This week, I have been telling my classes about some of the technological advances of the late 1800s. That was a time when inventors experimented in labs throughout the world to develop the next great invention. One of those, the telephone, greatly impacted communication and continues to be an integral part of our lives.
(Interesting Trivia: The telephone was up and running before George Custer was killed at Little Big Horn; before Wyatt Earp became a lawman in Dodge City; before Jesse and Frank James attempted a failed bank robbery in Northfield, Minnesota; and before Rutherford B. Hayes was elected president.)
Alexander Graham Bell is known by most as the inventor of the telephone. Of course, there has been debate about who invented it first, but he is the one who took the invention and made it a part of everyday life. This post is not about who invented it. Instead, it is about what we discussed in class.
I took the students through the evolution of the phone. We talked about party lines and how neighbors could listen to your conversations if they were so inclined.
We talked about how operators used to connect calls by sticking wires in the proper sockets.
We talked about rotary dials, when people had to stick their hands in the proper holes and turn the dial. Then, they listened to it click as it moved back into place.
We talked about phones with long cords that became tangled and stretched.
In short, we talked about things that they had never seen.
The telephone was a great invention and has alter the direction of humanity. However, I noticed something as I talked about the history of the telephone. Several of the students were not listening because they were playing around with their iPhones and Droids. While I was going over the virtues of the telephone, they were taking part in the bad side of the telephone.
For teachers, or anyone else who needs to have the attention of a group of people, telephones are the work of Satan. They are distractions for the ones using them, and they are distractions for the rest of us. These things have become attachments that people cannot do without.
On the first day of class, I tell everyone to stay off their phones. No texting. No tweeting. Put them away and do not look at them. I may as well be whistling in the wind. People cannot put down their phones. I am convinced that Steve Jobs was the most successful drug dealer in the history of the world. We cannot do without his product.
Just once, I would like to go back to the old days and have a class where no phone was in the room. Students would still daydream or stare out of the window. At least there would not be the blatant act of picking up a phone and looking at it and providing physical proof that they just do not care.
Ironically, I had to stop talking about the history of the telephone to tell people to get off their phones. As I walked out of class, I began to wonder what hath Bell wrought.
SBI: A Thinning Crowd 
The cell phone is the greatest invention since the original phone … and the most culturally destructive invention … maybe ever. I dislike them for lots of reasons, but most of all because young people use them instead of learning to talk to each other. I’ve seen them sit together in a room and rather than having conversation, they text each other. It’s ruined grammar AND social intercourse. And spelling.
But if it had been invented sooner, would Custer have charged into the Little Big Horn? What if someone had called and said “Hey, Dude, we’ve heard the entire Sioux nation is waiting for you down there.” Just a thought.
That is a good thought. If Custer had a cell phone they could have sent a text. “OMG!!! Your finna die!!!”
Someone could’ve live Tweeted the entire thing too…
#LastStand heh
Excellent suggestion #LastStand
I hate that phone indiscipline, especially on an aircraft two seconds after it lands and just after being told not to switch them on until in the terminal building. AGB has a lot to answer for…
Everybody reaches for their phones at the same time. It’s like synchronized phone grabbing.
it’s a disease .. an epidemic … a distraction … an addiction ,,,
horribly, in my new job it seems all co-workers use these devices and i may be obligated to do so as well.
GUARDS!! seize this man! he’s carrying no device!
sort of reminds me of that movie, Invasion of the Body Snatchers … may be updated to Invasion of the Cyber Devices …
It’s all of the things you described. Unfortunately, I may have it, too.
Rick … you see that phone at the top? the party line phone? I’ve used those – on the farm at Brooks, Alberta. (sometimes I feel older than dirt) You always feared everybody and their dog was listening in (right Mr. Obama?) – and learned to put things between the lines.
I have the phone that my parents used while courting. It looks just like that.