Henry Dreyfuss' Collaboration with Bell Telephone Laboratory
CHAE Sungzin*
*School of design, Yonsei Univ., KSDS, KAID, 234 Maeji Hungup Wonju, Kangwon, 220-710, Korea,
[email protected]
Abstract: This is a retrospective study on Henry Dreyfuss(1904-1972, industrial designer) focusing on his
collaboration with Bell telephone laboratory(BTL). Dreyfuss' long standing work for BTL had continued by his death
of 1972 since his first consulting to Bell Telephone Company in 1930. He could enjoy the period of the late 1930s and
the late 1950s, when the profession of industrial designer was at its zenith and the highest level of popular esteem. But
he had kept his concentration on practical, responsible, and moral attitude on his work mediating between
manufactures and consumers to their mutual benefit, and to his own. It is obvious that his concern for the three parties
became an essential conceptual framework of the consumer-industrial designer-manufacturer triad. He examined
carefully engineering and mechanical aspects of designing object, and discussed thoroughly on the specification with
engineers and relates specialists, while put optimal standard of human factors guideline for operating and using by
potential consumers.
Key words: Henry Dreyfuss, telephone, Bell Telephone Laboratory(BTL)
1. Henry Dreyfuss : A representative designer in history
1.1. Education and early career
Henry Dreyfuss had a profound impact on the daily lives of millions of Americans. Through industrial design,
the process we use to shape environments, transportation, products, and packaging, he raised the standards of
American industry. A constant focus on the needs of the average consumer characterized his work, Dreyfuss came
to prominence in the 1930s from a background in theatrical design. At the New York Society for Ethical Culture's
high school, he learned the rudiments of staging theatrical productions as well as dedication to and concern for the
welfare of others. As a designer, he firstly worked as an apprentice to Norman Bel Geddes, a genius of stage and
industrial design. In 1927, Dreyfuss set out on his own and within a few years was recognized as a bright young
talent in stage design[10].
1.2. Designer of long term perspective
Dreyfuss' many enduring professional relationships resulted in superior products that were designed to serve a
broad range of consumers and avoid short-term solutions. Today, the need for such "directors"-design
professionals capable of walking the worlds of business and design--is almost universally acknowledged within
the industrial design profession, and Dreyfuss's work continues to serve as a model of interdisciplinary teamwork.
The common link running through all of Dreyfuss's projects was his overriding concern for the user. Through a
variety of projects, including consulting for the U.S. military on equipment and vehicles, Dreyfuss pioneered
anthropometrics: the codification of human dimensions in industrial design. The Dreyfuss team developed "Joe"
and "Josephine," "typical" American models that were used in the design of airline seating, forklifts, power tools,
and other utilitarian objects. Human factors-reach, grasp, and the many other physical and mental aspects of using
an object-have become a key component of the industrial design process and profession since Dreyfuss published
the first charts in his autobiography <Designing for People (1955)>[7].
2. Dreyfuss' Work for Bell Telephone
2.1. The First Commision: Design of Desk Set Telephone Model 302[15]
In America domestic market, while other manufactured products became to struggle in the surviving game of
open competition, which forced them to be responsive to technological, social, and psychological changes, the
telephone existed in a near-monopoly situation. However situation of Bell was good enough to be optimistic, the
Bell people were seeking a new appearance combined several features. After long development, the most serious
operating faults of the so-called "French" phone or handset had been overcome. The resulting combination of
Model 302 telephone's handset with parts of the old stand-up phone had produced the early cradle type
instrument(the AIA). The proposed design (for the 302), with smaller components housed within the instrument,
would eliminate the box on the wall that held the ringing apparatus.
This time Dreyfuss had already collaborated with Western Electric beginning in 1931, on the design of the new
'combined telephone. Since the design of the new instrument was to be revolutionary, and not simply evolutionary,
it would be necessary to start the design process by fundamentally re-examining the way in which existing
instruments were used. Accordingly, Dreyfuss donned the uniform of a telephone repairman and accompanied an
actual repairman on rounds as an assistant, to better understand how phones were placed and used in the home[8].
After a six-year design effort, the 302 combined handset telephone was unveiled in late 1936 in basic black.
Colors became available in the following year and were the same as those offered on the 202 set. These colors
remained unchanged until 1954, at which time new color selections were offered identical to those available on
the 500 series sets, including some "two-tone" color combinations. These two-tone sets utilized colored housings
with a black Fl handset and black cords. The 302 set was available in both manual and dial versions which used
the new S-type dials. The new handset design for the 302 set (coded the Fl), was specifically designed so that it
could also be used with the older 202 set base. At the time of the introduction of the 302 set, the transmitter and
receiver shells used on wall sets and desk stands were re-designed to accept the receiver and transmitter capsules
used in the Fl handset, and this resulted in the nicknamed "bulldog" transmitter seen on many later desk stands.
Early production (1936-1941) 302 sets had a painted "pot metal"(die cast zinc alloy) housing; Phenolic Plastic
was considered as a material for the housings but was rejected due to concerns about brittleness. However, by
1941, thermo-plastics were improved to the point that they could be safely used for housings, and henceforth most
housings were made of this material. The older metal housings were painted to the desired color, however, the
newer plastic housings were available in five integral colors: ivory, Pekin red, dark blue, gray green, and Old Rose.
These colors all carne equipped with white enamel 5-type dials which often had matching color number cards. (A
Yale blue and medium brown color were offered in early 1937 only.) Since no practical method of reproducing the
"metallic" colors in plastic had been developed, these painted finishes continued to be supplied on a special basis.
Ivory ultimately proved to be the most popular color, capturing 70% of color sales. On color preference, a staff
complained: “The painted telephones were a major maintenance headache. They tended to end up in large
residences where the owners were meticulous about the condition of their appliances and furniture. We always
kept a freshly painted set on hand at the work center for a particularly fastidious customer.” [1]
By the end of the war, there had accumulated 2170000 unfilled applications for telephone service. By 1946,
however, the installation of new telephones was proceeding at the rate of over 25 a minute every working day. By
the time production of the 302 set was discontinued in 1954, in excess of 25,000,000 of these instruments had
been manufactured[8]. The popular 300 series bakelite telephone was the standard telephone issued by the
GPO(Great Britain Post Office) from 1938 to 1959. It continued in production for export and private systems until
the mid 1960's.
2.2. The Model 500 [16]
Dreyfuss had an earlier significant role in the design of the 302 set, and on this basis, was selected by Bell to
design the new 500 set. In 1930, Bell was impressed with Dreyfuss' attitude that a telephone should be designed
taking into great consideration the characteristics of the components to be placed within it. Dreyfuss suggested
that: "a telephone's appearance should be developed from the inside-out, not merely created as a mold into which
the engineers would eventually squeeze the mechanisms[4].” In 1946, BTL(AT&T) asked Dreyfuss to improve the
phone used in millions of American homes and offices. From the point of conception to the finished product,
design is a process. For Dreyfuss, it was the design of products and environments to be usable by all people, to the
greatest extent possible, without adaptation or specialized design. He made a working group of industrial
designers and BTL engineers collaborated to establish the general principles of universal design to guide a wide
range of design disciplines including engineering, products and communications. The basic design concept of the
Model 500 was influenced from the Ericofon[10], that invented and designed by L. M. Ericsson of Sweden. It was
a light one-piece product with a dial in the base of the hand-piece. Although its virtue lay more in its uniqueness
than in its utility, it helped open the way for a new generation of telephones.
Robert Hose(1915-1977), company engineers on the project, who had begun his design career as a Bell
employee and had left the company to become an associate of Dreyfuss, was given responsibility for the account.
Not only would the new phone have to meet designers' and engineers' criteria for human factors and function;
since the company charged a monthly fee for the "rental" of each unit long after its initial cost had been recovered,
reliability and durability were also important. Design guidelines were: 1. design is useful to people with diverse
abilities by keeping the privacy, security, and safety equally available to all users and make the design appealing
to all users. 2. The design accommodates a wide range of individual preferences and abilities, facilitating the
user's accuracy and precision. 3. It guides intuitive use of the design for easy understand, regardless of the user's
experience, knowledge, language skills, or current concentration level by eliminate unnecessary complexity. 4. As
the 300 series had already accomplished, it provided perceptible information effectively to the user, regardless of
ambient conditions or the user's sensory abilities in dial setting. 5. New design of handset and reclined dial face
was allowed low physical effort.
The design can be used efficiently and comfortably and with a minimum sustained physical effort and fatigue,
being allowed user to maintain a neutral body position, using reasonable operating forces and accommodating
variations in hand and grip size. Although the heavy promotion of colored sets was not favored by the current
chief executive of the Bell Co., it was strongly favored by the president of Western Electric, Fred Kappel, despite
some internal opposition, set out to make color telephones readily available to all subscribers. He characterized
this as "moving out of the Dark Ages" and proceeded to place advertisements in several national magazines
prompting colored sets, without the advance approval of the chief executive. He further geared up Western
Electric for mass production of these sets and later became a primary driving force behind the initiation of design
programs which ultimately produced the Princess and Trimline telephones. Quoting from Dreyfuss' account of the
design process of the 500 set provides a unique insight into the origins of design refinements incorporated into the
set[8]: We have to consider that phones are used not only on desks and tables while people are sitting, but also on
counters and shelves for stand-up use. We have to give critical consideration to room lighting and to arm, wrist,
and finger angles and motion of the dial operation. To permit a greater degree of accessibility for repair, Bell
engineers fastened all components to the base plate. The handset was also re-designed by Bell engineers; every
conceivable kind of handgrip was considered, triangular in cross section (like the F-style), square, thin and thick
rectangles, and many mongrel forms. The final selection was the thick rectangle, thinned down. It was smaller,
lighter, more comfortable, and could be held to the head by the shoulders without turning. Based on years of
experience with the dial number plates of pay phones, Bell engineers decided to expand the dial number plate to
place the numbers and letters outside of the finger wheel. With the new placement, dragging fingers and pencils
could no longer deface the characters, the flickering effect of the spinning wheel was eliminated, the characters
could be made larger, and the dial was easier to clean. Inherent limitations dictated much of the design; the ringer,
for instance, had to be placed at the rear because, as the largest component, this was the only area available.
Early designs of the new housing were unsatisfactory on two counts. They were too high, appearing taller than the
302, and the cradle prongs took away the sleek appearance that was desired. After renewed analysis, Bell
engineers found that the housing could be slightly lowered. By making additional small changes in the shape of
the housing, the position of the light reflection was changed, thus making the instrument look even lower.
After eight years, 2500 sketches, measurements of 2000 faces, and the preparation of endless clay models and
lacquered plaster castings, Dreyfuss had arrived at the final form of the new "universal" set: the "Model 500." If
people are made safer, more comfortable, more eager to purchase, more efficient, or just plain happier, by contact
with the product, then the designer has succeeded the form had to be classic, so that it would not be out of place
with shorter lived objects in homes and offices, either at the time of introduction, or twenty years later," stated
Dreyfuss on his ambitious goals for the new instrument. His goals were more than realized, as the widely imitated
500 set became the most popular telephone set ever designed. The Model 500 desk set, introduced in full scale
market in 1951, became the near-inviolate type form for the American desk telephone. It was said to have
represented more than 2,000 hours of design and development in the Dreyfuss office, most of it devoted to
analysis and human engineering. In appearance it presumed to be a neutral complement to any environment.
The early version of the 500 set was very popular with subscribers, but at the same time, it turned out to be
about 30% more expensive than the 302 set; as a result, many of the operating companies continued to purchase
302 sets for a number of years until the 500 set transmission equalization components were redesigned and the
cost brought down. The 500 set ultimately became the most popular set ever designed, far outlasting the original
goals for its design lifetime. A harsh legal climate resulting from antitrust litigation in the 1950s pushed Bell to
grant production licenses for Western Electric's 500 set to several other manufacturers, who copied the design to
varying degrees. Throughout the years, it was common practice for the operating companies to return used 500
style sets to Westem Electric for refurbishing. It is thus not unusual to encounter these sets with components of
differing production dates and with repainted housings and handsets. Often, a chassis with an early production
date is found short with much later "plastics."
The basic form of the 500 set was to ultimately endure far longer than its creators originally envisioned, and
the new G1 handset proved to be perhaps the most comfortable ever designed; it was the first Bell handset that
could be comfortably propped to the ear by the shoulder. The 500 set was in production for 35 years without
essential change, except for rare color alterations and chassis design refinements. It thus rivaled the basic design
life time of the 20 series desk stands, which also continued in production through 35 years. The first production
run of the new 500 set was made in November 1949, and consisted of 4000 units, in predictable basic black (some
of these early sets were equipped with cloth cords). Colored sets became available on a limited basis in 1953, but
all had black handsets and dials, and black or gray cords, as details for injection molding of these items in color
were still being worked out. By 1954, fully colored sets were being made in a range of hues. As the years passed,
pastel colors came into vogue, and another poll of subscribers in 1956 produced a shift in the color lineup, with
users selecting white, rose pink, light beige, aqua blue, and light gray; a turquoise was also later added.
2.3. Mechanical Optimizing for the Model 500
As a voice service, telephone is the equipment to be designed and engineered to link the customer to the
network. To Western Electric, it is one of their biggest "runners": about ten million telephones were built in 1975.
To the operating companies, it is the equipment on the customer's premises- low-cost, long-lived, and reliable. To
the customer, the telephone set is a communication link with the world. For end user the telephone and its design
considerations have become today’s description on the present offerings. The telephone has two functions:
transmission and signaling. For transmission, the telephone ties the electro-acoustic transducers, the transmitter
and the receiver, to the 2-wire line that connects the station to the central device. For signaling, the telephone uses
the switch hook to actuate central office supervision equipment to indicate origination, answer, or termination of a
call; it permits dialing with a rotary or touch-tone dial and uses a bell tone ringer for customer alerting. The
simplest telephone connection was important. A battery can be inserted in the line to provide a means of signaling
or to add gain by allowing the use of a carbon transmitter, which most present telephones useing transmitter,
which has the advantages of high output power and low cost. The carbon transmitter operates as a
pressure-sensitive resistance whose value is varied by movement of the microphone diaphragm to modulate the
battery-supplied line current. This simple connection has a basic problem: each party hears his own voice much
louder than he hears the other party because of the transmission line loss. To overcome this shortcoming, a
transformer hybrid is used as a 4-wire to 2-wire converter to couple the transmitter and receiver to the line. The
hybrid and its associated balance network provide compromises in side tone amplitude and impedance match to
the central office line. Side tone refers to the portion of the transmitted signal that appears at the receiver of the
same telephone[2].
The circuitry used in the 500 set has some additional features. Transmitting efficiency is improved over that of
the circuit by using different turns ratios in the auto-transformer configuration. This, combined with relatively
high transducer efficiencies, gives good performance on long lines but high transmit and receive amplitudes on
short lines. To reduce amplitude variations with different line lengths and cable gauges, the current-sensitive
variator, is placed across the line inside the set. The high current on short lines lowers the resistance, reducing the
high signal levels the low current on lone lines causes variator to remain a relatively high resistance so that long
line performance is not significantly changed. A second variator, must be added in the balancing network to
compensate introduced by variator. The third variator is placed across the receiver, acting as a peak clipper to
protect the ear against loud noise bursts.
Station equipment design must take into account many considerations in addition to cost. These added facets
include 'system' constraints, human factors, and operating company concerns related to instal1ation, maintenance,
repair, and administration. The primary electrical constraints on the telephone set are related to the need to do
everything-transmission, powering, and signaling-over a single pair of wires, while remaining compatible with the
existing telephone system. The available central office voltages, supervision currents, and line resistance,
combined with the electrical characteristics of the area, determine the maximum size of the serving area of a
central office. The telephone is line powered, rather than locally powered, to retain the reliability associated with
telephone service. The cost of providing battery backup for local powering usually cannot be justified in low-cost,
general-purpose sets. Physically, the general-purpose telephone must be designed to operate under severe
extremes: from inside a cold storage warehouse to the sunny windowsill of a humid, un-air-conditioned house in
Florida. Furthermore, the set must be sufficiently rugged to withstand being shipped across country or being
knocked off a table onto a concrete floor[9].
One of the most significant design innovations incorporated into the 500 set was the "speech equalization"
feature. This feature provided nearly equal transmitting output from the set, despite the distance of the set from the
Central Office; on earlier designs, sets located close to the C.O. received more battery power, and thus were able
to transmit at higher powers. This resulted in unequal capacity, and seemingly erratic performance to subscribers.
2.4. Bell and AT&T's offering after the Model 500, and the electronics
The mainstay of telephone service was, of course, the basic residential telephone. This is available in many
colors and .styles of housings, with either a rotary or TOUCH-TONE dial. for businesses, multi-line key
telephones are available; these sets, operating in conjunction with a small equipment unit use button switches to
select one of a number of incoming lines. There are special types of station apparatus or adjuncts for many
services: speakerphones for hands-free calling, repertory(automatic) dialers, the transaction telephone for credit
card transactions, the portable conference telephone for use in businesses and schools, and aid-to-the-handicapped
sets with hard-of-hearing handsets or loud-ringing bells. The new so-called DESIGN LINE sets offered telephones
with stylish new housings for sale directly to the customer, however its appearance were out of context with
Model 500. The customer owned and could modify and decorated the housings; the Bell System owns and will
maintain the operating internals.
Today, the use of electronics in the telephone is limited to the TOUCH-TONE dial and to low-volume,
special-purpose station equipment. At present, electronics are too expensive to replace internals of the existing
general purpose Model 500 set. Electronics are expected to become part of the set when either of the following
occurs: 1) Use of electronics provides the customer a special service for which one is willing to pay (e.g.,
TOUCH-TONE dialing, speakerphone, or other new feature), or 2) Use of electronics results in an overall system
saving (e,g,. electronic telephone set for long lines)[9].
3. Dreyfuss's Telephone: the philosophy of design for everyone
For almost all people today, the wired-telephone has become an "anonymous object," part of the everyday
environment, like houses, streets, and grocery stores. Intellectual interest was visible, which paid little attention to
the telephone in the past. However some commentators are ready to invest that device with heavy psychological
overtones, futuristic scenarios project radically new ways of life inspired by recent developments in electronic
technologies including mobile phone. Some, far instance, have described a twenty-first-century nations organized
around "electronic cottage - families living in homes scattered about the countryside, working via linked
computers, and learning, shopping, relaxing, and socializing by video telephones. While at least in the early 1990s
home computerization had not really occurred, mobile business become visible today with great marketing efforts.
The image of anonymous telephone or office machine changed into fashionable items for self-expression. It is
somewhat contradictory to Dreyfuss work by mid 20th century, that combined long-lasting standard and design
for 'usefulness and appropriateness' for every end of network.
References
[1] AT&T, Bell Lab Technical Journal
[2] BTL, The Bell System and Regional Business 1877-1920, The Johns Hopkins Univ. Press
[3] Doris and Henry Dreyfuss Memorial Study Center, Cooper Hewitt Museum: Industrial Design: A pictorial
Accounting, New York, 1929, 1958
[4] Dreyfuss, Henry, Designing for People, New York, 1955, 1967
[5] Ethical Culture: Felix Adler, Ph.D. (1851-1933) founded the New York Society for Ethical Culture, the
national and international Ethical Culture movements, and the New York Ethical Culture schools. He was
professor of Social and Political Ethics at Columbia University from 1902 until 1933, and he delivered the
Hibbert Lectures at Oxford University in 1923. Adler was an ardent social critic as well as civic and religious
leader. He pioneered in labor, housing, and educational reform and in the movement to abolish child labor. Dr.
Adler served as president of the American Philosophic Association and the Free Religious Association. His
major books include: The Moral Instruction of Children, The Religion of Duty, An Ethical Philosophy of Life,
The Reconstruction of the Spiritual Ideal, and Our Part In This World.
[6] Fisher, Claude S., American Calling, Univ. of California Press, 1992
[7] Flinchum, Russell, Henry Dreyfuss: Industrial Designer: Directing Design, Design Shop, 1997
[8] Mountjoy, R. 100 Years of Bell Telephones, A Schiffer Book of Collectors, 1995
[9] Milliam, S. ed. A History of Engineering and Science in the Bell system: Communication and
Science(1925-1980), Indianapolis, AT@T Bell laboratories, 1984
[10] National Museum Stockholm, Telephone 100 year Design and Communication, 1976
[11] Pulos, J. Arthur, The American Design Adventure, Cambridge: MIT Press, 1988
[12] Reich, Leonard S. The making of American industrial research, Cambridge Univ. Press, 1985
[13] http://www.ethicalstl.org/philosophy.shtml
[14] http://www.theoldtelephone.co.uk
[15]
[16]