RARE 1875 Primitive Honeoye Falls Telephone. Two Years before Alexander Graham Bell. This Primitive Telephone was owned by Timothy Holden a prominent banker in Honeoye Falls, NY (just south of Rochester, NY). Prior to Alexander Graham Bell's success, there was a lot of madcap scrambling to be the first to get rich from voice transmission. Even small-town geniuses were doing what they could for the cause, for even the hardy people of the 19th century were ever-mindful of the Utopian term, convenience. In Honeoye Falls, the successful mercantile and banking partnership of Timothy Holden and his son Alexander, inspired the younger man to set up a rudimentary communication system between his home and the Holden Bank. This contraption pre-dated Bell's device by a couple of years, though no one was about to attempt a patent on it. A recipe of piano wire, sleigh bells and a wooden disc fashioned into a mouthpiece diaphram, was set in motion by a whack that vibrated clear to the opposing station. A duplicate system reversed the pattern—and enterprising Alex Holden had a leg up on the competition. The good banker continued his primitive system until 1883, when the Bell Company of Buffalo arrived and set up a phone exchange at (George) Dutton & (Alba) Allen's drug store. Super piece of Telephone History. See pictures for complete condition and description.