5 Minute Factoids: Alexander Graham Bell

Today is the birthday of Alexander Graham Bell, an eminent scientist, inventor, engineer and innovator who is credited with inventing the first practical telephone. Many other inventions marked Bell's later life, including groundbreaking work in optical telecommunications, hydrofoils and aeronautics. In 1888, Alexander Graham Bell became one of the founding members of the National Geographic Society (Wikipedia). 

• He only attended school for five years; from the time he was 10 until he was 14, but he never stopped learning. He read the books in his grandfather’s library and studied tutorials.
• In 1883 Bell invented the graphophone, the first practical system of sound recording.
• Bell died on August 2, 1922. On the day of his burial, all telephone service in the US was stopped for one minute in his honor.

Want to read more on Bell? Try this book...

The Telephone Gambit: Chasing Alexander Graham Bell's Secret

by Seth Shulman

Seth Shulman closely examines the race to build the first telephone and uncovers potential bombshells with The Telephone Gambit. Although Alexander Graham Bell is widely accepted as the father of the telephone (despite the fact that rival inventor Elisha Gray submitted a similar claim the same day Bell filed his patent), Schulman provides intriguing evidence questioning if the scales were deliberately tipped in Alexander's favor. Was the venerable inventor party to theft from Gray's own research? Or are such accusations merely sour grapes from a bitterly contested legal battle? Fraught with controversy, conspiracy, and possible chicanery, Shulman spins real-life Da Vinci Code drama around one of the most influential inventions of the modern era.