Alexander Graham Bell & Thomas Alva Edison
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Issue: February 1997
Designer: M. Pereg
Size: 30.8 mm x 30.8 mm
Souvenir Sheet (90mm x 55mm) of 2 stamps
Printers: Government Printers
Printing Method: offset
lexander Graham Bell was born in Scotland on March 3rd, 1847. He emigrated with his family to Canada in 1870, and two years later they moved to Boston. Bell's father and grandfather were both phonetics experts, instructing those with speech impediments and conducting research on the human voice.
Young Bell also taught, and combined the two fields he most enjoyed: music and speech. In 1873 he was awarded a professorship at Boston University, where he researched the science of speech.
There was also a personal side to his interest in speech: his mother had lost her hearing in childhood -- and so had his wife.
Bell, at the age of 29, revolutionized communications by inventing the telephone -- the most profitable patent ever registered. By converting vibrations into electric currents, the telephone transmits sound waves from one location to another. The first telephone conversation was held between Bell and Tom Watson, his assistant, who was sitting in another room when he heard Bell's voice call, "Come here, Watson, I wish to speak with you."
Alexander Graham Bell said of himself, "An inventor cannot help but invent, just as he cannot help thinking and breathing." Thirty different patents are registered in his name, including voice transfer using light beams, a pyramid-shaped kite capable of carrying a man, and a hovercraft which, in 1919, attained a world record for speed for that kind of vehicle. Most of all,
And yet, Alexander Graham Bell preferred to define himself first and foremost as a teacher of the deaf. He died on August 2nd, 1922, at the age of 75.
Thomas Alva Edison
homas Alva Edison was born on February 11th, 1847 in the town of Milan, Ohio, USA. Edison was an active, curious child, and his formal education ended at the age of 7, after only three months at school. His mother, a former teacher, taught him to read and he developed an interest in books on a variety of subjects.
He began his business and science career at the age of 12, and when he was 23, he developed his first invention: an automatic telegraph system.
In 1877, Edison announced his invention of the phonograph, by which sound could be recorded and reproduced, ushering in the era of sound recording.
At the age of 31, he began working on a safe, inexpensive electric light bulb to replace the gas and kerosene lamps which were in use at the time. In 1879, after a year of trials and experiments, he lit the dark skies of Menlo Park, New Jersey (the location of his laboratory) for several hours. His immortalizing invention was an incandescent light bulb with a carbonized cotton thread.
He also contributed to the development of the first large electric power station, which began operating in 1882 and began the generalized use of electricity.
Over 1,000 patents are registered in Edison's name, including the alkaline battery; a discovery known as the Edison Effect which led to the invention of the electronic tube; and the silent movie projector, predecessor of current cinema.
Thomas Alva Edison died on October 18th, 1931, at the age of 84.
