Western Electric - Technological Innovations

Technological Innovations

In 1928, Western Electric issued the first Bell System telephone with a single handset, having both the transmitter and receiver placed thereon (previous telephones had been of the "candlestick" type). This telephone was known as the B1 or "102" phone, and had a round base; it was succeeded in 1930 by the D1 or "202" phone, which featured upgraded electronics (sidetone suppression) and a more stable oval base.

The next significant upgrade came in 1937 with the introduction of the "302" phone. Designed by the noted industrial designer Henry Dreyfuss, this telephone included the ringer within its rectangular housing; previous models (including the candlestick) had required a separate bell box called a "ringer box". The 302 was followed by the "500" phone, which would become the most extensively produced telephone model in the industry's history. Initially released in 1949, it was continually updated over time, reflecting new materials and manufacturing processes, such as quieter and smoother dial gearing and a printed circuit board in the "network" (the phone's circuit module). The Model 500 was discontinued in 1986, in favor of a Touch-Tone version that also electronically emulated a rotary dial.

Other innovations included the Princess telephones of the 1950s and Trimline telephones of the 1960s, and the development of Touch-Tone dialing as a replacement for rotary dialing.

In 1929, Western Electric was also a big player in early cinema sound systems. It created the Western Electric Universal Base, a device by which early silent cinema projectors could be adapted to screen sound films. It also designed a wide-audio-range horn loudspeaker for cinemas. This was estimated to be nearly 50% efficient, thus allowing a cinema to be filled with sound from a 3-watt amplifier. This was an important breakthrough in 1929 because high-powered audio valves were not generally available back then.

In addition to being a supplier for AT&T, Western Electric also played a major role in the development and production of professional sound recording and reproducing equipment, including:

• the Vitaphone system which brought sound to the movies;
• the electrical recording technology adopted by record companies in the late 1920s (despite the popular electrical system used by Autograph Records and its manager, Orlando R. Marsh);
• the Orthophonic phonograph, an acoustical phonograph with a flat frequency response tailored for reproduction of electrically recorded disks;
• the Westrex optical sound that succeeded it;
• the Westrex cutter and system for recording stereophonic sound in a single-groove gramophone record that was compatible with monophonic equipment.

Western Electric's switching equipment included the development of the Electronic Switching System or ESS. The No. 1 ESS was first installed in 1963. The 4ESS was the first digital toll switching system, implemented in 1976. Finally, in 1981, the first widespread digital switching system, the 5ESS was implemented throughout the United States.