Phoenix Electric Telephone Company. 1894 - 1899

New York: Cameron & Bulkley, 1899. Very good condition. Scarce large broadside from an early competitor to the American Telegraph and Telephone Company in New York City (AT& T), aimed at the independent telephone exchange manager and offering a free trial of the electric telephone patented by the company June 2nd, 1896.

Alexander Graham Bell made the first long distance phone call on August 10, 1876 from his home in Brantford, Ontario to his assistant located ten miles away. By 1878, Bell had set up the first telephone exchange in New Haven, Connecticut was the home of the first telephone exchange, which was established in 1878; connections were made between Boston, Massachusetts and New York City by 1884. In 1885 American Telegraph and Telephone Company (AT&T) was formed; it dominated telephone communications for the next 100 years. Bell employees were instructed to bad mouth the U.S. telephone system to drive down stock prices of its competitors facilitating for Bell's acquisition

George W. Sutton, an independent inventor, is named here both for the development of the Sutton microphone (filed April 14, 1896) and the Self Restoring drop patent (May 17, 1898). Sutton one of the best known independent telephone manufacturers in the east, installed 100 lines in Columbia South Carolina and 700 each in Poughkeepsie and Newburgh, NY.

Central panel with offset printed illustrations of standing female nude with light emanating from her hands, titled "Electricity Enlightening the World". At the top panel: "To the Independent Exchange manager"; around the central engraving topics include: about telephones in general, about transmitters, about switchboards, self restoring drop patent, and cut of calling key. Lower central is a picture of the Phoenix Company headquarters in New York at 93 Washington Street.

22 x 28". Some cracking on folds, otherwise very good condition. Not recorded in OCLC.