George M. Phelps

George M. Phelps was born in West Troy, NY (Watervliet) in 1820.  He became an apprentice machinist in Troy, working for his uncle Jonas Phelps, who was in a partnership with William Gurley in the firm Phelps and Gurley.  That firm later became W.& L. E. Gurley & Co.

 George Phelps operated his own machine shop and telegraph factory for the American Telegraph Company in Troy for a number of years before his factory was relocated to Brooklyn and was absorbed by the Western Union Telegraph Co.

Western Union was the dominant communications company in the U.S. during the 19th century.  Phelps became Western Union’s chief machinist and superintendent of their largest manufactory in New York.  Phelps’ telegraph instrument designs became standards in the industry and were installed throughout Western Union’s vast telegraph network of offices throughout the U.S. He invented and improved several telegraph instruments, including printing telegraphs, stock tickers, and later telephone instruments. Phelps also built several telegraph and telephone patent models for Thomas A. Edison for the various patents purchased by Western Union from Edison.

 In The Telegraph in America, published in 1879, James D. Reid profiles only three “prominent inventors of the day”: Elisha Gray, Thomas Edison, and George Phelps. Reid’s book is considered one of the most comprehensive works on the history of the telegraph in the United States during the 19th century.

 More information is available at the site below:

 George M. Phelps: Master Telegraph Instrument Maker and Inventor (telegraph-history.org)

 1820-1888