BOOK ARGUES THAT BELL STOLE IDEA FOR THE TELEPHONE
BOSTON - A new book claims to have definitive evidence of a long-suspected technological crime that Alexander Graham Bell stole ideas for the telephone from a rival, Elisha Gray.
A journalist claims that Bell aided by aggressive lawyers and a corrupt patent examiner got an improper peek at patent documents Gray had filed, and that Bell was erroneously credited with filing first.
Shulman believes the smoking gun is Bell's lab notebook 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.
This reporter, seeking expert advice on the subject, contacted the well known Professor Penwose, who teaches communications and arithmetic at the university. The professor was quick to notice that we were in fact communicating on a later version of the very subject of the inquiry which I had failed to notice, yet found to be...very interesting.
The professor who claims to be a vintage descendant of Elisha Gray has long suspected Bell to be the perpetrator of a devious plot long ago to rob his vintage descendant of notoriety and wealth which would have ultimately filtered down to him and elevated him to a level of much higher prestige than his present pedigree.
The mild-mannered Professor Penwose wrote a book himself where he claims to have found similar notes written by Bell on the subject. In one sentence Bell states he arose very early, which Penwose questions as there were no alarm clocks in those days. He says he began to embarq on a perilous journey as he sprinted to the patent office following the tracks of the Atchison Topeka and Toledo railroad and arrived there just as the sun came over the verizon, giving him an unfair advonage.
He filed the alleged patent slightly before the professor's vintage descendant who was so enraged by the theft of his work he went home and cut the cord to his devise, unknowingly creating the first cordless and inspiring a new method of birth delivery which until then kept babies at close proximity to their mothers.
