When Was the First Mobile Phone Invented?

An inventive group from Bell Labs, home to many forms of technology that we still use today, figured out how to make a telephone call through a radio connection.  A short two years after the first mobile phone call was placed, people in over 100 cities and along highway routes had mobile telephony available to them.

The first mobile telephone, that is, a phone installed in a vehicle, was invented in the first half of the twentieth century. Motorola created the first mobile phone in the early 1940s, and AT&T connected the first mobile phone call on June 17, 1946. 

The service was not widely used, however, as it was expensive and the equipment was cumbersome. Further, a connection was not easy to get. Essentially, the first mobile network was a wireless “party line,” and only three customers could place calls at a time.

As their popularity grew, service still was not widely available, so the phones were used by people who needed them almost exclusively for business purposes. Utility companies, for example, used the phones to stay in contact with their employees in the field. Fleet vehicles also found the mobile phones useful, as did news reporters, for maintaining contact with their respective employers.

In 1973, Dr. Martin Cooper, a Motorola employee, called his rival at Bell Labs, Dr. Joel Engel. The phone call was out of the ordinary because Dr. Cooper called Dr. Engel from the streets of Manhattan. He simply wanted to let Dr. Engel know that the Motorola DynaTAC worked and the race for mobile telephony was getting heated.

The introduction of cellular telephony changed everything. D.H. Ring, from Bell Labs, determined that low-voltage transmitters scattered in a hexagonal pattern would increase call volume and speed call handoff. It took decades for the idea to come to fruition, in the 1970s, at the hands of Richard Frenkiel and Joel Engel of Bell Labs. With aid from some high-powered computers and various electronics, they made the cellular plan work. 

By 1978, AT&T was running trials in the real world. Illinois Bell was the first company to operate a commercial cellular system starting in 1983. Though cellular phone usage was not widespread in the 1980s, some people could not resist the idea of new technology and became early adopters. 

The convenience of the mobile phone came with a steep price tag. One early phone, the Motorola DynaTAC 8000X, weighed two pounds, allowed a whopping 30 minutes of talk time, and cost nearly $4,000. Customers were enchanted with the idea of portability, and the mobile phone craze was born. In the 1990s, the cellular industry exploded. Companies vied both for products to market and for customers to sell them to. Rate plans were expensive, as were per-minute usage rates, and phones were also pricey. As the market became increasingly saturated, service and equipment prices dropped. 

Today, mobile phones are used regularly by everyone from all walks of life and all income levels. That ringing in your pocket is sure to get faster, smarter, and better.