Unit 1: A Changing Society

Agenda: Hand in Settlement writingUnit intro and summativeNotes: How we communicateWriting practice

Time before Phones• May 24, 1844 --

Samuel Morse sends message from Baltimore to Washington, D.C.

Morse Code: • 1854 – 25,000 miles of telegraph wires have been

laid across the US.• 1864 – A telegraph line spans the entire continental

US• 1866 – Trans Atlantic telegraph

– 8 words a minute

• Very costly

An almost phone

• 1861 – Johann Reis, a German physics teacher, completed an almost working version of a telephone using sausage skin, beer barrel, and a platinum bar, but it was just a fancier telegraph

More phone inventors• 1871 – Antonio Meucci, an Italian immigrant, has a

working prototype of a talking telegraph but is unable to pay for a patent. (honored by Congress in 2002)

• 1876 – Race to patents– 9:30 am Elisha Gray applies for patent, doesn’t pay for it.– 11:30 am Alexander Graham Bell applies AND pays for

a patent – Over 600 lawsuits will be filed but the 1st patent is given

to Bell, although who invented it is debatable.

1877 - 1900• 1896 – Invention of the rotary dial phone.

– Less wiring and cheaper.

1900 – 1982 Monopoly• 1899 – American Bell is acquired/

renamed AT & T – American Telephone and Telegraph.– No competition and expensive.– Remains a monopoly until 1982!

Developments in technology• 1947- Dr. Ring had the idea for a cellular

telephone service, but the technology to support it did not yet exist.

• 1962- touch-tone telephones were developed• 1973- first cell phone call mde afrom a Motorola

employee to an ATT&T employee.• 1983- The first commercial mobile telephone

system was opened.

Writing task: formative #1• How would life be different today without cell

phones? Think of all of the ways they are used today (they aren’t just phones anymore!) What would change in our daily lives.

• (Yes, even if you personally do not have a cell phone, you can answer this!) Expectations of response:–Well organized and use proper grammar and sentence structure–Responses should be a minimum of 200 words