History

Amos E. Joel, Jr. - The Early Years:
“I’ve always been motivated by wanting to invent, wanting to create something new.”

Mr. Joel was always interested in technology—even as a child growing up from Philadelphia, PA to Atlantic City, NJ and finally to New York City, NY

Model railroads were a hobby for which he created elaborate railroad layouts and signaling circuits.

His true spark of genius and interests were cultivated when his family received a new dial telephone at home, when he was 10 years of age.  He contacted the New Jersey Bell Company, hoping to find out how the dial telephone system worked…but without much gratification.

In 1929, the family moved to New York City.  It was during the Depression, and many apartments were left empty, leaving behind leased telephones.  Armed with this knowledge, Mr. Joel created his own private telephone system at the age of 13. This system connected him to his neighborhood friends.  Eventually, however, the telephone company discovered it, and one day, while Mr. Joel was monitoring his telephone switchboard, the telephone rang and a technician, demanding where he was located,  forced Mr. Joel to dismantle his network, thus avoiding  a life of juvenile delinquency.

These circumstances did not dampen Mr. Joel’s enthusiasm.  At 13, he also wrote to AT&T regarding their new switching systems.  He was referred by an AT&T employee to relevant patent literature.  And thus began Mr. Joel’s second major hobby—the collecting of patents and technical information about telephone switching.  At his local library, he began reading the monthly “Patent Office Gazette,” (9) which published recent patent announcements.  He started ordering copies of every switching patent he could identified, and with this knowledge, Mr. Joel designed his own telephone system, “The Joel All-Relay Dial System.”  Although he started to build his system, he quickly learned that its cost was prohibitively expensive.  This information became even more poignant at a later point in his professional career at Bell Telephone Laboratories (Bell Labs).

Amos E. Joel, Jr. at MIT:
I worked in the dormitory office.  And that’s very important, because the dormitory office had a switchboard, and I ran the switchboard.

In 1936, Mr. Joel graduated from DeWitt Clinton High School and matriculated into the Electrical Engineering department at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).  It was at MIT where he met key professors/students who would help shape his future.

At the time, there was a shift in the curriculum from power engineering to the leading edge in the electronics’ fields, especially in communications. Among the professors who were especially encouraging was Carlton Tucker. (10) Professor Tucker fueled Mr. Joel’s interest in the telephone/switching transmission. Through Professor Tucker, Mr. Joel made his first contacts within the telephone industry and gained hands-on experience, by repairing the Electrical Engineering Department’s telephone equipment, thus proving his facility with switching systems.

Mr. Joel recognized that topics like switching were not specifically offered at MIT.   At the time, there was no real theoretical basis for switching.   No one was really interested in switching—it was considered an “inventor’s art”. (11)  This lack of accessible information on switching technology is an issue that he would address later in his career.

Mr. Joel was also influenced at MIT by another student, Claude Shannon. (12) Frequent walks in Boston, and later at Bell Labs in NYC, helped both men in their future endeavors. Shannon recalls that his discussions with Mr. Joel were the inspiration for the subject of his own Master’s Thesis:  The Application of Boolean Algebra to the Design of Relay and Switch Circuits. (13)

Mr. Joel made extra money by running the dormitory office switchboard.  He used his earnings to continue buying patents.  While on duty, Mr. Joel met his future wife, Rhoda Fenton, while she was visiting MIT with a friend. On their first date, he invited her up to his room to show her his switching patents---which he really did show to her. She thought he was crazy, but she eventually married him; they were married for 58 years, until her death in 2000.

As graduation neared, Mr. Joel was concerned about future employment.  Although the job market was extremely tight, ongoing effects from the Depression, he desperately wanted to work for Bell Labs.  His letters to Bell Labs were not acknowledged, even with professors trying to pull strings.  With no response, he considered a small manufacturer in Chicago, the Automatic Electric Company. It is interesting to note that the Automatic Electric Company was started by Almon Strowger (14), who created the first “automatic stepping switch.”  It was later to be said of Mr. Joel that he was the “greatest figure in American switching, since Almon Strowger.” (15)

It was through a classmate’s father, who was one of Bell Labs’ patent attorneys, Mr. Joel was recommended to be interviewed.  Because of his unusual qualifications, Bell Labs contacted Carleton Tucker, who informed them that Mr. Joel was interviewing in Chicago with the Automatic Electric Company.  In a happy ending for all, Bell Labs urged Mr. Joel to come to New York City, where Mr. Joel gladly accepted a job leading to a career that spanned over four decades.

Amos E. Joel, Jr. at Bell Laboratories:
In the switching field I think it is important to note that the Bell System has always pioneered and innovated in most aspects of switching.

Mr. Joel worked at Bell Laboratories for his entire professional career, from 1940-1983.

Although gifted with the extensive knowledge of switching, like all new employees, Mr. Joel went through the traditional training programs.  He started at the West Street office in 1940 and, as Bell Labs expanded, he eventually worked in both Whippany, NJ and finally in Holmdel, NJ.  Gradually he met many of the Bell Laboratories engineers who he had learned about through his collection of telephone switching patents.  These early years helped Mr. Joel to hone skills and ideas that would later serve as catalysts for future inventions.

When World War II broke out, Mr. Joel was assigned to work on various cryptographic systems.  It was through the National Security Agency (NSA) that Bell Labs received a contract from the National Research Council to develop both a foolproof speech system for Franklin D. Roosevelt and Winston Churchill to secretly communicate and a voice encryption system that was sufficient for the battlefield. (16)

In 1941, Mr. Joel began working on military cryptographic systems that used electromechanical relays and complex switching circuits.  Their important work created a machine to transmit and received coded teletype messages.  This system was adopted by the Army Signal Corps and the Navy for secret communications. (17)

Through these wartime projects, Mr. Joel worked with and met influential men such as, Harry Nyquist (18), (Communication Theory); Samuel William (19) (Designer of Switching Systems), and Alan Turing (20) (British Mathematician and Computer Pioneer).

The technology that Mr. Joel and his colleagues at Bell Labs developed was called “Sigsaly” or “The Green Hornet.”  The secret voice transmission system, the scrambler-signal voice transmission system, first used in 1944, allowed for secure,  encrypted communications between Franklin D. Roosevelt and Winston Churchill. Mr. Joel’s wartime patents on this new cryptographic speech system that used digitized speech, because of its secrecy, were not granted a patent until after the War. (21) Acknowledgment certificates for wartime services were issued to the engineers at Bell Labs who were involved in these projects.

Other wartime efforts gave rise to a government contract to build a series of electromechanical calculating machines: Relay Interpolator; Model III, and Model IV, which gave rise to Model V. (22)  These machines were built to aid in the “design and simulation of automatic aiming device for anti-aircraft guns." Near the end of the war, Mr. Joel was assigned to work on Model V, designing the machine's most complicated circuitry. 

Mr. Joel's wartime experiences proved valuable to his post-war work on electronic telephone switching.

Amos E. Joel, Jr. -Bell Laboratories-Post-World War II:
“We were able to show there are certain principles—what switching is all about—that we can teach and explain to succeeding generations.”

It was because of Mr. Joel’s work on Model V that he was assigned to design computing equipment for the Automatic Message Accounting Computer System (AMA). His Patent #2,925,957, developed an accounting center for the AMA, from 1945-1947. This billing system, the largest patent of its day, was a key component for accurately billing customers and integral in the move from operator handled calls to the Direct Distance Dialing by the customers. (23)

Mr. Joel continued with the design of “switchgear” after the war, as new technological innovations provided more opportunities for switching development. (24)

With the apparent need to meet the opportunities for switching development, Mr. Joel, while working on the AMA, sent a memo to upper management re: the need to teach switching.  With management’s authorization, Mr. Joel and some of his colleagues taught the first classes on switching to new young engineers.  He was the founding instructor for a continuing education/technical program.  The success of the switching courses gave rise to an internal Bell Labs program, “Kelley College.” Eventually, this College included courses on other technical disciplines as well. (25)  Prior to and throughout his professional life, Mr. Joel was an active member in The American Institute of Electrical Engineers (AIEE), which eventually morphed into the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE), as well as AAAS; ACM; Sigma XI, and the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) to which he was elected in 1981. He was always concerned that there was never enough information available re: “switching” technologies.  To foster and encourage the sharing of ideas/information with other engineering colleagues, and with the support of IEEE, Mr. Joel helped form the “Switching Committee, which ultimately became what is now the IEEE Communications Society (Com Soc).  Eventually, he became the President of this Society in 1974.   Through his work with Com Soc, Mr. Joel also was instrumental in helping to form an International Switching Symposium (ISS), which was scheduled to meet every 2-3 years, thus conferring upon Mr. Joel the unofficial title, “Father of ISS.” (26)

Also post-War came the development at Bell Labs of the transistor in 1948. This would be important in the advancement of switching systems. It became clear that the speed of these technologies would be a major advantage in “common control switching systems.”  In 1952, as part of an Exploratory Development Department group, Mr. Joel worked on the development of a new era of switching systems.  This first new system was the advent of the future of electronic switching.  As part of a small systems engineering group, Mr. Joel worked with colleagues on the first system design of local electronic switching system, #1ESS. (27)  In 1957, the first dialed call was completed through the #1ESS.  In that same year, the first International Switching Symposium was held at the Bell Labs to show Bell System and the world engineers and licensees the future of electronic switching. (28)  The final work on the #1ESS was completed in 1959.  Although it was upgraded in years to come, the #1ESS was ground-breaking—it ultimately was cheaper to maintain than the previous systems; it was also more sophisticated and flexible to accommodate updates or changes to the system.

In 1976 Mr. Joel and his colleagues were awarded the first IEEE Alexander Graham Bell Medal for the “conception and development of Electronic Switching Systems and their effective introduction into a nation-wide telephone system.”--[ Mr. Joel (Early System Design);  R.W. Ketchledge (Hardware Implementation), and William Keister (Stored Program Control)]. (29)  It is important to note that this award was established by IEEE to commemorate the centennial of the telephone’s invention.  Their #1 ESS patent honored them for their “outstanding contributions to the advancement of telecommunications.”

"Amos E. Joel, Jr. –Bell Laboratories-Modern Telephony":
"From  cellular phones to satellite transmissions, the communications revolution, as we know it, has its roots in World War II."

Mr. Joel was also instrumental in the development of the Traffic Service Position System (TSPS), Patent #3,731,000, which enabled efficient handling of special operators handled calls, such as collect calls, person-to-person calls, and calls that could be charged to a third party.(30)  For this development, Mr. Joel was awarded the Franklin Institute’s Stuart Ballantine Medal in 1981 “for his contributions towards the many functions it makes possible for modern telecommunications.” (31)

Perhaps Mr. Joel’s most important contribution to the field of telecommunications is his 1972 patent for the Mobile Communications System.  It is for Patent #3,663,762  Mr. Joel was inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame in 2008.  This patent provides for basic cellular switching and pioneered the most rapidly growing segment of the telecommunications industry.  It is Mr. Joel’s invention that allows for the convenient use of cell phones, making them essential to the fabric of today’s society. One could even call Mr. Joel The father of the cell phone for his contribution to the technology.(32)

It is important to note, too, that because of Mr. Joel’s patent for Bell Labs/AT&T, the courts awarded the assignation of this modern invention to Bell Labs/AT&T and not to Motorola.  It was Mr. Joel’s patent which pre-dates any erroneous claims to this invention by Motorola.

In 1983, Mr. Joel retired from Bell Labs, after a 43+ year career, although he continued to serve as a consultant and worldwide authority in the telecommunications switching to AT&T and other companies.  He also continued lecturing and teaching, working with Jack McDonald on a course that they created for the University of Maryland and UCLA.  Ultimately other lecturers were invited to join them, resulting in the publication of the coursework in “The Fundamentals of Digital Switching.” (33)

Further, as a member of the NAE, Mr. Joel worked with Mr. McDonald and other industry leaders in a study of the vulnerability of the nation’s telecom infrastructure to terrorist attack.   Per Mr. McDonald, Mr. Joel “unselfishly contributed to this study.”  Unfortunately, the network failures in the 1990s were due to system design and not to terrorism.  However, as a result, the design of the nation’s infrastructure “changed substantially and subsequently became more resilient to unfriendly attack.” (34)

Mr. Joel died in 2008.
He was an inventor; a visionary, and a humanitarian.