[tps_title]5. Antonio Meucci (1808 – 1889)[/tps_title]
It is widely held that Alexander Graham Bell was the inventor of the telephone.
However, it is also claimed that inventor, revolutionary thinker and unconfirmed Freemason Antonio Meucci had devised the principles of the telephone when Bell was still an infant, and had a working model by 1859 — long before Bell and others.
Unfortunately for the Italian, due to technical omissions relating to vocal sounds in his patent — which was filed five years before Bell’s — he never gained the credit for his work; until recently, that is.
In 2002, the US Congress officially recognized Meucci’s work in the development of the telephone.
The rumors of Meucci’s involvement with the Freemasons appear to be largely down to his close friendship with the great military hero Giuseppe Garibaldi, the unifier of Italy.
Garibaldi was an active Mason and arrived in New York around the same time as Meucci.
The two shared ideas, and it seems likely that Freemasonry played some part in this exchange.
