Theodore Newton Vail (1845--1920) was an American entrepreneur who made his fortune in the telephone and mining business and became the first president of the Bell Telephone Company (later American Telegraph and Telephone or AT&T). President of the company for two separate tenures, he was instrumental in establishing telephone service, both local and long distance. A true visionary when it came to running a corporation, Vail oversaw the building of the first U.S. coast-to-coast telephone system, and it was his dedication to basic science that initiated a new research arm for AT&T's Bell Laboratories.

Vail was born on July 16, 1845, near the town of Minerva, Ohio. His family was rich and influential, its members descended from John Vail, a Quaker preacher who settled in New Jersey in 1710.

Strong Family Heritage

Affluence was not the Vail family's only attribute. There was a strong tradition of mechanical innovation...