May 30, 2012

Very rainy today in Baddeck with ¾ of an inch expected. We opted to visit the Alexander Graham Bell Museum. AGB and his wife Mabel built a huge home on the Bras d’Ore Lake right here in Baddeck for their summer home. He seems to have spent quite a bit of his time here whatever the season and is buried on the homestead. Bell started life as a teacher of the deaf. His father had created Visual Speech, a graphic representation of oral speech patterns, a technique that Bell applied with his students.  His wife was among his first students and later, Helen Keller. Of course, he is best known for inventing the telephone, which arose out of his work to improve telegraphic communication. He has many other inventions to his credit. Although the Wright brothers are credited with the first successful flight, Bell is considered the father of Canadian Aviation for his substantial improvements to aviation with the first aircraft to fly over a kilometer. He spent a lot of time working with kites incorporating tetrahedrons He applied many of his air flight concepts to the improvement of hydrofoils and held the record of over 70 miles an hour in the early 1900s. Other inventions include a metal jacket to help with breathing problems, an audiometer, a metal detector (which he unsuccessfully used on President Taft), and many more. He also co-founded the National Geographic Society.