I will say up front that I know nearly nothing about telephones, telegraph and radios. I do have a flip phone that I use to call Sharn Jean from the grocery store, but that's about it. I just wish it had a rotary dial. In any case, back in the early 60's I was a new father, just out of college and employed as a technician in an industrial research laboratory in Oklahoma City. We had an array of egg heads, and one of our PhD Chemists had apparently written his Thesis on creating ultra-pure chemical compounds. One day I noticed he had a battery of jugs that were lying sideways on a contraption that kept the jugs rolling 24/7.
I asked him what he was doing, and he said that he had been contacted by Bell Laboratories because of his expertise in ultra-pure chemicals, and that our lab had signed a contract with them to produce a certain amount of ultra-pure Silica. Apparently they were working on developing glass fiber technology, which he said would eventually replace Copper telephone wires. A new concept to me; it kinda blew my mind at the time.
As for radios, I thought this was kinda funny. I was attending a car show a few years back, and someone had brought a fully restored Model T Ford; about a 1914 model, or thereabouts. I noticed a young fellow about 14 or 15 years old who was really looking it over. He finally turned to his mother, and said "Why it doesn't even have a radio!". I told him that wasn't surprising, because the only thing I knew of that they had at that time was maybe wireless ship to shore. What are they teaching in school these days? laughing:
