Inventor of the automatic telephone exchange

Задание I. Следующие слова Вам нужно выучить наизусть, это поможет Вам понять текст.

1. Out of order – неисправный, не в порядке;

2. give up – сдаваться;

3. fear for – бояться за;

4. jump to the conclusion – прийти к выводу;

5. relative – родственник;

6. denial – опровержение;

7. (un)reliable – (не)надежный;

8. envisage – предусматривать, намечать;

9. consist of – состоять из;

10. ratchet and pawl mechanism – храповой механизм, храповик и собачка;

11. improvement – улучшение;

12. flange – выступ;

13. fail – терпеть неудачу, не оправдать ожидания;

14. retire – уходить в отставку, на пенсию;

15. representative – представитель;

16. principal – директор школы;

17. persuade – убеждать;

18. infringement – нарушение;

19. outspoken – искренний, прямой;

20. oftimes (oftentimes) – часто, много раз.

Задание II. В прочитанном тексте найдите информацию и расскажите по-английски.

1. Опишите принцип телефонного подключения, предложенный Строугером в 1887 году.

2. Расскажите как можно подробнее о биографии Строугера (место рождения, семья, работа).

3. Расскажите об изобретении телефона с наборным диском (номеронабирателем). Как он работал?

Задание III. Будьте готовы перевести любое предложение в тексте, если преподаватель попросит Вас об этом.

TEXT

The "girl-less, cuss-less, out-of-order-less, wail-less telephone", was how Strowger's invention of the automatic telephone exchange was described. "I am often told that the telephone girls will he angry with me for robbing them of their occupation", Strowger said at a public demonstration of the first such exchange. "In reply 1 would say that all things will adjust themselves to the new order The telephone replaced the messenger boy as this machine now displaces the telephone girl".

But not every telephone girl gave up without a fight, as one salesman discovered in North Carolina - where a town attorney feared for his girl-friend, the local telephone operator. Strowger's man lost the order because, the salesman was told, the automatic telephone "had no sex appeal".

The popular story behind the invention of the automatic telephone exchange has been told often. Strowger. at that time an undertaker in Kansas City, read in the local newspaper of the death of a friend and learned with surprise that the funeral arrangements were to be carried out by a rival. Always a man of quick temper he jumped to the conclusion that the lady telephone operator had connected the grieving relatives to his rival when they had really wanted to be connected to himself. This he judged to be either because his telephone was engaged at the time or for some more mischievous reason. His complaints brought denials and no satisfaction; and he turned to wondering how telephone callers might automatically connect themselves to their desired number without needing an unreliable operator.

Perhaps having seen a manual exchange, he soon conceived, in 1887, the basic idea of what he wanted and made a mock up by sticking pins into a circular cardboard collar box. (If you do not know what a collar box was, ask your grandfather!) Soon he had ten rows and ten columns of pins, representing contacts to 100 telephones. He envisaged a pawl and ratchet mechanism driven by pulsed electromagnets which would lift a wiper (which was connected to the caller's telephone) to the required row and then moved it round to the required column. There the wiper would make contact with the distant telephone. A US patent for a 1000-line "automatic telephone exchange" was applied for on 12 March, 1889 and granted almost exactly two years later, number 447,918.

Strowger had little if any knowledge of electricity or mechanics and so his nephew, Walter, was given the task of making a working model. Even with the help of a competent jeweller, a 1000-line switch proved beyond him. Instead, the first Strowger automatic switch consisted of just 100 contacts arranged in a single row inside a cylinder. It was exhibited at the Bell telephone exchange in Kansas City.

Fortune now smiled on Almon B. Strowger. Having failed to interest financial backers, Walter Strowger was approached by an enterprising salesman called Joseph Harris, on the look out for ideas which he could promote at the forthcoming World's Columbian Exposition. This was to be held in Chicago in 1892.

Two years before the Exposition, Harris persuaded Strowger and his nephew to go to Chicago. There the Strowgers, Harris and a friend. M.A. Meyer, agreed to develop the system. Further financial backing was found, and on 30 October, 1891, the Strowger Automatic Telephone Exchange was incorporated in the state of Illinois. With a salary of $100 a month, Strowger's days as an undertaker were over.

The automatic switch was exhibited at the Chicago offices of a railway company where Meyer worked. A firm of model makers was asked to make samples and work began on further development of the switch. Perhaps more importantly a telegram was sent to Baltimore to one Alexander Ellsworth Keith, electrician, asking him to come to Chicago at their expense. Keith came, saw, understood, and accepted an appointment as chief engineer. He proved to be a good choice.

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