Mayor dials the first long-distance telephone call

© Mark Ollig

On March 7, 1876, Alexander Graham Bell was awarded U.S. Patent 174,465, titled “Improvement In Telegraphy,” for his telephone invention.

He co-founded the American Telephone and Telegraph Company (AT&T) March 3, 1885.

One hundred years ago, a long-distance telephone call could take many minutes to set up before both parties could speak.

Then, long-distance operators in each city the call passed through needed to patch cords into their telephone switchboards to complete an electrical circuit for the speech path so the originating calling party could converse with the called party.

Operators also recorded by hand on paper the date and time of each telephone call to bill customers.

In 1947, AT&T developed the North American Numbering Plan (NANP).

The original NANP included 86 three-digit geographic codes (area codes) designed to speed the completion of direct-dialed calls placed by long-distance telephone switchboard operators for the subscribers of the country’s telephone companies.

The NANP initially divided Minnesota into two numbering plan areas, 612 and 218.

During the mid to late 1940s, AT&T installed new relay-logic telephone toll (long-distance) switching offices for its Long Lines Department, which connected the regional Bell companies and independent telephone companies.

These toll switching offices were capable of processing prefixed area codes of long-distance calls placed by switchboard operators.

Toll switching offices dramatically lowered the time needed to connect telephone calls placed by switchboard operators for telephone company subscribers who were not yet able to dial long-distance calls.

On Nov. 10, 1951, a telephone company subscriber dialed the first long-distance call.

Mayor Melvin Leslie Denning of Englewood, NJ, a city with a population of 25,000, was the first to dial a coast-to-coast long-distance telephone call without the assistance of a switchboard operator.

Denning’s call was to Alameda, CA.

Sitting at a desk surrounded by dignitaries inside the New Jersey Bell Telephone Company, an AT&T subsidiary, Mayor Denning dialed a three-digit area code (415) and a seven-digit telephone number on a rotary phone.

Within 18 seconds, the telephone on the desk of Mayor Frank Osborne of Alameda, CA, was ringing.

“The world shrinks so that soon there won’t be enough room for the people,” Mayor Osborne jokingly said on the telephone to Mayor Denning.

The direct-dialed call to Alameda was processed using a No. 5 Crossbar relay-logic dial telephone switching system manufactured by Western Electric, which AT&T owns.

Bell Telephone Laboratories, also owned by AT&T (yes, at that time, AT&T pretty much owned the telephone industry), designed the No. 5 Crossbar to accept and process additional digits dialed by telephone company subscribers.

The New Jersey Bell telephone customers in Englewood with one and two-party service could dial long-distance directly to 11 million telephones located in 13 area codes around the country without operator assistance.

Telephone switching equipment for processing long-distance calls dialed by telephone company subscribers (advertised as Direct Distance Dialing) began being installed in cities across the country.

Telephone companies also installed automatic message accounting (AMA) computing systems to track and store long-distance calling records used to create the billing statements mailed to subscribers.

Since telephones in 1947 used rotary dials, NANP considered the number of “dial pulls” used for an area code to reduce the time required for a rotary dial on a telephone to out pulse a digit.

NANP initially assigned area codes with minimum rotary dial pulls to highly populated regions; therefore, New York City and Los Angeles used area codes 212 and 213.

New Jersey, home of Bell Telephone Laboratories, was assigned the first area code, 201.

The telephone numbering plan format NXX-NXX-XXXX is where N is any digit from 2 through 9 and X is any digit from 0 through 9.

Today, the North American Numbering Plan Administration (NANPA) oversees telephone numbers consisting of a three-digit numbering plan area (area code), followed by a three-digit telephone office prefix code.

The local telephone company provider assigns the last four digits (line number), completing the ten-digit telephone numbering plan.

The NANPA manages the area and office prefix code assignments for 20 North American countries and territories.

As of 2022, Minnesota area codes are 218, 320, 507, 612, 651, 763, and 952.

I recently learned that NANPA anticipates before 2025, area code 507 could be split into two geographic regions with a second area code added.

Presently, there are 335 assigned area codes, 317 within the continental U.S., and 18 area codes outside of the U.S.

There are enough unused area codes to last until sometime after 2039, according to the director of the NANPA.

Direct Distance Dialing arrived in Minnesota on Aug. 18, 1957, when Northwestern Bell Telephone Company’s one and two-party line subscribers began making long-distance calls within the state and nationwide.

In 1960, the Winsted Telephone Company installed a Leich (pronounced “like”) relay-logic electromechanical telephone switching system. Shortly after, one and two-party line subscribers could direct-dial long-distance telephone calls without operator assistance.

“The Nation at Your Fingertips,” is a 1951 video preserved by the Library of Congress. It tells the story of Englewood, NJ, a brief history of using the telephone, switchboard operators, and the equipment used to provide long-distance dialing. You can watch it at https://bit.ly/3Sg6rhr.

Mayor Melvin Leslie Denning of Englewood, NJ, 

dials the first coast-to-coast long-distance

 telephone call without the assistance

 of a switchboard operator. Nov. 10,1951

 NANP Area Code Map (1951)

Transatlantic ‘lightning’ communications

© Mark Ollig

During the early 1830s, Samuel F. B. Morse developed a working electric telegraph.

In 1838, Alfred Vail’s assistance created a signaling protocol (Morse code) for sending messages over a telegraph system.

On May 24, 1844, in Washington DC, Samuel Morse keyed the first telegraph message sent in the US, “What hath God wrought?” 

His message, the first telegram, was transmitted over a 41-mile metallic telegraph line to the B&O Railroad station in Baltimore, MD.

In 1850, two brothers – John Brett, a telegraphic engineer, and Jacob, installed an underwater telegraph cable from southern England, across the English Channel, to northern France.

Heavy lead weights used for ballast were attached to the cable, so it would sink as workers laid it into the water.

Each end of the cable was brought ashore and connected to batteries for powering telegraph messages.

Unfortunately, the telegraph operators could not decode the messaging signals due to electrical current dispersions emitted from the metallic conductors of the underwater cable.

In 1851, the Brett brothers tried it again using an improved underwater cable with stranded iron wire. Its four metallic copper conductors were insulated inside three layers of water-resistant gutta-percha, a thermoplastic-like material.

Gutta-percha is a natural rubber obtained from a tree of the same name.

When gutta-percha is heated, it becomes pliable and can be molded. When it is cooled, it hardens like plastic and becomes water resistant.

Gutta-percha insulation cores used with telegraph cables were manufactured by the Gutta Percha Company in the United Kingdom.

During the 1930s, underwater cables replaced gutta-percha with polyethylene.

An armored-wire sheathing protected the brother’s new underwater telegraph cable from Dover, England, across the English Channel, to Calais, France, some 52 miles away.

Workers prepared both ends of the newly installed telegraph cable for use.

Eureka!

On Oct. 15, 1851, telegraph operators successfully transmitted and received coded telegrams through the cable.

In 1854, Frederic Gisborne, a Canadian inventor from Nova Scotia, and Cyrus W. Field, an American capitalist and financier, undertook the formidable challenge of installing a transatlantic telegraph cable.

With assistance from Samuel Morse and specialists in oceanography, they decided upon the best route for laying a telegraph cable across the Atlantic Ocean.

It took three weeks for workers to load and spool the telegraph cable in large, circular coils aboard two naval ships, USS Niagara and HMS Agamemnon.

The first portion of the transatlantic telegraph cable consisted of a shallow-water cable line extending five miles into the ocean from the land-based telegraph stations on each side of the Atlantic Ocean.

This cable was more heavily armored to protect it from damage caused by rocks, boat anchors, heavy ocean currents, and waves occurring within five miles from shore.

Workers spliced the shallow-water cable lines to each naval ship’s onboard transatlantic cable end.

On July 17, 1858, both ships began their historic voyage across the Atlantic Ocean, where they would meet in the middle; the HMS Agamemnon from Ireland and the USS Niagara from Newfoundland.

Mechanical machinery maintained and operated by each ship’s crew controlled the speed at which the telegraph cable was paying out into the ocean from the large cable coils inside each vessel.

The underwater telegraph cable contained seven individual strands of twisted metallic wire insulated with three layers of gutta-percha.

Ship workers bonded the cable’s conductor splices with a coal-tar pitch mixture before lowering it into the Atlantic Ocean.

On July 29, 1858, the HMS Agamemnon and the USS Niagara rendezvoused in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. There, workers spliced both ships’ telegraph cable ends to complete the 2,000-mile connection between two land-based telegraph stations on each side of the Atlantic Ocean.

On Aug. 10, 1858, telegraph operators understood coded signaling pulses sent and received through the transatlantic cable between Ireland and North America.

On Aug. 16, 1858,  congratulatory message telegrams were transmitted over the new transatlantic telegraph cable between US President James Buchanan and Queen Victoria of England, the great-great-grandmother of the late Queen Elizabeth II.

I was fortunate to obtain a small strand of metallic wire from the telegraph cable carried aboard the USS Niagara during the 1858 transatlantic installation.

Charles Lewis Tiffany, who founded New York City’s Tiffany & Co. in 1837, acquired a length of the 1858 transatlantic telegraph cable and sold pieces of it as souvenirs.

On Aug. 29, 1860, Minnesota’s first telegram via telegraph was sent from St. Paul by Minnesota Senator Morton Smith Wilkinson to former New York Governor and current New York Senator William Henry Seward, located 1,300 miles away in New York.

“To Governor Seward: Through the courtesy of Mr. Winslow, proprietor, we are enabled to send this, the first dispatch ever transmitted by lightning from St. Paul to the east, as complimentary to you,” read Sen. Wilkinson’s telegram.

Sen. Seward replied, “You have grappled New York – now lay hold on San Francisco.”

It has been 164 years since the first “lightning” telegrams were sent over a transatlantic telegraph cable with our friends from across the pond.

Samuel Finley Breese Morse died April 2, 1872, at age 80.

Vintage electronic calculators

© Mark Ollig

Last week’s column mentioned the Sinclair computer I used in 1981.

Another computing device I used in 1976 was a handheld electronic calculator.

The company I purchased this calculator from started in 1930 as Geophysical Service, an independent contractor specializing in reflection seismograph methods within the ground.

Its name was changed to Texas Instruments Incorporated in 1951 and is today headquartered in Dallas, TX.

Texas Instruments, a semiconductor and technology manufacturer, began work on its first handheld electronic calculator in 1965.

They named their calculator Cal Tech. It was an experimental prototype and not yet ready for commercial resale.

Cal Tech was a binary-coded decimal calculator that handled the essential four arithmetic functions: addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division.

It was a small rectangular device measuring about 4.25 by 6.15 by 1.75 inches, weighed a little over two and a half pounds, and was battery-powered.

In 1964, Canon Inc., based in Japan, engineered and built a working prototype electronic calculator called the Canon Canola 130.

It used 545 germanium semiconductor transistors and hundreds of germanium diodes soldered onto circuit boards. It weighed 45 pounds.

In 1968, Canon began selling the Canola 130S electronic calculator for $995, which today is equivalent to the purchasing power of $8,641.

In 1970, Texas Instruments negotiated with Canon Inc. to manufacture a commercial version of Cal Tech, which had proven to be a reliable electronic device.

Cal Tech became known as the Pocketronic calculator.

In 1971, the Pocketronic was sold in the US for $345, equivalent to $2,568 in today’s purchasing power.

The Pocketronic has been called the first handheld, battery-powered, paper printing electronic calculator.

The Pocketronic had no electronic display. Instead, the device printed typed calculations and the results on a strip of thermal paper tape fed from a plastic cassette spool made by 3M Corp.

The electronics inside the Pocketronic included the Texas Instruments TMC1730B, TMC1731A, and TMC1732A electronic integrated circuit packages.

Although called a “Pocketronic” calculator, it weighed two and a half pounds, and its length was 8.2 inches.

Also, in 1971, Busicom (formerly The Nippon Calculating Machine Corp) manufactured what some call the first genuine “pocket-sized” electronic calculator, the Busicom LE-120A.

The LE-120A calculator included an impressive 12-digit red LED display and is reportedly the first electronic calculator to use an LED display.

It was powered with four six-volt AA batteries, weighed 10.5 ounces, and was priced at $395 in 1971, the same buying power as $2,940 today.

On December 4, 1975, the Smithsonian Institution accepted Texas Instruments’ donation of their original 1965 Cal Tech prototype handheld calculator.

In 1976, Texas Instruments began selling their T-1225 solid-state electronic handheld calculator for $24.95, equivalent to $132 today.

I purchased a Texas Instruments T-1225 in 1976.

The T-1225 calculator was a custom model manufactured by Texas Instruments for the True Value hardware store chain.

The calculator’s box has the following text, “Custom Model manufactured for True Value Hardware Stores.”

The Texas Instruments T-1225 measures 1.25 by 2.625 by 5.375 inches, weighs 3.7 ounces, and is about the same size as those transistor pocket radios we used during the 1960s.

It is an eight-digit microelectronic calculator using red LEDs (Light-Emitting-Diode) to display digits typed and computation results across its thin, horizontal screen.

The T-1225 calculator is powered using a single nine-volt transistor battery or with the Texas Instruments AC adapter model AC9180.

The T-1225 featured logic technology known as VLSI (Very Large-Scale Integration), which creates an integrated circuit by combining large numbers of metal-oxide-semiconductor transistors onto a single computer chip. In the case of the T-1225, it is an integrated circuit package called TMS0972.

During the late 1970s, the buyer’s market for pocket-sized handheld electronic calculators dramatically increased as the cost of owning one decreased.

Businesses, students, and the general public appreciated the convenience of having a portable electronic “personal calculating device” one could hold in the palm of their hand.

During the 1970s, some electronic calculator manufacturers used LCD (liquid-crystal display) screens because of their low power consumption and cost.

However, the LCD turned out not to be as reliable (parts of the LCD digit would sometimes fade out); thus, manufacturers ended up selling more electronic calculators with longer-lasting LED displays.

We had fun with those early electronic calculators, such as typing the number “0.7734” and then turning the calculator upside down to see the word “hello.”

Today, my vintage 1976 Texas Instruments T-1225 calculator resides on the memorabilia bookshelf.

I am happy to report it still worked fine after installing a new nine-volt transistor battery.

While talking with my brother Mike, I learned he still has his Keystone SC 656 handheld electronic calculator from 1975.

And yes, it still works.

My 1976 Texas Instruments T-1225 calculator (It still works!)

Those were the days

© Mark Ollig

When I attended high school, computers were not yet in the classroom; the only keyboard I used was attached to a Smith Corona typewriter.

In 1981, I worked at the local telephone company and realized computers and software would play a prominent role in the future of telecommunications.

So I purchased an inexpensive Sinclair ZX81 computer manufactured by the Timex Corporation in Dundee, Scotland, for $100, which, in 2022, would cost around $325.

The Sinclair ZX81 was lightweight and compact.

It did not have a dedicated monitor; its video display output was connected via a cable to my portable black-and-white TV.

I recall typing humorous messages on the TV screen for visitors, who usually smiled upon seeing them.

The computer’s operating system was a form of BASIC (Beginner’s All-purpose Symbolic Instruction Code) called Sinclair BASIC.

I taught myself to code some software programs, typing on a pressure-sensitive membrane (flat) keyboard. The data was stored on cassette tapes using my tape cassette recorder.

A program was loaded into the computer from a cassette tape in the tape player through a connected cable.

The Sinclair ZX81 computer used an NEC Zilog Z80-compatible central processor running at a clock rate of 3.25 MHz.

It included 8KB of ROM and 16KB of RAM.

I also used a small ZX Printer plugged into the Sinclair ZX81’s expansion bus via a short-length cable.

It printed the output for BASIC commands and simple reference data onto an aluminum-coated 4-inch thermal paper attached to the printer.

The ZX Printer resembled a packaging tape dispenser.

I purchased VHS tapes (what are those, grandpa?) and books about personal computers, BASIC, MS-DOS, and how to write code to execute batch commands and run utility programs.

By 1983, I was using an IBM personal computer with a 4.77 MHz Intel 8088 processor, 256KB (which I expanded to 512KB) of RAM, and a 20MB hard drive the size of an eight-slot toaster.

This computer included a large cathode ray tube monitor and an IBM dot matrix printer using a parallel cable plugged into the computer’s DB-25 connector.

Software programs were written on 5.25-inch floppy disks and loaded into the computer via a single-sided 160KB 5.25-inch floppy drive.

At the end of 1985, Microsoft released its Windows 1.0 platform, Microsoft MS-DOS Executive. It was a graphical user interface shell program of MS-DOS and allowed navigation using a mouse.

In 1983, a Friday evening television program called “The Computer Chronicles,” based in San Mateo, CA, began broadcasting over the local PBS channel.

Stewart Cheifet was the Executive Producer and host.

During each 30-minute episode, he discussed and demonstrated the latest in computing technology and interviewed people with expertise in computers, peripherals, and software.

Cheifet, a journalist, covered the high-tech industry in the Silicon Valley of California as a correspondent for the PBS “Nightly Business Report,”

Each Friday, he greeted us with: “Welcome to the Computer Chronicles.”

Cheifet talked about computing technology in an easy-to-understand manner, demonstrating how personal computers, their peripherals, and software could improve our lives at work and home.

“The Computer Chronicles” regularly included representatives from those companies manufacturing and selling computer hardware and software.

These representatives demonstrated their computing products and answered questions from Cheifet.

The show was enjoyable to watch, and I learned something new each week.

“The Computer Chronicles” not only covered IBM and Microsoft; it included segments featuring Apple and other computer manufacturers and software companies.

One of the show’s segments, “Random Access,” discussed the week’s latest computing news.

“The Computer Chronicles” was fitting for the times as fast-evolving personal computer technology descended upon us. Cheifet’s analysis, interviews, and professional presentation significantly contributed to the audiences’ learning and understanding.

“The Computer Chronicles” episodes kept me informed on the recent computing news.

One episode from July 14, 1988, began with a Commodore Amiga personal computer sitting on a desk Stewart Cheifet was seated at.

“Welcome to the Computer Chronicles,” the Commodore Amiga said through its speaker.

“A computer that talks!” a very surprised Cheifet exclaimed.

For nearly 20 years, this program covered most facets of personal computing, the internet, and the world wide web — the final episode of “The Computer Chronicles” aired in 2002.

According to Cheifet, “The Computer Chronicles” was seen in over 100 countries worldwide and was the first 30-minute television program streamed on the internet in 1990.

The early 1980s was a time of excitement and enthusiasm as interest in home computing hardware and software began in earnest.

Original episodes of “The Computer Chronicles” are stored on the Internet Archive at https://bit.ly/3eqAHas.

YouTube also contains many episodes at https://bit.ly/3RyjYQC.

In 2018, Cheifet was the keynote speaker at Tandy Assembly and discussed his days hosting “The Computer Chronicles.” You can watch this video at https://bit.ly/3wS3CKz.

He described his work on “The Computer Chronicles” as “A hobby of love for me,” adding, “It was great fun.”

Stewart Cheifet will turn 84 on September 24. He lives in San Mateo, CA.

And yes, I still have the Sinclair ZX81 computer.

Those were the days.

Sinclair ZX81 computer kit
before being assembled

Mark Ollig typing code on his
 Sinclair ZX81 computer in 1981

Sinclair ZX81 personal computer
home setup

Sinclair ZX Printer
 (with connector cable/module)

Dawn of the ATM

© Mark Ollig

ATM is an acronym for asynchronous transfer mode, a protocol or set of rules used by a communication system to transmit voice, video, and data over a network.

However, today, I will write about this acronym used for an automated teller machine.

The technology used with an ATM includes digital computing to perform automated banking transactions using plastic debit/credit or smart cards.

Smart cards, aka chip cards, store information on an EMV (Europay Mastercard Visa) computing memory chip rather than the magnetic stripe found on older cards.

Their information can also be retrieved on electronic devices using wireless near-field communication (NFC) protocols.

On Sept. 2, 1969, the first US ATM called a Docuteller appeared in the Chemical Bank at North Village Avenue in Rockville Centre, NY.

The Docuteller was installed on the bank’s wall and allowed checking account customers to receive cash by inserting their plastic bank cards with an affixed magnetic stripe containing coded customer account data.

Don Wetzel was an executive with Docutel, a company that developed automated baggage-handling equipment in Dallas, TX.

Wetzel came up with the idea for an automated cash machine in 1968 while waiting in a bank teller line to cash a check, which, for those in my age group, will remember to be, at times, a long wait.

The Chemical Bank ATM could only give out cash, but in 1971, a new ATM that could handle multiple functions, including providing customers’ account balances, was installed.

The patent for the first US ATM was filed on July 29, 1970, and on Sept. 25, 1973, US Patent 3,761,682 titled CREDIT CARD AUTOMATIC CURRENCY DISPENSER was awarded to Don C. Wetzel and two others.

The patent’s description begins with, “A currency dispenser automatically delivers a medium of exchange in packets in response to a coded credit card presented thereto. The coded credit card is presented to the currency dispenser, and an initial check is made to determine if the card has the proper format.”

“The cash drawer opens to a detent position which allows the customer to move the drawer to a fully open position to remove his currency. Upon release of the cash drawer, it returns to a partially opened position from which it automatically closes after a preset time limit,” the wording in the patent described.

The Chemical Bank ATM internal circuitry contained digital electronic components, including decision-making logic gates, integrated circuits, and mechanical functionality.

The dawn of the ATM began in 1967 from across the pond by our British friends.

Fifty-five years ago, Barclays Bank installed the world’s first ATM cash machine in the borough of Enfield in North London, England.

John Shepherd-Barron is credited with inventing the first ATM for dispensing cash.

He was Managing Director at the British banknote manufacturer De La Rue and found himself unable to cash his checks after his bank closed on a Saturday morning.

“It struck me there must be a way I could get my own money, anywhere in the world or the UK. So I hit upon the idea of a chocolate bar dispenser, but replacing chocolate with cash,” Shepherd-Barron said in a 2007 BBC interview.

In 1967, plastic bank cards hadn’t been invented, so Shepherd-Barron’s machine processed special paper vouchers for up to 10 quid (pound sterling).

These paper vouchers contained carbon-14, a slightly radioactive substance the ATM could detect.

After inserting the paper voucher, a customer entered a four-digit PIN (personal identification number).

Shepherd-Barron originally was going to use a six-digit PIN; however, his wife said she had trouble remembering that many digits.

 Four digits have become the standard ATM PIN length worldwide.

Sir Thomas Bland, deputy chairman of Barclays Bank, pulled back a black velvet curtain and revealed to the public its automated cash dispensing machine with the name  BARCLAYCASH on June 27, 1967.

English actor Reginald Alfred Varney was the first to withdraw money from the automated cash dispensing machine in the amount of ten quid, equivalent to 171 quid (about 200 USD) from the ATM.

Barclays Bank customers appreciated the ATM for automated cash withdrawals as the bank closed the teller counters mid-afternoon.

“The bank was only open until 3:30 p.m. at that time, so when the ATM was introduced, customers could get cash outside of banking hours, which must have made a huge difference to people’s lives,” Shepherd-Barron said in the 2007 BBC interview.

Approximately 3 million ATMs are being used worldwide, mostly on Fridays.

It is good to remember the people, who, years ago, made possible what today we take for granted, the ATM.

You can see Donald Wetzel’s ATM US Patent at https://bit.ly/3AV8CRf.

Donald C. Wetzel was born Jan. 3, 1929, and is 93 years of age.

John Shepherd-Barron died May 15, 2010, in the Scottish Highlands of the UK, at age 84.

English actor Reginald Alfred Varney was the first to withdraw money
 from an ATM on Jun 27, 1967.
(Enfield in North London, England)