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a v a. 111 I
lOOUVU
U.S. Postal Service in March.
— A special Bicentennial commemorative directory cover, first used in Washington, D.C., in May 1975, and ultimately to appear on 184 million directories in 42 of the 48 states in which the Bell System operates.
Although Alexander Graham Bell did not develop the telephone beyond the elementary stage, he immediately envisioned the manner in which his primitive electronic device would revolutionize the way people communicate.
Two years after the telephone first "spoke,” Bell perceived in uncanny detail the concept of universal communications: He wrote this in a prospectus dated March 25, 1878, to a group of London capitalists :
“It is conceivable that cables of telephone wires could be laid underground or suspended overhead, communicating by branch wires with private dwellings, counting houses, ships, manufactories, etc., etc., uniting them through the main cable with a central office where the wires would be connected as desired ... I believe in the future wires will unite the head offices of the Telephone Company in different cities, and a man in one part of the country may communicate by word of mouth with another in a distant place.”
The vision of universal communications may have been clear to the 31-year-old elocution teacher-inventor from Scotland, but it failed to impress the London capitalists as well as his own financial backers, who advised him to forget the telephone and get on with the business at hand — the development of a “harmonic telegraph" capable of tranS*mitting several simultaneous messages
V/UiiVi U1 VI
during a financial panic. One of their first moves was to persuade Vail to return as president.
Now Vail was fully in charge, and he voiced some firm convictions about how his company and the nation’s telephone system should be structured.
Vail said the country would be served best if the telephone companies operated as “natural monopolies” with exclusive franchises in a given territory. He also proposed, to the amazement of many, that the telephone companies oper-ate under public regulation.
His policy was proclaimed in company advertising: “One Policy, One System, Universal S«rvice.”
Vail also recognized that it would be necessary to coordinate the company’s various service functions — research, design, manufacture, installation and maintenance — if the nation’s telephone users were to enjoy a unified service. A start in this direction already had been made in 1881, when Western Electric was acquired as a dependable source of manufacture and supply. In 1907, Vail:
—	Established a Long Distance Department, later to become the AT&T Long Lines Department.
—Reorganized and consolidated the operations of the regional tel-ephone companies, acquiring some and selling others.
—	Allowed non-Bell telephone companies to provide service over the Bell System’s long distance lines.
—	Brought the company’s scattered research activities to one location in New York City to concentrate on
May itfuu wun m telephones now serves 40,972; Gulfport in 1900 with 43 telephones now serves 51,179; and in March of 1907 in Picayune with 27 telephones, now serving 11,439.
Bell System service came to Moss Point in July 1904 with 137 telephones and Pascagoula in August 1904 with 251 telephones. Moss Point today has 15,199 telephones and Pascagoula has 32,246.
In the century since the invention of the telephone, few other single inventions have had such a dramatic impact on the life-style of Americans.
“Combining the research of Bell Laboratories, the manufacturing know-how of Western Electirc, the interstate long distance service of Long Lines, and our own local and long distance service has produced the most efficient, most economic telephone system anywhere in the world,” according to F.M. Kyle Jr., South Central Bell's district manager.
This system has provided:
—	The largest electronic switching machine, called the No. 4 ESS, which handles as many as 550,000 long distance calls hourly. The first one went into service January 16 and makes service even faster, more reliable.
—	The Bell System's domestic satellite system, Comstar, which goes into operation this year, too. It will lend additional capacity and
HAPPY
BIRTHDAY
AMERICA
FROM
ASSOCIATED STORE
NOEL FUENTE, OWNER BAY ST. LOUIS 832 HWY 90 467-4365
Welcome center. . .
This artist’s drawing depicts the colonial style building planned for the 00-acre hospitality station site adjacent to Interstate 10 and Mississippi 607 in Hancock County. The center will be one of seven being con-
structed throughout the state by the highway department. Initial groundwork has begun at the local site and is expected to be complete by July 1977. Bids on the building will be taken in the spring. Story on G-5.
*
We at W. A. McDonald & Son's
*
and
A. McDonald Furniture Showroom^JJ
have been serving the people of Bay St. Louis and Waveland and sur-t^A rounding areas for over 80 years. We have met and made many friends in our tenure of business. For your past patronage we thank you. In the future, we are ready to serve you in your Building Materials, Hardware^ ir Furniture and Real Estate needs.
Thank you	,
Have a Safe 4th of July.
W. A. McDonald's	W.	A. McDonald ^ r
showroom	And Sons
Furniture Showroom l Corner of Main & 2nd St. Bay St. Louis - 467-6845
And Sons Toulme & Easter Brook St. Bay St. Louis - 467-5442
LET US DO THE WORK...................
PARTIES • PICNICS • BANQUETS • SANDWICHES • SALADS* NERS • PIZZA • SOFT DRINKS & BEER BY THE LASF OR KEG. HWY. 90 • BAY ST. LOUIS, MS. PHONE 467-5900