- Written by Zoe Kleinman
- Technology Editor
Marty Cooper, with the phone he used to make the first call
On April 3, 1973, Marty Cooper stopped at the corner of Sixth Avenue in New York City and pulled a phone book from his pocket.
He then punched a number into a large cream colored device and placed it to his ear while onlookers stared at him.
Cooper, a Motorola engineer, called a colleague at rival Bell Laboratories to tell him triumphantly that he was calling from a “personal portable cell phone.”
He remembers that there was silence at the end of the line.
“I think he was grinding his teeth,” says the 94-year-old, laughing.
Bell Labs has been focused on developing a car-based phone, he says. “Can you believe? We’ve been trapped in our homes and offices by this copper wire for over 100 years — and now they’re going to trap us in our cars!”
Commercial copy of Motorola phone used by Mr. Cooper, owned by the Mobile Museum.
Needless to say, Cooper and Motorola didn’t agree this was the way to go—and history has proven them right.
The basics of how first call works haven’t changed much. The phone converts your voice into an electrical signal, which modulates the radio wave. the radio wave goes to the mast; Mast sends your voice to the person you’re calling, and when you reverse the process, that person can hear you speak.
Except there weren’t a lot of masts around back then…but you get the point.
However, today’s cell phones are unrecognizable when compared to the older model of Motorola.
The commercial version of Marty Cooper’s prototype, the Motorola Dynatac 8000X, was launched 11 years after the first call, in 1984. It would cost the equivalent of £9,500 ($11,700) if bought today, says Ben Wood, who runs Mobile museum.
“Basically, it was just a matter of dialing the number and making the call,” Wood explains.
There were no messages, no camera. Thirty minutes of talk time, 10 hours of battery life, about 12 hours of standby time, and a 6-inch (15 cm) antenna on top. ”
It also weighs 790g (1.7lbs) – nearly four times the iPhone 14’s weight at 172g.
Zoe Kleinman with some cell phones from the 80’s and 90’s
Still, Cooper remains unimpressed by the design of 2023 cell phones — though he admits he never predicted that one day phones would be portable “supercomputers” with cameras and Internet access.
“I think today’s phone is suboptimal. It’s really not a good phone in a lot of ways.”
“Think about it. You take a flat piece of plastic and glass—and you put it on the curve of your head; you put your hand in an uncomfortable position; when you want to do these cool things he can do, you have to get an app.” [first]. “
He believes that in the future, AI will create or curate apps for phone owners depending on their individual needs.
He also believes that one day the device will monitor our health, increase our productivity, and greatly improve our lives.
It was even suggested at one point that they could help end the wars.
“The cell phone doesn’t do it on its own,” he admits. But he will be the central part of this great future.
Despite his grip on his modern counterparts, it seems secretly that Mr. Cooper is still fascinated by the device he first put in his ear on a New York street corner 50 years ago.
“We are still at the beginning of the mobile revolution,” he declares.
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