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2025 - Pratt's Telephone Connection by Ralph Meyer

Prattfolio, April 4, 2025. Contributed by Ralph Meyer.

In a new book, Bell Telephone System's Preeminent Role in the Growth of Industrial Design, Ralph 0. Meyer and Russell A. Flinchum chronicle the role of the Bell System in the emergence of industrial design as a discipline and compare their telephones with many others. In this article, Meyer sheds light on two of Pratt lnstitute's connections to that story.

One of the top industrial design programs in the world, the Pratt Institute had two alumni with major telephone connections.  Arthur Shilstone who painted the Holiday greeting card with the MJR railroad train at the Hawthorne works, and Donald Genaro who designed the Trimline and other Bell telephones.

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