GNG News Guy
12-27-2007, 11:47 AM
http://i.dslr.net/urls/92/792.gif (http://www.dslreports.com/shownews/Alexander-Graham-Bell-Patent-Thief-90521)
According to the Associated Press (http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/22400009/), a new book claims that Alexander Graham Bell, long credited with inventing the telephone, actually stole much of the idea from a rival, Elisha Gray. According to the book Bell, "aided by aggressive lawyers and a corrupt patent examiner," got a look at Gray's patents, stole some successful ideas, and somehow managed to get credited with patenting his solution first:Shulman believes the smoking gun is Bell's lab notebook, which was restricted by Bell's family until 1976, then digitized and made widely available in 1999. The notebook details the false starts Bell encountered as he and assistant Thomas Watson tried transmitting sound electromagnetically over a wire. Then, after a 12-day gap in 1876 when Bell went to Washington to sort out patent questions about his work he suddenly began trying another kind of voice transmitter. That method was the one that proved successful.
Bell's notebook, in its entirety, can be found here (http://lcweb2.loc.gov/cgi-bin/ampage?collId=am-reas&fileName=trr002page.db&recNum=0&itemLink=http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/treasures/trr002.html&linkText=9).
read comment(s) (http://www.dslreports.com/shownews/Alexander-Graham-Bell-Patent-Thief-90521)
According to the Associated Press (http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/22400009/), a new book claims that Alexander Graham Bell, long credited with inventing the telephone, actually stole much of the idea from a rival, Elisha Gray. According to the book Bell, "aided by aggressive lawyers and a corrupt patent examiner," got a look at Gray's patents, stole some successful ideas, and somehow managed to get credited with patenting his solution first:Shulman believes the smoking gun is Bell's lab notebook, which was restricted by Bell's family until 1976, then digitized and made widely available in 1999. The notebook details the false starts Bell encountered as he and assistant Thomas Watson tried transmitting sound electromagnetically over a wire. Then, after a 12-day gap in 1876 when Bell went to Washington to sort out patent questions about his work he suddenly began trying another kind of voice transmitter. That method was the one that proved successful.
Bell's notebook, in its entirety, can be found here (http://lcweb2.loc.gov/cgi-bin/ampage?collId=am-reas&fileName=trr002page.db&recNum=0&itemLink=http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/treasures/trr002.html&linkText=9).
read comment(s) (http://www.dslreports.com/shownews/Alexander-Graham-Bell-Patent-Thief-90521)