Okay, so picture this: it’s January 25, 1915. A guy named Alexander Graham Bell—you know, the dude who invented the telephone—is in New York. Meanwhile, his old assistant, Thomas Watson, is all the way over in San Francisco. That’s, what, 3,000 miles apart? Basically, it’s like trying to yell at your kids who are upstairs, except your house is the entire United States.
Bell gets on the phone—his own invention, mind you—and does the most iconic throwback of all time. He says, “Mr. Watson, come here, I want you.” Which, honestly, sounds a little needy, but hey, it was the first-ever transcontinental phone call, so we’ll let it slide. And Watson, on the other end, totally deadpans, “It would take me a week now.” I mean, perfect timing. The guy should’ve gone into comedy.
Now, let’s back up a second. To even make this call happen, they had to string telephone lines all the way across the freaking country. We’re talking through mountains, deserts, forests—basically, every place you do not want to get stuck with no cell service. And when they finally connected the last pole in Utah, you know someone was like, “Whew, glad we didn’t screw that up. Imagine Bell trying to call and it’s all static? Awkward.”
And here’s the kicker: they timed this call with the Panama-Pacific International Exposition in San Francisco. Which is basically a fancy way of saying, “Look, we’re smart. We’ve got a telephone line AND a world’s fair!” Meanwhile, President Woodrow Wilson joined in on the call. Yeah, the President. Can you imagine? It’s like if Biden hopped on your Zoom meeting to say, “Hey, nice Wi-Fi setup you’ve got there.”
But this was more than just a stunt. This was the moment America shrunk faster than your jeans after Thanksgiving. Businesses could talk deals without having to hop on a train for two weeks. Families could check in without writing letters that took months to arrive. And long-distance drama? Oh, it was born that day. You just know someone’s mom was yelling, “I called you from New York, and you can’t even pick up? Do you know how much this costs?!”
So here’s to January 25, 1915: the day Bell proved you could yell at someone from across the country and get a reply in real time. Thanks to him, we got the building blocks of modern life—and the ability to ghost people from thousands of miles away. Progress, baby.
