Two Sore Backs

Val and Pat's Travel Adventures

Alexander Graham Bell

We have wrapped up a lovely weekend of golf and plan to stay in Inverness for a few more days. And sure enough the rains come again. No worries – we have an Airbnb booked and some downtime would be terrific.

(Recent weather stats for the Maritimes have called this the wettest summer ever and that doesn’t surprise us. When/ if we return we’ll expect a sunnier summer with less rain and fewer mosquitoes and little black flies.)

Today we head to Charlene’s – for a bowl of the best seafood chowder. (Fun fact, Charlene’s was featured on ‘You’ve Got To Eat Here’.) Then on to Baddeck – just hoping to stay indoors out of the rain.

Alexander Graham Bell (AGB) and his wife Mabel Bell are the power couple of their time. Their lives and accomplishments are well documented at the Alexander Graham Bell National Historic Site. The Bell family summered at Beinn Bhreagh (near Baddeck) on Cape Breton and it was their happy place as well as the place some later inventions were tweaked.

Known for the invention of the phone, initially AGB taught hearing impaired people. Mabel was a pupil. AGB’s mother was also deaf.

Inventing aides for the hearing impaired led to the invention of the telephone. He gave his shares in Bell / AT&T to Mabel as a wedding present.

AGB was inquisitive – an inventor. When an invention got to market he pivoted to the next idea. The financial success of an invention meant that there was money to fund the next 💡.

So after the telephone there were inventions in:

Optical communications – a photophone – transmitting sound on a beam of light

Aeronautics – Silver Dart – 1909 made it’s first successful flight in Canada at Baddeck

Air worthy replica of the Silver Dart – flown in 2009 on the 100th anniversary of the original flight

Hydrofoils – HD-4 prototype tested on Bras d’Or Lake at Beinn Bhreagh in 1919. The speed that the HD-4 reached on the test was 114 km/hr – a speed not surpassed until the 1930’s. Outside interest in the hydrofoil went dormant after WW1. The technology could have been a game changer if commercialized during the war.

And did you know that AGB was the co-founder of National Geographic. We didn’t either.

Mabel Bell had an interesting life. She was the business person in the family; funding AGB’s innovations. Mabel ran the estate, contributed to the community, and was as interested in nature, gardening and animal husbandry as AGB.