"Before smartphones, before the Internet and before the personal computer, a misfit group of technophiles, blind teenagers, hippies, and outlaws figured out how to hack the world's largest machine: the telephone system. Starting with Alexander Graham Bell's revolutionary "harmon…
The Bell System dominated telecommunications in the United States and Canada for most of the twentieth century, but its monopoly was not inevitable. In the decades around 1900, ordinary citizens--farmers, doctors, small-town entrepreneurs--established tens of thousands of indepe…
"The People's Network reconstructs the story of the telephone's contentious beginnings, exploring the interplay of political economy, business strategy, and social practice in the creation of modern North American telecommunications. Drawing from government documents in the Unit…
The People's Network reconstructs the story of U.S. and Canadian independent telephone companies which challenged the Bell System's market domination in the twentieth century, linking the fight to control telecommunications to dueling political philosophies: regional versus nati…
