Telephone Intercommunication. By Order of the Postmaster-General, December 1880

Folio. 1 page. 17 1/4 x 10 1/2 inches. Very scarce large vintage broadside printed in blue on cream-colored paper, with the Royal coat of arms "Dieu et mon Droit", dated December, 1880. Browned on folds, small closed tear, professional repair at the lower left corner. "The Post Office will be prepared to provide for such a system, either the A.B.C. or the Telephone instrument. Application should be made to the Postmaster; and when several persons have agreed to take wires, immediate steps will be taken to establish a system of Intercommunication by Telephone instruments". Alexander Graham Bell invented the telephone in 1876. The first telephone exchange in Britain opened in 1879. The first telephone directory in London was published in 1880. The U.K. General Post Office (GPO) commenced its telephone business in 1878 (in the towns of Newcastle-on-Tyne, Hull, Middlesbro', Stockton, etc.), however the vast majority of telephones were initially connected to independently run networks. Although the earlier Telegraph Acts contained no reference to telephones, a court judgement was issued on December 20th 1880 in favour of the Post Office in a landmark legal action (Attorney General vs. Edison Telephone Company of London Ltd). The judgement laid down that a telephone was a telegraph, and that a telephone conversation was a telegram, within the meaning of Section 4 of the Telegraph Act, 1869. As a result, the telephone came within the telegram monopoly. This exceptional broadside was published exactly at that time, in December 1880. The General Post Office then started licensing all existing telephone networks to operate from the Postmaster-General. As a result the Postmaster General was to continue providing the telephone service under the provisions of various telegraph acts until the Telephone Act of 1951. This Act was the first statutory recognition of the telephone separate from the telegraph, 75 years after the telephone was invented. Very early U.K. telephone history. …