Come here, Watson! I want you!
Posted on 04/03/2011 7:56:18 AM PDT by Brandonmark
CNN) -- Sunday is the anniversary of something that undoubtedly has changed your life.
Whether for good or for bad is a question only you can answer.
On this day in 1973 -- on April 3 of that year -- a man did something no one had ever done before.
You may bless him for it or curse him for it. At this juncture, it hardly matters. The impact of what he did is so enormous that judging it now is almost beside the point.
The man's name was Martin Cooper. He was 44 at the time.
He made a cell phone call.
The world's first. At least the first public one; the cell phone had been tested in the lab, but never tried in the real world.
"As I walked down the street while talking on the phone," Cooper once told an interviewer, "sophisticated New Yorkers gaped at the sight of someone actually moving around while making a phone call."
There had been car phones before -- mobile radios, really. They were powered by heavy equipment that had to be stashed in the trunk of the automobile.
But Cooper, who was the general manager of Motorola's communications systems division, had the idea that people didn't want to be tethered to a stationary telephone, even if the phone could ride along with them in their car. He thought that the phone should be so portable that it could go anywhere they went.
(Excerpt) Read more at cnn.com ...
“Can you hear me now?”
I just got a cell phone at age 67. Playing ketchup is tough. :-)
Long live the brick...
Beam me up Scotty.
1st cell phone at age 67. But bought a GPS (Garmin) about 20 years ago.
They had commercial GPS 20 years ago? I did not know that - thanks for sharing.
Come here, Watson! I want you!
Interesting...
We're about the same age. Which cell phone did you get, might I ask?
In 1976 Motorola put phones in the MAST/DUSTOFF UH-1H’s at Ft. Lewis. This 35K20 “helped.” That was amazing then.
Avionics tech? cool!
And now we’re totally dependent on them. Feel freaked out when we realize we left it at home.
I remember at work in The mid 90’s they were testing out a Motorola Text device to replace our beepers which was pretty cool, i could e-mail etc with it.
Then they quickly replaced that with the heavy brick Nextel phone.
I have HATED cell phones ever since.
I still cringe when i hear that nextel alert noise.
you must have been a surveyor with a 5 channel unit. they didn’t get all the satellites up until sometime after 1990.
Depends on how you do it.
My first cell phone was a Motorola Brick in 1992. Still have it packed away to show my someday grandchildren. (I’m 40.)
"What you mean 'we', white man?"
Mustard been tough to adjust to....
I just looked at my log...1996 was the first time with the handheld Garmin. I can’t remember when we first used the Trimble unit but I remember we had to sit for 4 hours for one lousey point. Today...it’s 90 seconds....
Loved being in Signals..there was always some pretty neat gear around to handle...former 31m20
My uncle had one of the early phones,that thing was big as a brick and it was quite expensive to use
FReeper HUMOR BUMP!
“Whether for good or for bad is a question only you can answer. “
Yesterday I sat at a wake for a dear friend who passed away after a long illness. While the priest was giving the service, cell phones went off on two separate occasions in what was a group of about 40 people. The sound of the clownish ring tones cut through your mind like a blowtorch.
I really could not believe the complete lack of consideration of these people. One carried on a 5 minute conversation that you could plainly hear before hanging up.
Would it have been too much to ask to simply leave it in the car or turn it off for what amounted to about an hour of consideration for this departed soul?
Same here....I think it was a Motorola flipphone.
felt like a brick...it now is resting in my junk drawer
Couldn’t resist could you... :)
- - - - -
On this day in 1973 — on April 3 of that year — a man did something no one had ever done before.
You may bless him for it or curse him for it. At this juncture, it hardly matters. The impact of what he did is so enormous that judging it now is almost beside the point.
The man’s name was Martin Cooper. He was 44 at the time.
He made a cell phone call.
- - - - - - -
Oh please; this wasn’t anywhere near the ‘cellular system we have today, in fact, the 870 - 890 MHz spectrum was still assigned to TV broadcast CHs 70 - 83!
On top of that, ‘Mobile phone’ service had been offered since the 50’s, although the spectrum was limited and therefore the availability was restricted in populated areas ...
Now that you’re up to snuff and have a cell phone, do you drive an Email route?
I think I may have the distinction of having the only remaining rotary dial cell phone.
The rest of the story:
He was driving at the time and drove straight into a tree.
A little more authoritative account:
http://www.privateline.com/PCS/history8.htm
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On October 17, 1973, Motorola filed a patent entitled ‘Radio telephone system.’ It outlined Motorola’s cellular radio system and was given US Patent Number 3,906,166 when it was granted on September 16,1975. Inventors on the patent were Martin Cooper, Richard Dronsuth, Albert J. Mikulski, Charles N. Lynk, Jr., James J. Mikulski, John F. Mitchell, Roy A. Richardson, and John H. Sangster. This came a year after the Bell System patent was approved.
...
On May 1, 1974 the F.C.C. decides to open an additional 115 megahertz of spectrum, 2300 channel’s worth, for future cellular telephone use. Cellular looms ahead, although no one know when FCC approval will permit its commercial rollout.
Bet he found out the two-way communicator is pain in the a$$ 90% of the time,to many useless calls.
A ham radio operator friend explained that they were for a cellular service being developed by Motorola.
Can't remember where they began, but I always noticed them the most while approaching Arlington Hts.
The Feds had them a decade earlier. 
I thought there was “proof” pointed out a few months ago that the cell phone was used in some early cinema (like 1920’s) movie... I don’t have the link handy, but it showed some actor moving with a cell phone to his ear... it was in a Charlie Chaplin or similar flick.
Drat, you win. I took our last one down about a year ago. I was a wall model made to look like a phone from the 1920s. We kept it up so our kids could amuse their friends when they were growing up. The kids came home from college and saw that it was down and all exclaimed “Why’d you take it down. We LOVED that phone!” LOL.
How do you play ketchup???? A pick, a bow, with keys?
I’m just wondering how you keep it from squishing as you try to play it.
They had commercial GPS 20 years ago?
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Early 90’s; the Gulf War (August 2, 1990 – February 28, 1991 per wiki) was also the really first full-scale use by the military ... consumer products followed ... had an early Magellan ‘94 that took awhile to initially acquire and only showed Lat/Long speed, COG (Course over Ground) and some waypoint functions (distance, bearing) ... but, of course, no map!
Resorted to a Delorme mapping program on a low-powered laptop receiving data from the GPS for the ‘moving map’ function.
You’re SUPPOSED to squish the packet. It’s like a tiny accordion. Um, without the sound.
It’s like an accordian so the ketchup merely gets redistributed.
Can you feel me now?
-Peanut (Jeff Dunham)
Thanks for the info!
Or, if the call is genuinely that important, switch the fool thing to "excite" and leave the sanctuary to take the call.
There are at least two members of our congregation who do so. Unless you are seated close to them you wouldn't even realize what was happening. Both of them are business owners and a missed call might mean missed business. Understandable the way the economy is.
It’s absolutely amazing that we both came up with the concept of an accordian....and seconds apart!!! Sac
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