Early telephone replica, transmitted audible speech, 1876

nitrate negative; glass plate negative

PHOTOGRAPHS - GLASS NEGATIVES
Rosenfeld, Morris
1876 (telephone); 1917-01-25 (negative)
nitrate film
overall: 8 x 10 in.; 20.32 x 25.4 cm

8 x 10 glass plate nitrate negative taken by Rosenfeld and Sons. Image taken as part of long term commissioned work and documentation for the American Telephone & Telegraph Company, ranging from 1910 through the 1940s. View of a reproduction telephone transmitter powered by a single-pole magnet attached to a membrane, used at the Centennial Exhibition by Alexander Graham Bell, for a crowd demonstration. This negative was taken on January 25, 1917. The telephone reproduces an 1876 era telephone. Handwritten on original negative sleeve: "Tel. Co. / Copy of Bell's Original Centennial Single Tube".

1984.187.5308

Mystic Seaport, Rosenfeld Collection