Bell Telephone System’s Preeminent Role in the Growth of Industrial Design

Histories of design pay scant attention to the corded telephone, which played an immeasurable role in early communication. Although the Bell System, with many Nobel Prizes, is justly acknowledged for its technical prowess, it should also be recognized for its early and considerable impact on the developing discipline of industrial design. In 1930, young Henry Dreyfuss, who would later become known as a pioneer of industrial design, was retained by the Bell System as a design consultant and matured in that environment. With substantial input from Bell System engineers, Dreyfuss and his staff produced attractive telephone designs that were manufactured and installed in more than one hundred million American homes and copied around the world. Featuring over one hundred illustrations, Bell Telephone System’s Preeminent Role in the Growth of Industrial Design is a deep dive into the development and evolution of the corded telephone. A detailed case study of an object that would become so ubiquitous and commonplace, it is also the story writ large of the establishment and importance of the field of industrial design.

Ralph O. Meyer is a physicist with extensive publications in the fields of telecommunications and nuclear power safety. He has a PhD from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and a Phi Beta Kappa key from the University of Kentucky. He is the author of Old-Time Telephones and coauthor of Henry Dreyfuss: Designing for People.

Russell A. Flinchum is an associate professor of industrial design at North Carolina State University. He has a PhD from the Graduate Center of the City University of New York and a Phi Beta Kappa key from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He is the author of Henry Dreyfuss, Industrial Designer: The Man in the Brown Suit and American Design, and coauthor of Henry Dreyfuss: Designing for People.