- ON THIS DAY - On Jan. 25, 1915, the inventor of the telephone, Alexander Graham Bell, inaugurated U.S. transcontinental telephone service. See This Front Page http://www.nytimes.com/learning/general/onthisday/20110125.html?th= <http://www.nytimes.com/learning/general/onthisday/20110125.html?th=&emc=tha 213&nl=todaysheadlines> &emc=tha213&nl=todaysheadlines
>From the article: The telephone line used across the continent yesterday will be opened for commercial purposes on March 1. It was announced that the charge for a telephone conversation between New York and San Francisco would be $20.70 for the first three minutes, and $6.75 for each minute thereafter. When one man in New York talks to a man in San Francisco $2,000,000 worth of apparatus will be tied up and cannot be used for the duration of the conversation for any other purpose. It is expected that, in normal conditions, it will require about ten minutes to put a call "through" across the continent. In the line there are two physical and one phantom circuits and in each physical circuit there are two wires and 6,800 miles of hard drawn copper wire. There are 870 pounds of copper wire in each circuit mile and 2,960 tons in the entire line. The line crosses thirteen States and passes through Salt Lake City, Denver, Omaha, Chicago, and Buffalo, with a branch that runs through Pittsburgh, Washington, and Philadelphia. In the main line there are 130,000 poles. And less than 100 years later, look where we are and what we take for granted.
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