etallic circuits,
no multiple telephone switchboard, or telephone switchboard of any
kind, no telephone cable that would work satisfactorily; in fact,
there were none of the multitude of parts which now constitute the
telephone system.

The first practical telephone line was a copy of the best telegraph
line of the day. A line wire was strung on the poles and housetops,
using the ground for the return circuit. Electrical disturbances,
coming from no one knows where, were picked up by this line.
Frequently the disturbances were so loud in the telephone as to
destroy conversation. When a second telephone line was strung
alongside the first, even though perfectly insulated, another surprise
awaited the telephone pioneers. Conversation carried on over one of
these wires could plainly be heard on the other. Another strange
thing was discovered. Iron wire was not so good a conductor for the
telephone current as it was for the telegraph current. The talking
distance, therefore, was limited by the imperfect carrying power of
the conductor and by the confusing effect of all sorts of disturbing
currents from the atmosphere and from neighboring telephone and
telegraph wires.

These and a multitude of other difficulties, constituting problems of
the most intricate nature, impeded the progress of the telephone
art, but American engineers, by persistent study, incessant
experimentation, and the expenditure of immense sums of money, have
overcome these difficulties. They have created a new art, inventing,
developing, and perfecting, making improvements great and small in
telephone, transmitter, line, cable, switchboard, and every other
piece of apparatus and plant required for the transmission of speech.

As the result of nearly forty years of this unceasing, organized
effort, on the 25th of January, 1915, there was dedicated to the
service of the American public a transcontinental telephone line,
3,600 miles long, joining the Atlantic and the Pacific, and carrying
the human voice instantly and distinctly between San Francisco and New
York and Philadelphia and Boston. On that day over this line Doctor
Bell again talked to Mr. Watson, who was now 3,400 miles away. It was
a day of romantic triumph for these two men and for their associates
and their thousands of successors who have built up the great American
telephone art.

The 11th of February following was another day of triumph for the
telephone art as a product of American in