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January 13, 1877
Alexander Graham Bell demonstrates his telephone for Secretary Joseph Henry and his daughters at the Smithsonian, and at a meeting of the Philosophical Society of Washington that evening. Bell's first telephone patent had been issued on March 7, 1876, and a month later, Bell transmitted the first intelligible human speech over the telephone. As a judge for the 1876 Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia, Henry submits a report praising Bell's invention. Bell's second patent, covering the "box" phone as transmitter and receiver that he demonstrates during his visit to Washington, would be issued January 30, 1877.
