Micro-History 3: The Mobile Phone

The artifact I chose to represent mobile phones is also a representation of how technologies in
general sure have come a long way. The Motorola DynaTac 8000X was the first handheld
cell/mobile phone released to the public, occurring in the year 1984 (Wolpin, 2014). Looking
back on it, seemed to be a quite interesting development at the time for many reasons. First of
all, compared to today’s mobile phones, it was humongous, weighing 28 ounces, and having
dimensions of 13 by 1.75 by 3.5 inches (Wolpin, 2014). In fact, everyone knew it was a big
revelation, so Motorola creators and the public dubbed it “The Brick” (Wolpin, 2014).
Second of all, this device costed $3,995, a very hefty price to pay, being the equivalent of
$9,000 in the year 2014 (Wolpin, 2014). While cell phones today are not always cheap, they
certainly are not that expensive, either. Third of all, something that would drive people mad
today is the fact that The Brick’s battery life was only about 30 minutes (Wolpin, 2014).
Even today’s iPhones sometimes will not cut it, so only having 30 minutes to speak seems
like a modern-day travesty. All jokes aside, it truly shows we have come a long way, as well
as the fact that everything has to start somewhere. When this device was consumed by more
and more people, it did not yet begin the mobile phone revolution, because the reality was
that only the rich had them due to their steep price. However, like anything in technology,
especially in communication technology, it started at such a high price because the
technology was not improved upon and not ready for the masses to consume it yet, leaving
only the rich to be able to afford it, a common matter with prior communication technologies.
The mobile phone would go on to change the shape of telecommunications, setting a
precedent for what we consume today and moving in a completely different direction than
original telephones such as the landline.

Figure 1

Dynatac Cellular Telephone

Note. Adapted from Dynatac Cellular Telephone [Mobile Phone Artifact]. National Museum

of American History, Smithsonian Institute. (n.d.).
https://americanhistory.si.edu/collections/search/object/nmah_1191361.

Prior to the Telephone…

The beginnings of the mobile phone in the telephone’s historical context ranges somewhere
in the middle of the telephone’s beginnings and where telecommunications stand currently.
Early telecommunications methods started with the ever-so-famous Alexander Graham Bell,
the pioneer of the telephone. While that is the earliest rendition of what a telephone actually
is, it would not be right not to mention early efforts at transmitting messages across distances.
Some of these technologies include the telegraph and the acoustic telephone, the cup or can
and string “telephone” turned children’s toy (“The History of the Telephone,” n.d.). The
acoustic telephone was created in 1672 by Robert Hooke, an English scientist (“The History
of the Telephone,” n.d.). After that, the telegraph paved the way for the telephone’s success
because it set up the model of infrastructure for the telephone without even realizing it. In
1858, “the first transatlantic telephone [telegraph] cable” was laid down, connecting England
and the United States, which allowed for the world to be connected from that point forward
(“The History of the Telephone,” n.d., 1858 section). Very similar principles of infrastructure
exist today, connecting countries and the world together with many fiber optic lines under the
world’s oceans, which is a thing that is unknown by many.