, to Europe for an extended honeymoon. At that time he asked Tainter to move from Cambridge to Washington to start up the new laboratory.
Bell's cousin,
Chichester Bell
Chichester Alexander Bell (1848–1924) was an American chemist and inventor. He was a first cousin of Alexander Graham Bell, and instrumental in developing improved versions of the phonograph.American History MuseumCharles Sumner Tainter Papers, ...
, who had been teaching college chemistry in London, also agreed to come to Washington as the third associate.
The establishment of the laboratory was comparatively simple; according to Tainter's autobiography:
Bell appeared to have spent little time in the Volta Laboratory. Tainter's unpublished manuscript and notes (later donated to the
Smithsonian Institution
The Smithsonian Institution ( ), or simply the Smithsonian, is a group of museums and education and research centers, the largest such complex in the world, created by the U.S. government "for the increase and diffusion of knowledge". Founded ...
's
National Museum of American History)
depict Bell as the person who suggested the basic lines of
research
Research is " creative and systematic work undertaken to increase the stock of knowledge". It involves the collection, organization and analysis of evidence to increase understanding of a topic, characterized by a particular attentiveness ...
, furnished the financial resources, and then allowed his associates to receive the credit for many of the
inventions that resulted. The experimental machines built at the Volta Laboratory include both
disc and
cylinder types, with some of the disc type
turntables
A phonograph, in its later forms also called a gramophone (as a trademark since 1887, as a generic name in the UK since 1910) or since the 1940s called a record player, or more recently a turntable, is a device for the mechanical and analogu ...
rotating vertically about a horizontal axis, as well as a hand-powered, non-magnetic
tape recorder
An audio tape recorder, also known as a tape deck, tape player or tape machine or simply a tape recorder, is a sound recording and reproduction device that records and plays back sounds usually using magnetic tape for storage. In its present ...
. The records and tapes used with the machines were donated to the collections of the Smithsonian Institution's
Museum of Natural History
A natural history museum or museum of natural history is a scientific institution with natural history collections that include current and historical records of animals, plants, fungi, ecosystems, geology, paleontology, climatology, and more ...
, and were believed to be the oldest reproducible bona fide sound recordings preserved anywhere in the world. While some were scratched and cracked, others were still in good condition when they were received.
Photophone
![Photophony1](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/9d/Photophony1.jpg)
The Photophone, also known as a
radiophone, was invented jointly by Bell and his then-assistant Sumner Tainter on February 19, 1880, at Bell's 1325 'L' Street laboratory in Washington, D.C.
[Jones, Newell]
First 'Radio' Built by San Diego Resident Partner of Inventor of Telephone: Keeps Notebook of Experiences With Bell
San Diego Evening Tribune, July 31, 1937. Retrieved from the University of San Diego History Department website, November 26, 2009.
Bell believed the photophone was his most important
invention. The device allowed for the
transmission of
sound
In physics, sound is a vibration that propagates as an acoustic wave, through a transmission medium such as a gas, liquid or solid.
In human physiology and psychology, sound is the ''reception'' of such waves and their ''perception'' b ...
on a beam of
light
Light or visible light is electromagnetic radiation that can be perceived by the human eye. Visible light is usually defined as having wavelengths in the range of 400–700 nanometres (nm), corresponding to frequencies of 750–420 te ...
. On April 1, 1880, and also described by plaque as occurring on June 3, Bell's assistant transmitted the world's first wireless
telephone
A telephone is a telecommunications device that permits two or more users to conduct a conversation when they are too far apart to be easily heard directly. A telephone converts sound, typically and most efficiently the human voice, into e ...
message to him on their newly invented form of
telecommunication
Telecommunication is the transmission of information by various types of technologies over wire, radio, optical, or other electromagnetic systems. It has its origin in the desire of humans for communication over a distance greater than that fe ...
, the far advanced precursor to
fiber-optic communications. The wireless call was sent from the
Franklin School to the window of Bell's laboratory, some 213 meters away.
[Carson 2007, pp. 76-78][Groth, Mike]
Photophones Revisted
'Amateur Radio' magazine, Wireless Institute of Australia, Melbourne, April 1987 pp. 12–17; and May 1987 pp. 13–17.
Of the eighteen
patent
A patent is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the legal right to exclude others from making, using, or selling an invention for a limited period of time in exchange for publishing an enabling disclosure of the invention."A ...
s granted in Bell's name alone, and the twelve he shared with his collaborators, four were for the photophone, which Bell referred to as his "greatest achievement", writing that the Photophone was ''"the greatest invention
haveever made, greater than the telephone"''.
Bell transferred the Photophone's rights to the
National Bell Telephone Company in May 1880. The master patent for the Photophone ( ''Apparatus for Signalling and Communicating, called Photophone''), was issued in December 1880,
many decades before its principles could be applied to practical applications.
Early challenge
Bell and his two associates took Edison's
tinfoil
Tin foil, also spelled tinfoil, is a thin foil made of tin. Tin foil was superseded after World War II by cheaper and more durable aluminium foil, which is still referred to as "tin foil" in many regions (an example of a misnomer).
History
F ...
phonograph and modified it considerably to make it reproduce sound from wax instead of tinfoil. They began their work in Washington, D. C., in 1879, and continued until they were granted basic patents in 1886 for recording in wax.
They preserved some 20 pieces of experimental apparatus, including a number of complete machines, at the
Smithsonian Institution
The Smithsonian Institution ( ), or simply the Smithsonian, is a group of museums and education and research centers, the largest such complex in the world, created by the U.S. government "for the increase and diffusion of knowledge". Founded ...
. Their first experimental machine was sealed in a box and deposited in the Smithsonian's archives in 1881 in case of a later patent dispute. The others were delivered by Alexander Graham Bell to the National Museum in two lots in 1915 and 1922. Bell was elderly by that time, busy with his
hydrofoil and
aeronautical experiments in
Nova Scotia
Nova Scotia ( ; ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada. It is one of the three Maritime provinces and one of the four Atlantic provinces. Nova Scotia is Latin for "New Scotland".
Most of the population are native Eng ...
.
In 1947 the Museum received the key to the locked box of experimental "
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 ...
s, " as they were called to differentiate them from Edison's'' 'phonograph'. '' In that year Mrs. Laura F. Tainter also donated to the Smithsonian's
National Museum of Natural History
The National Museum of Natural History is a natural history museum administered by the Smithsonian Institution, located on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., United States. It has free admission and is open 364 days a year. In 2021, with 7 ...
ten bound notebooks, along with Tainter's unpublished autobiography. This material described in detail the strange creations and even stranger experiments at the laboratory which led to the greatly improved phonographs in 1886 that were to help found the recording and dictation machine industries.
[
Tainter, Charles Sumner. "The Talking Machine And Some Little Known Facts In Connection With Its Early Development", unpublished manuscript in the collections of the ]United States National Museum
The Smithsonian Institution ( ), or simply the Smithsonian, is a group of museums and education and research centers, the largest such complex in the world, created by the U.S. government "for the increase and diffusion of knowledge". Founded ...
.
Thomas A. 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 inventio ...
had
invented the phonograph in 1877. But the fame bestowed on Edison for this invention (sometimes called his most original) was not due to its quality. Recording with his tinfoil phonograph was too difficult to be practical, as the tinfoil tore easily, and even when the
stylus was properly adjusted, its reproduction of sound was distorted and squeaky, and good for only a few playbacks; nevertheless Edison had discovered the idea of
sound recording
Sound recording and reproduction is the electrical, mechanical, electronic, or digital inscription and re-creation of sound waves, such as spoken voice, singing, instrumental music, or sound effects. The two main classes of sound recording ...
. However he did not work to improve its quality, likely because of an agreement to spend the next five years developing the
New York City electric light and power system.
Meanwhile, Bell, a
scientist
A scientist is a person who conducts scientific research to advance knowledge in an area of the natural sciences.
In classical antiquity, there was no real ancient analog of a modern scientist. Instead, philosophers engaged in the philosoph ...
and experimenter at heart, was looking for new worlds to conquer after his invention of the
telephone
A telephone is a telecommunications device that permits two or more users to conduct a conversation when they are too far apart to be easily heard directly. A telephone converts sound, typically and most efficiently the human voice, into e ...
. According to Sumner Tainter, it was due to
Gardiner Green Hubbard that Bell took an interest in the emerging field of phonograph technology. Bell had married Hubbard's daughter
Mabel in 1879 while Hubbard was president of the Edison Speaking Phonograph Company. Hubbard was also one of five stockholders in the ''Edison Speaking Phonograph'', which had purchased the Edison patent for US$10,000 and dividends of 20% of the company's profits.
[
Library and Archives Canada]
The Virtual Gramophone: Canadian Historical Sound Recordings: The Berliner Gram-o-phone Company of Canada
Library and Archives Canada website, Ottawa. Retrieved May 24, 2014.
But Hubbard's phonograph company was quickly threatened with financial disaster because people wouldn't buy a machine which seldom worked and which was also difficult for the average person to operate.
By 1879 Hubbard was able to interest Bell in improving upon the phonograph, and it was agreed that a laboratory should be created 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, ...
Experiments were also to be conducted in telephone and other telecommunication technologies such as the
transmission of sound by light, which resulted in the
selenium-celled Photophone
The photophone is a telecommunications device that allows transmission of speech on a beam of light. It was invented jointly by Alexander Graham Bell and his assistant Charles Sumner Tainter on February 19, 1880, at Bell's laboratory at 1325 ...
.
Both the Hubbards and the Bells decided to move to the nation's capital, in part due to the
numerous legal challenges to Bell's master telephone patent of 1876. Washington was additionally becoming a center of scientific and institutional organizations, which also facilitated Bell's research work.
Graphophone
![Transcription using cylinder phonograph](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b0/Transcription_using_cylinder_phonograph.png)
By 1881 the Volta Associates had succeeded in improving an Edison tinfoil phonograph significantly. They filled the groove of its heavy iron cylinder with wax, then instead of wrapping a sheet of foil around it and using a blunt stylus to indent the recording into the foil, as Edison did, they used a chisel-like stylus to engrave the recording into the wax. The result was a clearer recording. Rather than apply for a patent at that time, however, they sealed the machine into a metal box and deposited it at the Smithsonian, specifying that it was not to be opened without the consent of two of the three men. By 1937 Tainter was the only one of the Associates still living, and the box preserved at the Smithsonian was opened with his permission. For the occasion, descendants of Alexander Graham Bell gathered in Washington, but Tainter, who held a lifelong admiration of Bell, was too ill to attend and remained at home in
San Diego
San Diego ( , ; ) is a city on the Pacific Ocean coast of Southern California located immediately adjacent to the Mexico–United States border. With a 2020 population of 1,386,932, it is the eighth most populous city in the United State ...
.
A recording had been engraved into the wax-filled groove of the modified Edison machine. When it was played, a voice from the distant past spoke, reciting a quotation from
Shakespeare's
William Shakespeare ( 26 April 1564 – 23 April 1616) was an English playwright, poet and actor. He is widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's nation ...
Hamlet
''The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark'', often shortened to ''Hamlet'' (), is a tragedy written by William Shakespeare sometime between 1599 and 1601. It is Shakespeare's longest play, with 29,551 words. Set in Denmark, the play depicts ...
:
[Engel, Leonard H]
Alexander Melville Bell's Voice On Graphophone Record
Science Service via the Sarasota Herald, November 27, 1937, p. 10. Retrieved April 10, 2010, from Google News. "There are more things in heaven and earth,
Horatio
Horatio is an English male given name, an Italianized form of the ancient Roman Latin '' nomen'' (name) '' Horatius'', from the Roman '' gens'' (clan) '' Horatia''. The modern Italian form is ''Orazio'', the modern Spanish form ''Horacio''. It app ...
, than are dreamed of in your philosophy ..." and also, whimsically: "I am a Graphophone and my mother was a Phonograph."
Believing the faint voice to be that of her father, Bell's daughter
Mrs. Gilbert Grosvenor remarked: "That is just the sort of thing father would have said. He was always quoting from the classics."
The voice was later identified by Tainter as in fact that of her paternal grandfather,
Alexander Melville Bell.
The historic recording, not heard since 1937, was played again in 2013 and made available online.
The method of sound reproduction used on the machine was even more interesting than the quotation. Rather than a conventional stylus and
diaphragm, a jet of high pressure air was used. Tainter had previously recorded, on July 7, 1881:
The associates also experimented with other stylus jets of molten metal, wax, and water.
Most of the disc machines designed at the Volta Lab had their disc mounted on vertical turntables. The explanation is that in the early experiments the turntable with disc was mounted on the shop lathe, along with the recording and reproducing heads. Later, when the complete models were built most of them featured vertical turntables.
One interesting exception was a horizontal seven inch turntable. Although made in 1886, the machine was a duplicate of one made earlier but taken to Europe by
Chichester Bell
Chichester Alexander Bell (1848–1924) was an American chemist and inventor. He was a first cousin of Alexander Graham Bell, and instrumental in developing improved versions of the phonograph.American History MuseumCharles Sumner Tainter Papers, ...
. Tainter was granted Patent No. 385886 for it on July 10, 1888. The playing arm is rigid except for a pivoted vertical motion of 90 degrees to allow removal of the record or a return to starting position. While recording or playing, the record not only rotated but moved laterally under the stylus which thus described a spiral, recording 150 grooves to the inch.
The preserved Bell and Tainter records are of both the lateral cut and the Edison
hill-and-dale (up-and-down) styles. Edison for many years used the "hill-and-dale" method with both cylinder and disc records, and
Emile Berliner
Emile Berliner (May 20, 1851 – August 3, 1929) originally Emil Berliner, was a German-American inventor. He is best known for inventing the lateral-cut flat disc record (called a "gramophone record" in British and American English) used with a ...
is credited with the invention of the lateral cut Gramophone record in 1887. The Volta associates had been experimenting with both types as early as 1881, as is shown by the following quotation from Tainter:
The basic distinction between the Edison's first phonograph patent and the Bell and Tainter patent of 1886 was the method of recording. Edison's method was to indent the sound waves on a piece of tin-foil while Bell and Tainter's invention called for cutting or "engraving" the sound waves into an
ozokerite wax record with a sharp recording stylus.
At each step of their inventive process the Associates also sought out the best type of materials available in order to produce the clearest and most audible sound reproduction.
The strength of the Bell and Tainter patent was noted in an excerpt from a letter written by Washington patent attorney S. T. Cameron, who was a member of the law firm conducting litigation for the American Graphophone Company. The letter dated December 8, 1914 was addressed to George C. Maynard, Curator of Mechanical Technology at the U.S. National Museum (now the National Museum of Natural History):
Among the later improvements, the Graphophone used a cutting stylus to create lateral'' 'zig-zag' ''grooves of uniform depth into the wax-coated cardboard cylinders rather than the up-and-down
hill and dale grooves of
Edison's then-contemporary phonograph machine designs.
[Tainter, Charles Sumner]
Recording Technology History: Charles Sumner Tainter Home Notes
, History Department of, University of San Diego. Retrieved from University of San Diego History Department website December 19, 2009
Bell and Tainter developed wax-coated cardboard cylinders for their record cylinders instead of Edison's cast iron cylinder which was covered with a removable film of tinfoil (the actual recording media) that was prone to damage during installation or removal.
Tainter received a separate patent for a tube assembly machine to automatically produce the coiled cardboard tubes which served as the foundation for the wax cylinder records.
Besides being far easier to handle, the wax recording media also allowed for lengthier recordings and created superior playback quality.
[
Library and Archives Canada]
The Virtual Gramophone: Canadian Historical Sound Recordings: Early Sound Recording and the Invention of the Gramophone
Ottawa: Library and Archives Canada website. Retrieved May 24, 2014.
The Graphophone designs initially deployed foot treadles to rotate the recordings which were then replaced by more convenient wind-up clockwork drive mechanisms and which finally migrated to electric motors, instead of the manual crank that was used on Edison's phonograph.
The numerous improvements allowed for a sound quality that was significantly better than Edison's machine.
Magnetic sound recordings
The other experimental Graphophones indicate an amazing range of experimentation. While the method of cutting a record on wax was the one later exploited commercially, everything else seems to have been tried at least once.
The following was noted on Wednesday, March 20, 1881:
The result of these ideas for magnetic reproduction resulted in patent , granted on May 4, 1886; which dealt solely with "the reproduction, through the action of magnetism, of sounds by means of records in solid substances. "
Optical/photographic recordings
The scientist at the Volta lab also experimented with optical recordings on photographic plates.
Tape recorder
A non-
magnetic, non-
electric
Electricity is the set of physical phenomena associated with the presence and motion of matter that has a property of electric charge. Electricity is related to magnetism, both being part of the phenomenon of electromagnetism, as described by ...
, hand-powered
tape recorder
An audio tape recorder, also known as a tape deck, tape player or tape machine or simply a tape recorder, is a sound recording and reproduction device that records and plays back sounds usually using magnetic tape for storage. In its present ...
was patented by two of the Volta associates in 1886 ().
The tape was a 3/16 inch (4.8 mm) wide strip of paper coated by dipping it in a solution of
beeswax
Beeswax (''cera alba'') is a natural wax produced by honey bees of the genus ''Apis''. The wax is formed into scales by eight wax-producing glands in the abdominal segments of worker bees, which discard it in or at the hive. The hive work ...
and
paraffin Paraffin may refer to:
Substances
* Paraffin wax, a white or colorless soft solid that is used as a lubricant and for other applications
* Liquid paraffin (drug), a very highly refined mineral oil used in cosmetics and for medical purposes
* Alkan ...
and then scraping one side clean before the coating had set. The machine, of sturdy wood and metal construction, was hand-powered by means of a knob fastened to a
flywheel
A flywheel is a mechanical device which uses the conservation of angular momentum to store rotational energy; a form of kinetic energy proportional to the product of its moment of inertia and the square of its rotational speed. In particular, as ...
. The tape passed from one eight inch (20.3 cm) diameter reel and around a
pulley with guide flanges, where it came into contact with either the recording or playback
stylus. It was then wound onto a second reel. The sharp recording stylus, actuated by a sound-vibrated
mica diaphragm, engraved a groove into the wax coating. In playback mode, a dull, loosely mounted stylus attached to a rubber diaphragm rode in the recorded groove. The reproduced sound was heard through rubber listening tubes like those of a
stethoscope.
The position of the recording and reproducing heads, mounted alternately on the same two posts, could be adjusted so that several recordings could be cut on the same wax-coated strip. Although the machine was never developed commercially, it is interesting as a predecessor to the later magnetic tape recorder, which it resembles in general design. The tapes, when later examined at one of the Smithsonian Institution's depositories, had become brittle, the heavy paper reels had warped, and the machine's playback head was missing. Otherwise, with some reconditioning the machine could be put back into working order.
[
Newville, Leslie J]
Development of the Phonograph at Alexander Graham Bell's Volta Laboratory
''United States National Museum Bulletin'', United States National Museum
The Smithsonian Institution ( ), or simply the Smithsonian, is a group of museums and education and research centers, the largest such complex in the world, created by the U.S. government "for the increase and diffusion of knowledge". Founded ...
and the Museum of History and Technology
The National Museum of American History: Kenneth E. Behring Center collects, preserves, and displays the heritage of the United States in the areas of social, political, cultural, scientific, and military history. Among the items on display is t ...
, Washington, D.C., 1959, No. 218, Paper 5, pp. 69–79. Retrieved from ProjectGutenberg.org.
Commercialization of phonograph patents
In 1885, when the Volta Associates were sure that they had a number of practical inventions, they filed
patent
A patent is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the legal right to exclude others from making, using, or selling an invention for a limited period of time in exchange for publishing an enabling disclosure of the invention."A ...
applications and also began to seek out investors.
They were granted Canadian and U.S. patents for the Graphophone in 1885 and 1886 respectively. The Graphophone was originally intended for business use as a
dictation recording and playback machine.
The Graphophone Company of Alexandria, Virginia, was created on January 6, 1886 and formally incorporated on February 3, 1886 by another of Bell's cousins. It was formed to control the patents and to handle the commercial development of their numerous sound recording and reproduction inventions, one of which became the first dictation machine, the '
Dictaphone
Dictaphone was an American company founded by Alexander Graham Bell
that produced dictation machines. It is now a division of Nuance Communications, based in Burlington, Massachusetts.
Although the name "Dictaphone" is a trademark, it has ...
'.
After the Volta Associates gave several demonstrations in the City of Washington, businessmen from
Philadelphia
Philadelphia, often called Philly, is the List of municipalities in Pennsylvania#Municipalities, largest city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the List of United States cities by population, sixth-largest city i ...
created the American Graphophone Company on March 28, 1887, in order to produce the machines for the budding phonograph marketplace.
The Volta Graphophone Company then merged with American Graphophone,
[Hoffmann, Frank W. & Ferstler, Howard]
Encyclopedia of Recorded Sound: Volta Graphophone Company
CRC Press, 2005, Vol.1, p. 1167, , . which itself later evolved into
Columbia Records (co-founded
CBS
CBS Broadcasting Inc., commonly shortened to CBS, the abbreviation of its former legal name Columbia Broadcasting System, is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the CBS Entertainm ...
, and now part of the
Sony
, commonly stylized as SONY, is a Japanese multinational conglomerate corporation headquartered in Minato, Tokyo, Japan. As a major technology company, it operates as one of the world's largest manufacturers of consumer and professiona ...
media empire).
Bell's portion of the share exchange at that time had an approximate value of US$200,000 (half of the total received by all of the Associates), $100,000 of which he soon dedicated to the newly formed Volta Bureau's research and pedagogical programs for the deaf.
[Interique]
The Columbia Graphophone and Grafonola – A Beginner's Guide
Intertique.com website. Retrieved March 2010.
The American Graphophone Company was founded by a group of investors mainly from the Washington D.C. area, including Edward Easton, a lawyer and
Supreme Court reporter, who later assumed the presidency of the
Columbia Graphophone Company
Columbia Graphophone Co. Ltd. was one of the earliest gramophone companies in the United Kingdom.
Founded in 1917 as an offshoot of the American Columbia Phonograph Company, it became an independent British-owned company in 1922 in a managemen ...
. The
Howe Machine Factory (for
sewing machines
A sewing machine is a machine used to sew fabric and materials together with thread. Sewing machines were invented during the first Industrial Revolution to decrease the amount of manual sewing work performed in clothing companies. Since the in ...
) in
Bridgeport, Connecticut, became American Graphophone's first manufacturing plant. Tainter resided there for several months to supervise manufacturing before becoming seriously ill, but later went on to continue his inventive work for many years, as health permitted. The small Bridgeport plant which in its early times was able to produce three or four machines daily later became, as a successor firm, the
Dictaphone Corporation.
[Scriptophily.com]
American Graphophone Company - 1900
Scriptophily.com, Chantilly, Virginia. Retrieved 17 March 2010.
![Graphophone1901](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c0/Graphophone1901.jpg)
Shortly after American Graphophone's creation, Jesse H. Lippincott used nearly $1 million (approximately $ in today's dollars), of an inheritance to gain control of it, as well as the rights to the Graphophone and the Bell and Tainter patents.
Not long later Lippincott purchased the Edison Speaking Phonograph Company, and then created the North American Phonograph Company to consolidate the national sales rights of both the Graphophone and the Edison Speaking Phonograph.
In the early 1890s Lippincott fell victim to the unit's mechanical problems and also to resistance from
stenographers. This would postpone the popularity of the Graphophone until 1889 when Louis Glass, manager of the Pacific Phonograph Company would popularize it again through the promotion of nickel-in-the-slot "entertainment" cylinders.
The work of the Volta Associates laid the foundation for the successful use of
dictating machines in business, because their wax recording process was practical and their machines were durable. But it would take several more years and the renewed efforts of
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 ...
and the further improvements of
Emile Berliner
Emile Berliner (May 20, 1851 – August 3, 1929) originally Emil Berliner, was a German-American inventor. He is best known for inventing the lateral-cut flat disc record (called a "gramophone record" in British and American English) used with a ...
, and many others, before the
recording industry
A record, recording or records may refer to:
An item or collection of data Computing
* Record (computer science), a data structure
** Record, or row (database), a set of fields in a database related to one entity
** Boot sector or boot record, r ...
became a major factor in
home entertainment.
Legacy
In 1887, the Volta Associates effectively sold their sound-recording-related
patents to the newly created American Graphophone Company through a share exchange with the Volta Graphophone Company. Bell used the considerable profits from the sale of his Graphophone shares to found the
Volta Bureau as an instrument "for the increase and diffusion of knowledge relating to the deaf",
and also to fund his other philanthropic works on deafness. His scientific and statistical research work on deafness became so extensive that within a few years his documentation had engulfed an entire room of the Volta Laboratory in his father's backyard carriage house. Due to the limited space available there, and with the assistance of his father who contributed US$15,000 (approximately $ in today's dollars), Bell had the new Volta Bureau building constructed nearby in 1893.
Under Superintendent John Hitz's direction, the Volta Bureau became one of the world's premiere centers for research on deafness and
pedagogy
Pedagogy (), most commonly understood as the approach to teaching, is the theory and practice of learning, and how this process influences, and is influenced by, the social, political and psychological development of learners. Pedagogy, taken ...
for the deaf. Bell's Volta Bureau worked in close cooperation with the American Association for the Promotion of the Teaching of Speech to the Deaf (AAPTSD), which was organized in 1890, and which elected Bell its president.
The Volta's research was later absorbed into the Alexander Graham Bell Association for the Deaf (now also known as the 'AG Bell') upon its creation when the Volta Bureau merged with the AAPTSD in 1908, with Bell's financial support.
[Fitzgerald 1996] The AAPTSD was renamed as the
Alexander Graham Bell Association for the Deaf in 1956.
The historical record of the Volta Laboratory was greatly improved in 1947 when Laura F. Tainter, the widow of associate Sumner Tainter, donated ten surviving volumes (out of 13) of Tainter's ''Home Notes'' to the
Smithsonian Institution
The Smithsonian Institution ( ), or simply the Smithsonian, is a group of museums and education and research centers, the largest such complex in the world, created by the U.S. government "for the increase and diffusion of knowledge". Founded ...
's
National Museum of American History – Volumes 9, 10 and 13 having been destroyed in a fire in September 1897.
The daily agenda books described in detail the project work conducted at the laboratory during the 1880s.
In 1950 Laura Tainter donated other historical items, including Sumner Tainter's typed manuscript ''"Memoirs of Charles Sumner Tainter"'', the first 71 pages of which detailed his experiences up to 1887, plus further writings on his work at the Graphophone factory in Bridgeport, Connecticut.
Bell's voice
Alexander Graham Bell died in 1922, and until recently no recordings of his voice were known to survive. On April 23, 2013, the
Smithsonian Institution
The Smithsonian Institution ( ), or simply the Smithsonian, is a group of museums and education and research centers, the largest such complex in the world, created by the U.S. government "for the increase and diffusion of knowledge". Founded ...
's
National Museum of American History, which houses a collection of Volta Laboratory materials, announced that one of its fragile Volta experimental sound recordings, a deteriorated wax-on-cardboard disc that can now be played safely by the
IRENE
Irene is a name derived from εἰρήνη (eirēnē), the Greek for "peace".
Irene, and related names, may refer to:
* Irene (given name)
Places
* Irene, Gauteng, South Africa
* Irene, South Dakota, United States
* Irene, Texas, United Stat ...
optical scanning technology, had preserved the inventor's Scottish-tinged voice. Museum staff working with scientists at the U.S. Department of Energy's
Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory had also revived the voice of his father,
Alexander Melville Bell, from an 1881 recording in the wax-filled groove of a modified Edison tinfoil cylinder phonograph.
Both Bells evidently assisted in testing some of the Volta Laboratory's experimental recorders, several of which used discs instead of cylinders. The 4 minute, 35 second test recording on the disc, mostly a recitation of numbers, is dated April 15, 1885 by an inscription in the wax and an announcement in the recording itself. It concludes with an emphatic spoken signature: "Hear my voice. ... Alexander. . Graham. . Bell."
After hearing the recording, Bell biographer
Charlotte Gray described it, saying:
[ Gray, Charlotte]
We Had No Idea What Alexander Graham Bell Sounded Like. Until Now: Smithsonian researchers used optical technology to play back the unplayable records
''Smithsonian magazine
''Smithsonian'' is the official journal published by the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C. The first issue was published in 1970.
History
The history of ''Smithsonian'' began when Edward K. Thompson, the retired editor of ''Life'' mag ...
'', May 2013. Retrieved April 24, 2013.
Location
The Volta Bureau is located at 3417 Volta Place NW, or alternatively at 1537 35th St. NW, in the
Georgetown district of Washington, D.C. near
Georgetown University
Georgetown University is a private university, private research university in the Georgetown (Washington, D.C.), Georgetown neighborhood of Washington, D.C. Founded by Bishop John Carroll (archbishop of Baltimore), John Carroll in 1789 as Georg ...
and across the street from
Georgetown Visitation Preparatory School
Georgetown Visitation Preparatory School is a private Roman Catholic college-preparatory school for girls located in the historic Washington, D.C. neighborhood of Georgetown. Founded in 1799 by the Order of the Visitation of Holy Mary (also k ...
, and close to the
Foggy Bottom Metro subway stop.
Laboratory patents
''Patents which resulted or flowed from the Volta Laboratory Association'':
See also
*
Alexander Graham Bell Association for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing
*
Alexander Graham Bell honors and tributes
275px,
Alexander Graham Bell honors and tributes include honors bestowed upon him and awards named for him.
Alexander Graham Bell received numerous tributes during his life, and new awards were subsequently named for him posthumously.Reluctant ...
*
Beinn Bhreagh
( ) is the name of the former estate of Alexander Graham Bell, in Victoria County, Nova Scotia. It refers to a peninsula jutting into Cape Breton Island's scenic Bras d'Or Lake approximately southeast of the village of Baddeck, forming th ...
– Bell's country estate in Nova Scotia, where he established a second, larger laboratory
*
Bell Labs
Nokia Bell Labs, originally named Bell Telephone Laboratories (1925–1984),
then AT&T Bell Laboratories (1984–1996)
and Bell Labs Innovations (1996–2007),
is an American industrial Research and development, research and scientific developm ...
– although not directly related to each other, AT&T, founder of the Bell Laboratories of 1925, and the Bell Laboratory (the Volta's alternate name), both owed their creation to Alexander Graham Bell, and both laboratories were initially conceived to conduct research into telecommunications.
References
* ''This article incorporates text from th
U.S. National Register of Historic Places and the United States National Museum Bulletin, government publications in the public domain. ''
Footnotes
Citations
Bibliography
* Bruce, Robert V. ''Bell: Alexander Bell and the Conquest of Solitude''. Ithaca, New York:
Cornell University Press
The Cornell University Press is the university press of Cornell University; currently housed in Sage House, the former residence of Henry William Sage. It was first established in 1869, making it the first university publishing enterprise in t ...
, 1990. .
*
* Newville, Leslie J
Development Of The Phonograph At Alexander Graham Bell's Volta Laboratory United States National Museum Bulletin,
United States National Museum
The Smithsonian Institution ( ), or simply the Smithsonian, is a group of museums and education and research centers, the largest such complex in the world, created by the U.S. government "for the increase and diffusion of knowledge". Founded ...
and the
Museum of History and Technology
The National Museum of American History: Kenneth E. Behring Center collects, preserves, and displays the heritage of the United States in the areas of social, political, cultural, scientific, and military history. Among the items on display is t ...
, Washington, D.C., 1959, No. 218, Paper 5, pp. 69–79. Retrieved from Gutenberg.org.
* Parkin, John H
''Bell and Baldwin: Their Development of Aerodromes and Hydrodromes at Baddeck, Nova Scotia'' Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1964.
* Tainter, Charles Sumner
History Department of,
University of San Diego. Retrieved from University of San Diego History Department website December 19, 2009.
Further reading
For The Aid Of The Deaf: The Volta Bureau Almost Ready To Begin Its Work ''
The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...
'', November 11, 1894, p. 18. Note: extensive discussion is provided of Bell's assistance to
Helen Keller.
*
* Zhou, Li
Until Now, There Was No Play Button for the Recordings Bell and Edison Made in their Lab Smithsonian.com, January 26, 2015. Note: also contains discussion of the Smithsonian exhibit: ''"Hear My Voice:" Alexander Graham Bell and the Origins of Recorded Sound'', on view at the
National Museum of American History until October 25, 2015.
External links
Volta Laboratory & Bureau NRHP 'travel itinerary' listing at the
National Park Service
The National Park Service (NPS) is an agency of the United States federal government within the U.S. Department of the Interior that manages all national parks, most national monuments, and other natural, historical, and recreational propert ...
.
Historic American Buildings Survey: Volta Bureau 1537 Thirty-fifth Street Northwest, Washington, District of Columbia, DC: 12 photos, 14 data pages and supplemental material, at
Historic American Buildings Survey
Heritage Documentation Programs (HDP) is a division of the U.S. National Park Service (NPS) responsible for administering the Historic American Buildings Survey (HABS), Historic American Engineering Record (HAER), and Historic American Landscapes ...
.
Bell's voice recorded at the Volta Laboratory, dated April 15, 1885(video)
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