Thursday, April 03, 2008

Today in History... 35 years ago the world's first mobile call

Matin Cooper was the corporate director of Research and Development for Motorola. Cooper is the inventor named on US patent 3906166 "Radio telephone system" filed on October 17, 1973. He is considered the inventor of the first portable handset and the first person to make a call on a portable cell phone on April 3, 1973, to the bewilderment of passers-by in a New York City street. That first call, placed to his rival Joel Engel, Bell Labs' head of research, caused a fundamental technology and communications market shift toward the person and away from the place. It was the incarnation of his vision for personal wireless communications, distinct from cellular car phones. Cooper later revealed that watching Captain Kirk talking in his communicator on the television show Star Trek inspired him to research the mobile phone.

1 comment:

jlester01 said...

That's a great story behind something we really take for granted. The cell phone is one of those things that no one ever looked back from. It has replaced the land line phone, the alarm clock, the pager, and soon, the laptop...