That phone you carry with you like it was your Iron Man’s Arc Reactor; the one that reassuringly beeps under your pillow as you go to sleep and buzzes you up in the morning with a hundred notifications; How much do you really know about that phone? From being an ‘improvement in telegraphy’ to the sophisticated business tool it is today, the evolution of the telephone is fascinating, and sometimes even funny.Here are some interesting facts about it we’re betting you didn’t know before.1) “Ahoy” was the original telephone greeting.Alexander Graham Bell suggested ‘ahoy’ (as used in ships), but was later superseded by Thomas Edison, who suggested ‘hello’ instead.2) The very first phone call was: “Watson come here, I want you!”It was made on March 10, 1876 in Boston, Massachusetts, between Alexander Graham Bell and his assistant Thomas A. Watson3) The origin of the phrase ‘to put someone on hold’ was Alexander Graham Bell handing over his telephone instrument to his partner Mr Watson and saying, “here, hold this”.4) The memorable Nokia tone for receiving SMS text messages is Morse code for ‘SMS’ Likewise, the ‘Ascending’ tone is Morse code for ‘Connecting People,’ (Nokia’s slogan) and ‘Standard’ is Morse code for ‘M’ (Message).5) Bell’s patent for the telephone was modestly titled‘Improvement in Telegraphy’.6) According to a recent survey, 47 per cent of all water-damaged mobile phones in the UK have beendropped in the toilet bowl.7) A ton of mobile phones contains more gold than a ton of ore from a gold mine.8) According to the 1945 edition of Who’s Who,Hitler’s home phone number was Berlin 11 6191.9) The mobile phone number 666 6666 fetched £1.5 million in a charity auction in Qatar in 2007.10) In the early days, telephone wires were ranked according to how tasty they were to mice and rats.11) Mark Twain was one of the first to have a phone in his home.12) The 555 prefix is reserved for fictional US telephone numbers.13) As a tribute to Alexander Graham Bell when he died in 1922, all the telephones stopped ringing for one full minute (14 million telephones in US and canada were affected).14) Frigensophobia is the fear that using your mobile is damaging your brain.15) Nokia was founded back in 1865 andmanufacturing paper was its primary business. Many years later, it switched to making rubber products, telegraph wires, and other electrical cables

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by Pranjal Batra

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