Mobile phones have become an essential part of our lives; like Navel-strings connecting us to the world. People barely remember those times when cell phones did not exist, let alone the era of regular telephones. I was about 7 when our first landline telephone was installed in our home, and 15 when I got my first cell phone. I can still remember the excitement spreading through me the first time our home telephone was ringing, or the overwhelming joy I felt when my parents got me my own mobile.
Whereas now, in the age when almost every kid in kindergarten carries a phone, telephones have become an everyday necessity, and an indicator of social status. Perhaps this is the reason why I enjoyed this museum visit so much. It was a nostalgic journey to a time when telephones were still a rarity and the subjects of fascination.
The Telephone Museum is located in the Buda Castle district, in the residential building of the Institute of Sociology (Hungarian Academy of Sciences). Visitors can enter the exhibition from the inner courtyard of the building. I kindly advise my fellow museumgoers to wait patiently and ring the bell a few times if necessary. (The guide inside may not always hear the ringing, due to the loud noise the antique telephone exchange system produces in one of the exhibition halls. However, please rest assured that a few minutes waiting is more than worth it and the experience will make up for this slight delay.)
The first exhibition hall provides a brief history of the evolution of telephones with a large number of featured items. One can also learn who the real inventor of this epoch-making instrument was, as it turns out, it was not Bell. The primary focus of the exhibition is the work of Theodore Puskás, the man who came up with the idea of the telephone exchange, where any number of subscribers could be connected to any other subscribers with the help of telephone exchange centres.
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| Thomas Edison acknowledges that Theodore Puskás was the first person to suggest the idea of the central station for the telephone |
Visitors can also read private letters and telegraph messages between Thomas Edison and Puskás; see the very first Hungarian telephone book, which was only two pages long; or listen to an exhibition guide on the phone (in English, German and Hungarian), but the best part of the exhibition is most definitely the 85 years old, still functioning telephone exchange station. It was astonishing to see this monstrous machinery, which can only be maintained by technicians nearly as old as the device itself. What is more, we were having a blast when me and my friend could call each other through the central station and have a conversation with almost a century old instruments in our hands. Imagine how many people had used these phones, how many conversations they had transmitted. Now, that is something you do not experience every day!
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| original station of the telephone exchange staff |
The second part of the exhibition is actually a temporary exhibition to commemorate the 120 years of The Telephone Newspaper, the revolutionary and highly successful invention of Theodore Puskás. Visitors can listen to the Telephone Herald in three languages and get acquainted with the history of the talking newspaper.
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| The pavilion of Telephone Newspaper at the Millenium Exhibition, 1896 |
This museum offers a great adventure for lovers of history, telephones, or old mechanical devices for that matter. Also, if parents are looking for a place to bring the kids on a rainy weekend afternoon, this is the place to go.
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| The private telephone of Franz Joseph I, Emperor of Austria and King of Hungary |
Tip:
- On Fridays after 3:30 pm and on weekends visitors should enter from the opposite side of the building, 30 Országház Street
Telephone Museum
1014 Budapest, 49 Úri Street
Tuesday-Sunday: 10 am - 16 pm
http://postamuzeum.hu/stores/item/100.html
