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June 1946 Radio News
 [Table
of Contents]
Wax nostalgic about and learn from the history of early
electronics. See articles from
Radio & Television News, published 1919-1959. All copyrights hereby
acknowledged.
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Remember when you could hold a telephone
conversation without having to allow a moment of time at the end of a sentence before
responding in order to keep from "stepping on" the person on the other end? It used
to be only overseas phone calls or maybe communicating to astronauts on the moon
suffered such inconveniences, but talking to someone across town was like having
a face-to-face discussion. More often than not - or so at least it seems - there
is a noticeable delay between the time someone actually stops talking on the transmitter
end and the time the audio stops at the receiver end. People who have never known
otherwise accommodate the delay with no appreciation for how good phone calls used
to be. This promotion by Bell Telephone Labs which appeared in a 1946 issue of
Radio News magazine extolls the virtues of its "scientific quality
control" innovation that produced repeatable appearance and performance of its
telephone products.
Bell Telephone Ad - Scientific Quality Control
 Alike as Two Pins
Yes, or alike as two telephone handsets made by the same process. Yet, pins or
handsets - no two could ever be made exactly alike. Dimensions, weight, performance
- all vary every time due to variables in manufacture. How can these variables be
controlled?
Back in 1924, Bell Laboratories' mathematicians and engineers teamed up to find
out, forming the first group of quality-control specialists in history. They invented
the now familiar Quality Control Chart, designed inspection tables for scientific
sampling. They discovered that test data mathematically charted in the light of
probability theory were talking a language that could be read for the benefit of
all industry.
Western Electric, manufacturing branch of the Bell System, applied the new science
to its large-scale production. In war, it was used by industrial and government
agencies of the United Nations in establishing and maintaining standards for military
materiel. A Quality Assurance Department, a novelty back in the nineteen-twenties,
has come to be indispensable to almost every important manufacturer.
Scientific quality control is one of many Bell Laboratories' ideas that have
born fruit in the Bell System. The application of mathematics to production helps
good management all over the industrial world - and furthers the cause of good telephone
service.
Bell Telephone Laboratories
Exploring and Inventing, Devising, and Perfecting for Continued Improvements
and Economies in Telephone Service.
Posted March 10, 2022
(updated from original post on 5/27/2015)
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