It was for producing in 1877 the five hundred pounds of No. 12 B. & S. gauge hard drawn copper wire used in stringing the aerial circuits in the Ansonia Brass and Copper Company's private telephone exchange system that the Franklin Institute awarded to Mr. Doolittle the Edward Longstreth medal of merit.
In connecting up the different offices and mills of the Ansonia Brass and Copper Company he built substantial pole lines, installed a home-made type of switchboard to which all circuits were attached and had a regular operator employed. A pole line was also built to the freight station of the Derby Railroad Company, and a telephone installed there and connected to the main switchboard, thus enabling any department to get in immediate communication with the freight station. This system was completed and in successful operation on December 4, 1877. Then, when the Connecticut Telephone Company came into possession of the territory by virtue of purchasing the rights of earlier Bell licensee systems, and thus possessed the sole right to operate telephone exchanges under the Bell patents, it claimed that this pioneer private exchange was a commercial exchange by reason of connections to outside interests, although calls were exchanged without thought of payment, and thus was infringing the rights of the Connecticut Company. So that exchange was closed. Later on a private branch exchange system was regularly installed for the Ansonia Brass and Copper Company, and now that company is the largest user of telephone equipment and service in Connecticut.
Probably Hartford can be credited with establishing the second mutual telephone exchange system. Three months after Dr. Bell's lecture, an agent for the Bell company called on the principal merchants in Hartford and tried to induce them to utilize the telephone as a business-bringer. On July 19, 1877, the local manager of the Western Union, Mr. G. B. Hubbell, secured the agency of the Bell telephone. On August 9, 1877, the Hartford Courant stated: "At the Capital Avenue drug store there is a telephone of simple construction connected with the residence of Dr. Campbell." On August 22 the Courant stated that "At the regular meeting of the allopath physicians on Monday evening, experiments were successfully tried with the telephone, and it is proposed to have a system of intercommunication between the doctors established by means of this new invention, so that by reporting to the central office at the Capital Avenue drug store, they can readily exchange views between office and office." In September, 1877, Isaac Smith, owner of the Capital Avenue drug store, had one and possibly two party-lines working in Hartford, and terminating in his store. On October 8, 1877, Smith advertised as fol-
