*2022-03-13 to 2023 - Mercer County - Princeton - Ma Bell: The Mother of Invention in New Jersey (Wednesdays through Sundays)
James West Noise Test in the Anechoic Chamber at Murray Hill, New Jersey, 1960s. Courtesy of AT&T Archives and History Center.
Ma Bell: The Mother of Invention in New Jersey
Opening in March 13, 2022
What do cell phones, digital cameras, solar panels, radar, and the discovery of the Big Bang all have in common? They are all possible because of the technology created in New Jersey — at branches of Bell Telephone Laboratories throughout the state to be exact.
Beginning in the 1930s Bell Telephone Laboratories, named for founder Alexander Graham Bell, inventor of the telephone, had facilities operating in the Garden State. Throughout the 20th century, this company pioneered innovations that transformed every part of modern-day life. Seismic breakthroughs came by way of the highly technical (radar, solar panels, satellites) to the personal (telephone communications). The transistor, which bridges these two worlds, ushered in the digital age and was first built at Bell Telephone Laboratories in Murray Hill, NJ in 1947.
Bell Telephone Laboratories, American Telephone & Telegraph (AT&T) and Western Electric employed tens of thousands of New Jersey residents through its 100-year tenure in the state. From highflying linemen risking their safety atop telephone poles, to women trained to connect calls across the country, to the world’s leading engineers working to answer logistical questions of communication, New Jerseyans from all walks of life supported the ground-breaking technology of the company.
Major innovators to emerge from NJ locations include Claude Shannon, hailed as “the father of information technology,” and important contributor to the field of artificial intelligence; Erma Schneider Hoover, owner of one of the first software patents in history; Arno Penzias and Robert Wilson, whose work led to the discovery of the Big Bang; and countless others whose day to day work was invisible to the public yet echoed to the corners of the world. The resulting companies, like AT&T and Nokia continue to innovate to this day and still have facilities in New Jersey.
Morven Museum & Garden is proud to partner with the AT&T Archives and History Center to explore the ways in which these NJ-born creations came to be and how they became the building blocks of today’s technology. This exhibition will include original historical artifacts pertinent to the many discoveries, products and fields of work that comprised the Bell System in NJ, from the 1920s to around 1984, when the Bell System monopoly divestiture created the seven “Baby Bells” known as the Regional Bell Operating Companies.
Wednesdays through Sundays, from 10:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m.
Please note: docent led tours are available indoors on a limited basis at this time.
We will close from 1:00 to 1:30 for a cleaning
55 Stockton Street
Princeton, New Jersey 08540
