Welcome to OldTelephones.com
I'm not sure how the earliest telephones have stayed off the radar of main stream collectors while cars, guns, sports memorabilia and artwork make all the headlines, but the telephone changed the world when it was invented in 1876 and it continues to change the world today.
This website includes over 100 original "candlestick" telephones from 1892-1926, the single greatest competitive and innovative period in the wonderful history of the telephone. Imagine a time when over 6,000 independent telephone companies competed against AT&T. Here is a brief look at what led up to this remarkable chapter in the history of the telephone.
Alexander Graham Bell received the first of his two initial patents for the telephone, U. S. Number 174,465, on March 7th, 1876. It has been called the most valuable patent ever issued. In 1976, exactly 100 years after the patent was issued, AT&T stood as the richest company on earth. Today, the telephone represents one of the greatest inventions in human history and the stories of how it all began are fascinating.
When Bell's attorney filed his application at the patent office on February 14th, 1876, it came only hours before Elisha Gray filed his Notice of Invention for a telephone. Mystery still surrounds Bell's application and what happened that day. In particular, the key point to Bell's application, the principle of variable resistance, was scribbled in a margin, almost as an afterthought. Some think Bell was told of Gray's Notice then allowed to change his application. That was never proven, despite some 600 lawsuits that would eventually challenge the patent, all of which Bell won.
The months following the patent grant proved financially difficult for Bell and his backers. Critics claimed Bell's patent couldn't produce a working telephone and many stated they had a prior claim. Litigation loomed. By the fall of 1876, Bell offered to sell his telephone patent rights to Western Union for $100,000. In one of the greatest miscalculations in history, Western Union said no. Instead, Western Union believed that the telegraph, not the telephone, was the future. In September, 1877 Western Union changed its mind when one of its subsidiaries, the Gold and Stock Telegraphy Company, ripped out their telegraphs and started using Bell telephones. Rather than buying patent rights or licenses from Bell Telephone, Western Union decided to buy patents from others and start their own telephone company. They were not alone. At least 1,730 telephone companies organized and operated in the 17 years Bell was supposed to have a monopoly.
Most competitors disappeared as soon as the Bell Company filed suit against them for patent infringement, but many remained. They either disagreed with Bell's right to the patent, ignored it altogether, or started a phone company because Bell's people would not provide service to their area. In any case, Western Union began entering agreements with Elisha Gray, Thomas Edison, and Amos E. Dolbear for their telephone inventions. In December, 1877 Western Union created the American Speaking Telephone Company. A tremendous selling point for their telephones was Edison's improved transmitter. Bell Telephone was deeply worried since they had installed only 3,000 phones by the end of 1877. Western Union, on the other hand, had 250,000 miles of telegraph wire strung over 100,000 miles of route. If not stopped they would have an enormous head start on making telephone service available across the country. Undaunted by the size of Western Union, then the world's largest telecom company, Bell's Boston lawyers sued them for patent infringement the next year.
On November 10, 1879 Bell won its patent infringement suit against Western Union in the United States Supreme Court. In the resulting settlement, Western Union gave up its telephone patents and the 56,000 phones it managed, in return for 20% of Bell rentals for the 17 year life of Bell's patents. It also retained its telegraph business as before. The court's decision made National Bell Company even bigger and resulted in a new entity with a new name. American Bell Telephone Company was created on February 20, 1880, capitalized with over seven million dollars. Bell now managed 133,000 telephones.
On February 26, 1882, Bell completed the takeover of Western Electric, a previous rival and a manufacturer of telephones that would, from that day on, produce products exclusively for American Bell. In 1885, American Bell introduced a new Long Distance Company, a wholly owned subsidiary called American Telephone & Telegraph. By the end of the year, AT&T completed its first long distance line between New York and Philadelphia. The initial capacity of the line was one call. In 1892 AT&T opened a long distance line connecting New York and Chicago. The circuit could handle only one call at a time. The price was $9 for the first five minutes. AT&T became the parent company of the Bell system in 1899.
In 1894 Alexander Graham Bell's second telephone patent expired, opening the telephone industry to competition. Within a decade, over 6,000 companies went into the telephone business all across the country and independent telephones numbered 2,000,000 while Bell managed 1,278,000.
And this is where the story of the candlestick began.
In 1892, just before the telephone patents expired, Bell introduced the first upright desk telephone called "desk stand" or "candlestick" telephone. In 1894, after the patents expired, competitive telephone companies sprang up all over the United States producing candlestick telephones of all kinds, but consolidation (and failure) resulted in a short life span for most of them. As a result, only limited documentation exists on many of the early telephone companies and the phones they manufactured. In 1926 Bell introduced the first desk phone, or cradle phone (the AA1), bringing an end to the candlestick era. The lifespan of candlestick telephone production lasted about 35 years, 1892-1926, and reflected one of the greatest periods of competition and innovation in the wonderful history of the telephone. To put this into historical context, consider this. Ellis Island opened its doors in New York in 1892 and closed down in 1926. During the very same window in history as the candlestick telephone, over 12 million immigrants entered the U.S., the greatest mass migration of people the world had ever seen. This 35 year period in American history would change the world forever.
Please enjoy the website and let me know if you have a unique candlestick you would consider selling. I am always looking to add unusual, original candlesticks to this collection.