There’s an old brick building on the corner of Main and Osborn Street in Cambridge Massachusetts that arguably could be considered the birthplace of the modern day smart phone.  An unassuming structure as historic buildings go, for years it looked like an abandoned warehouse but inside the beauty of innovation has blossomed for years.  What makes this building unique is that it hosted the workshops of both Alexander Graham Bell the inventor of the 1st telephone and Dr. Edwin land the inventor of the Polaroid Instant camera.

On the Main street side hangs a bronze plaque which was its only adornment on an otherwise plain building, aside from the chicken wire that used to cover the 1st floor windows for years.

At this site on October 9th 1876 Thomas A Augustus Watson and Alexander Graham Bell  made the 1st long distance telephone conversation over wire.  Bell became a professor in elocution at Boston University was working on transmitting sound using an electrical current.  In 1876, Bell had advanced his work to the point where he was able to transmit sounds using a method that involved a needle vibrating in water, which caused the electrical current to change. The change in current was what transmitted the sound. It was this water-based device that Bell used to utter the words “Mr. Watson, come here, I want to see you” to his assistant, Thomas Watson, who was listening in another room on another of the same device.

Dr Land’s Polaroid Company started out making Polarized sheet materials used in sunglasses, camera lenses, and many military applications during the war.   He needed a way to expand his company’s product line into something that could extend its reach into new markets.   While on vacation with his family an idea came to him.  The “high-tech” camera Land was using that day was a Rolleiflex box model. The film would have to be unloaded from the camera, taken to a pharmacy, and shipped off to a laboratory to be painstakingly developed before being shipped back. Land’s daughter was disappointed when she learned that it would be weeks before she would be able to see her photographs. “Why can’t I see these pictures right now?” she asked. “I don’t want to wait.”

Inside this building two inventors worked their vision and history was made.  Their legacy has endured and converged into a single device that enables people to communicate and make images that Edwin and Alexander would be proud of.

I guess it is fair to say that brick walls cannot hold back great inventions if the right people are inside.