An unexpected inventorSourced
An undertaker helped automate telephone calls
Almon Brown Strowger worked as an undertaker before developing an automatic telephone exchange, patented in 1891. With technical and financial help from others, his company opened a commercial exchange in Indiana in 1892.
A person from a different trade helped change how calls were connected.
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Almon Brown Strowger · Wikimedia contributors
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Reviewed: 2026-10-10