Well before Alexander Graham Bell invented the telephone, Aleck (as his family called him) was a curious boy, interested in how and why he was able to hear the world all around him. His father was a speech therapist who invented the Visible Alphabet and his mother was hearing impaired, which only made Aleck even more fascinated by sound vibration and modes of communication. Naturally inquisitive and inclined to test his knowledge, young Aleck was the perfect person to grow up in the Age of Invention. As a kid he toyed with sound vibrations and began a life of inventing. This in-depth look at the life and inspiration of the brilliant man who invented the tele-phone is sure to fire up the imaginations of young readers who question why and how things work. Driven by curiosity and an eagerness to help others, Aleck became a teacher for the deaf. His eventual invention of the telephone proved that he never stopped thinking big or experimenting with sound. Backmatter includes more information about Bell’s inventions, a timeline of his life, a bibliography, and sources for further learning.

An introduction to the life and career of the inventor of the telephone, who was also accomplished in many other ways.

Growing up, Alexander Graham Bell was fascinated with music, speech, and sounds. He worked hard to invent things that would not only help those with impaired hearing, but also bring people together in new and special ways. What he didn't know was that his simple idea--to help people communicate--would change the world when he invented the telephone.

The popular image of Alexander Graham Bell is that of an elderly American patriarch, memorable only for his paunch, his Santa Claus beard, and the invention of the telephone. In this magisterial reassessment based on thorough new research, acclaimed biographer Charlotte Gray reveals Bell’s wide-ranging passion for invention and delves into the private life that supported his genius. The child of a speech therapist and a deaf mother, and possessed of superbly acute hearing, Bell developed an early interest in sound. His understanding of how sound waves might relate to electrical waves enabled him to invent the “talking telegraph” be- fore his rivals, even as he undertook a tempestuous courtship of the woman who would become his wife and mainstay. In an intensely competitive age, Bell seemed to shun fame and fortune. Yet many of his innovations—electric heating, using light to transmit sound, electronic mail, composting toilets, the artificial lung—were far ahead of their time. His pioneering ideas about sound, flight, genetics, and even the engineering of complex structures such as stadium roofs still resonate today. This is an essential portrait of an American giant whose innovations revolutionized the modern world.

A reprint of the 1973 biography of the American inventor. Divided into pre-telephone, telephone, and post-telephone sections, also covers his work with the Smithsonian, the deaf, the National Geographic Society, and Science magazine. Paper edition ($12.95) not seen. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

A revelatory revisionist biography of Alexander Graham Bell — renowned inventor of the telephone and powerful enemy of the deaf community. When Alexander Graham Bell first unveiled his telephone to the world, it was considered miraculous. But few people know that it was inspired by another supposed miracle: his work teaching the deaf to speak. The son of one deaf woman and husband to another, he was motivated by a desire to empower deaf people by integrating them into the hearing world, but he ended up becoming their most powerful enemy, waging a war against sign language and deaf culture that still rages today. The Invention of Miracles tells the dual stories of Bell’s remarkable, world-changing invention and his dangerous ethnocide of deaf culture and language. It also charts the rise of deaf activism and tells the triumphant tale of a community reclaiming a once-forbidden language. Katie Booth has researched this story for over a decade, poring over Bell’s papers, Library of Congress archives, and the records of deaf schools around America. Witnessing the damaging impact of Bell’s legacy on her deaf family set her on a path that upturned everything she thought she knew about language, power, deafness, and technology.

This book is a seminal work in the field of phonetics, written by Alexander Melville Bell, the father of the famous inventor Alexander Graham Bell. It provides a detailed analysis of the mechanics of speech, including the production of vowels and consonants, and has been a key reference for linguists and speech therapists for over a century. This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work is in the "public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.