Smithsonian releases restored Alexander Graham Bell recording

"Hear my voice, Alexander Graham Bell."

For the first time in history, we can hear the voice of the man who brought us the telephone.

The Smithsonian recently released a restored 1885 wax-disc recording from Bell's Washington, D.C. laboratory in which the inventor recites a bunch of numbers.

"Identifying the voice of Alexander Graham Bell—the man who brought us everyone else’s voice—is a major moment in the study of history," says John Gray, director of the museum. "Not only will this discovery allow us to further identify recordings in our collection, it enriches what we know about the late 1800s — who spoke, what they said, how they said it — and this formative period for experimentation in sound."

In addition to the identification of Bell, the Smithsonian also identified the voice of Alexander Melville Bell, the famous inventor’s father.

The Verge reports that the wax disc was initially deemed "unplayable" when Bell donated it to the museum. But thanks to a technique developed at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, researchers now have the first-ever playable record of Bell's voice.

"The Berkeley method, which was based on particle physics equipment, relies on taking high-resolution digital images of the surface of a physical audio recording medium, such as Bell's wax disc, then running an analysis to rebuild the areas of the recording that are damaged," The Verve's Carl Franzen writes.

Listen to the 128-year-old recording below. Bell says his name around the 3:50 mark.

See Bell's handwritten transcript of the recording here.