Long before cell phones made communication fit into your pocket, people have used telephones, devices to connect two or more users to a conversation when they’re too far apart to be heard nearby.

This is an invention that works all across the world and connects people from many long ranges, and it deserves to be celebrated. That’s why April 25 is known as National Telephone Day.

While we all know how to use a phone, many of us take it for granted, not understanding “A telephone converts sound, typically and most efficiently the human voice, into electronic signals that are transmitted via cables and other communication channels to another telephone which reproduces the sound to the receiving user.” (Wikipedia).

This invention has since evolved since it was first created in 1876 by Alexander Graham Bell, to become the device we know as a cell phone I n 1973, John F. Mitchell and Martin Cooper of Motorola created a complicated prototype of the modern device. (Motorola)

In 1979, Nippon Telegraph and Telephone (NTT) launched the world’s very first cellular network in Japan. (Wikipedia) .  Four years later, in 1983, the DynaTAC 8000x was the first commercially available handheld mobile. (Collections)

So what can you do to celebrate National Telephone Day? National Today has some suggestions:

1. Try to really call someone. Go ahead. Shock your friends with an actual phone call on National Telephone Day. They’ll likely think you have something very serious to say.
2. Get nostalgic. Ask your grandparents about the energy needed to “dial” a phone — and why they dreaded numbers with lots of zeroes.
3. Still carrying around that iPhone 5? You’re saving money, but consider your reputation.