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Show HEAD OF BELL TELEPHONE SYSTEM DEAD I - & & & Qi 5 B84 11 : Theodore Vail, Genius Who Promoted Popular Use of Phones Called By Death NEW YORK, April 16 Theodore N. Vail, chairman of the board of dl-1 dl-1 rectors of the American Telephone and Telegraph company, died this morning at 5:52 o'clock In John Hop-j kins hospital, Baltimore, according to. a message received here today. ' As president of the American Telephone Tele-phone & Telegraph eompahy. Thco-' dore Newton Vail was tho head of tnc ! largest telephone system in the woi 1 1 1 'lie was not only its nominal head, but j he was from the first the genius thai) promoted tho popular use or the t-le-J I phone, the first man to cstabli long-J 'distance communication by telephone, i 'and. when past seventy years of ajc, j he was still the initiative head rf a . system that numbered nine million ( telephone subscribers and represent-ul ' an investment of a billion and a h.uf ! dollars. I i Mr. Vail retired jis president of tho j American Telephone & Telegra )h company last Juno and becamo chaiv- ( ! ma nof the board of directors. j Ir. Vail was thirty-one years old ' when Alexander Graham Bell Invent--ied the telephone, and, notwithsland- j j ing his age. he was filling the rcspon- slble post of general superintendent of the railway mall service. Still earlier, however, he had been a telegraph operator, op-erator, and, interested in the possibilities possibili-ties of electrical communication, he had visions that Bell's "toy" would-sonve would-sonve day' be. agrcat factor -in Vmerir can 'lireVljoll and his associates had equal faith in Mr. Vail's organizing genius, for he had already made a, name for himself as an organizer in! the promotion of the railway Mail service, and he was readily induced to resign his government post to become be-come general manager, in 1S7S. of the first American Bell Telephone , com-pans". com-pans". Vnil Had Visions. Even the mo3t optimistic backers of; the telephone then thought that the invention would serve only for ioc:j1 communication, but Mr. Vail hud' visions of its long-distance use. It' j was he who inaugurated successive! steps of intercity communication. The firat lino from Boston to Providence was ridiculed as "Vail's side show," but some of the persons who indulged! in the ridicule at that time lived to sec Mr. Vail telephone, not only from! Boston to Providence, bUt from Nev York to San Francisco, in 1915, thirty-five thirty-five years later. Further, in October in that year, they found that it was than half way around the world, as : was done by wiroles3 telephone from the government station at Arlington, Vn., the words being recorded simultaneously simul-taneously at Honolulu, in tho mid-Pacific, mid-Pacific, and the Eiffel Tower in Paris. Mr. Vail was known as "the biggest telephone man in the world," not only in tribute to his genius for both mechanical me-chanical and financial organization, but from the fact that he was person-all person-all a man of remarkable physique. He was six feet 2 Inches tnll and weighed about 2S0 pounds. With this great physique he had an infinite capacity for hard work and a genial disposition. disposi-tion. Worked in Wyoming. He was born In Carroll county, Ohio, July 16, 1S4 5, of Quaker ancestry. ances-try. Ilia athor, Davis Vail, removed from Ohio to Morristown, X. J., whon the son was four years old, and becamo be-camo associated with a broclK-r, Stephen Vail, who had founded ll.e Speedwell Iron Works, near Mlrns-town, Mlrns-town, where they built much of the machinery for the first trans-Atlantic steamship. Alfred Vail, another brother, was one of those associated with Samuel Morse in tho Invention and promotion of the telegraph. Theodore Theo-dore Vail was educated at the old academy at Morristown, and for a time studied medicine, but becoming Interested Inter-ested in the telegraph, ho. learned to operate tho key and went west in lSfiS as an operator for the Union Pacific railroad at Pine Bluffs, Wyo. Pino Bluffs wa3 at that time tho principal supply point for wood for tho Union' Pacific, which had not yet been completed. com-pleted. Through tho friendship of General Grenvillc M. Dodge, chief engineer en-gineer ol the Union Pacific, Vail, in the next year, was appointed a clerk in the railway mall service, and here his ability to systematize and organize was soon felt, At that time the railway rail-way mail service was in an undeveloped undevel-oped stage, and Vail prepared special studies on tho question of distribution find dispatching of tho mall, whicn brought him quick recognition from i tho authorities at Washington. It was just after he had been promoted to the general suporlntcudoncy of the railway mail service that ho acted against the advice of hir? friends and accepted tho position of general man-' man-' ager of tho American Bell Telephone : company. (Continued on Page 3) . T11EOJDOKJ5 N. VAU- UU Theodore N. Vail (Continued From Page 1) .Made Universal Convenience, air. Vail set for himself the task of making the telephone a universal convenience, con-venience, and It was on his initiative that every possible improvement was seized upon for the perfection of the service. In 1SS5 he resigned from the original company and became the first president of the ncwly-formcd American Telephone & Telegriph company, which at firat made a specialty spe-cialty of only long-distance communication, communi-cation, but which, in 1000. acquired ..nnnoX. -. f flirt A til Vf 11 ISOll I IIIV IIU)Vll, Vi nil .-...w. ' " - -- Telephone company, and also negJti-I negJti-I ated combinations with the prlncipul I competing telcphono cbmwanles ' throughout the country, so that the whole service came largely under a j single central administration. In the meantime, In 1S00. Mr. Vail retired from the telephone business for many years. Me purchased a large j fa'rm at Jbyndonville, Vt., and interest-I interest-I ed himself In agriculture. In 1S93 he niade a trip to South America, and, I with his customary foresight, saw the i possibilities of the Argentine republic. I He obtained from the .government a concession near Cordoba, built an elec-' elec-' trie power station there, purchased a horse car lino, in Buenos Aires, oon-j oon-j verted U into a trolley line, formed a : company and equipped it with the best 'ears from the United States, bojght j out all competing lines and gave ihe ! city a complete modern service. The company was composed largely of British capitalists, and for some '.ime j Mr. Vail had his headquarters in Lon-! Lon-! don. When he retired from these activities ac-tivities in 190-1. he returned to Vermont,, Ver-mont,, but three years later he was" again called to enter the telephone field as president of the American Telephone S; Telegraph company, of which he had been the first president. Merge Willi Western Union. i One of the most ambitious projects which he then planned was a merger of the Wes . n Union Telegraph coi-i-pany with ihr telephone company, and in 19 10, when the telephone Interests succeeded in securing the controlling power in ihe Western Union, Mr. Vv.A became president of both these great j corporations. lie resigned as president of the Western Union, however, whei.j on April 15, 1914, the telephone com-j pany disposed of its interests in the Western Union because of threatened action by the government against r'loi combination -of these competing, uti.i-j ties. While others may have marveled at the perfection of the great telephone system, that now connects more than 70,000 places in the United States, Mr. Vail always believed in the greater possibilities ahead. He believed it would only be a- short time before New York would be able to carry on wireless telephone conversation with European points almost as easily as it may communicate with San Francisco by land lines today. Mr. Vail played as hard as he worked, lie was fond of good music, books .and pictures, and the outdoor! life. lie had one of tho finest libraries in the state of Vermont. Tho house on his 3,500-acre farm at Lyr.donville, although beautiful, was a home rather than a palace. In it he had built a ?40,000 pipe organ, and onco ocry year he made the-practice of bringing up from Now York some of the finest musicians to give a. concert, to which ho invited the country people for miles around. Ho also established a i'arm school, hoping to encourage Vermont boys to take up scientific agriculture and remain In tho country. Ho believed be-lieved that New England -rras facing a great renaissance. |