Inspiration for Mobile Phone
Cooper said that the inspiration for the mobile phone came from Captain Kirk’s Communicator on Startrek. In fact, many cellular phones look very similar to the one on the show. Cooper had a theory on mobility and people, where individuals were inherently mobile beings, and if given the opportunity, they would rather call people than a place. He began initial testing for the cell phone to persuade the FCC to allow some frequency space for private companies to use the cell phone. In 1973, Cooper first used the phone outside in downtown Manhattan to call one of his competitors at Bell Labs to tell him he was making a call using a “real cell phone.”