ever, and its manufacture and distribution placed its inventor, then in humble, almost indigent, circumstances, in possession of a vast fortune and of world-wide fame.
Elisha Gray, of Boston, filed a "caveat" stating that he was at work upon a telephone only two hours after Bell's application was filed. Daniel Drawbaugh, of Pennsylvania, also claimed to have made and used a practical telephone in 1867-68, and out of these claims much litigation arose involving the expenditure of vast sums of money on the part of the Bell controversialists in the protection of his rights. Every court decided in Bell's favor. All telephonic operations since Bell's invention have been based upon the instrument which he patented.
He subsequently invented the photophone, which is very similar to the telephone in principle, in which a vibratory beam of light takes the place of a wire as a medium to convey speech. Although considerable attention has been attracted to this invention its practical use has not yet been established. He first brought it to the attention of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, in Boston, August, 1880. He has also made many experiments, of a similar nature, with water for a conducting medium; and, in association with C. Sumner Tainter and Dr. Chichester Bell, he invented and has greatly improved the graphophone.
In recent years Mr. Bell, aided by an independent fortune, has devoted himself to costly and laborious experiments for the relief of deaf and dumb persons. His wife was one of his deaf and dumb pupils, and it is said that it is largely due to his intense desire to soften her misfortune that he has turned aside from pure mechanical invention to those more personal and directly humane. He has contributed to the National Academy of Science an important monograph on the threatened "Formation of a Deaf Variety of the Human Race."
Another invention of Dr. Bell's which has called for much commendation is the telephone probe for the painless detection of bullets in the human body. A practical, though unsuccessful, application of it was made in the case of the late President Garfield. Heidelberg university, at the celebration of its three hundred and first anniversary, gave him the honorary degree of M.D. in recognition of this contribution to surgical science. Experiments with tetrahedral kites and tests of theories of flying machines have received much of his attention in late years.
