Two years after the invention of the telephone, in 1878, the first telephone was installed in the White House by the just inaugurated President of the United States, Rutherford B. Hayes. The first “official” call was between Alexander Graham Bell and the President. Although the federal government strongly supported this new technology, international long distance phone calls still left a lot to be desired. In the following years, long distance telephone service would be improved in many incremental stages as new associated inventions and more efficient applications of available technologies were developed.
On March 27, 1884 the first long-distance telephone line between New York and Boston was activated, using copper for the very first time. Copper had greater attenuation of signal that the previous galvanized iron, which was used for the 1881 connection between Boston and Providence. The cost of a connection between the cities was daytime: $2 and nightime $1.
Subsequently, there were connections made between New York and Philadelphia (1885), Atlanta and Chicago (1890) and New York and Chicago (1892), which was personally opened by Bell (see photo above).
References: Cybertelecom.com; San Jose Mercury News; idPhonecard.com.
– Christopher Hartman
