For many Americans, trying to envision life without our various telephones would be like trying to live without indoor plumbing. The telephone is 138 years old today. In 1876, Alexander Graham Bell made the first telephone call in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Over a wire to his assistant in the next room, Bell said, “Mister Watson, come here; I want to see you.” Only when Bell improved his invention to carry a voice for several miles did the public discover a need for them. Now, the public has an insatiable appetite for phones and uses them in ways Bell could not have foreseen. Over 116 million — or over 88 percent — of America’s 132 million housing units have phone service. You can find more facts about America’s people, places and economy, from the American Community Survey, at <www.census.gov>
Sunday, March 9th. This is National Peanut Month — celebrating one of the nation’s favorite foods. They are enjoyed in many ways — roasted in the shell as a snack, used in salads and stir-fry recipes, in cookies and, of course, ground into peanut butter. The idea of honoring the peanut has been a monthlong observance since 1974. Americans eat an average of more than six pounds of shelled peanuts a year, about half in the form of peanut butter. Even the shells are used in such products as kitty litter, wallboard, and artificial fireplace logs. American peanuts have a global customer base. In 2012, over $250 million worth were exported; more than 36 percent of that went to Canada and 27 percent to Mexico. You can find more facts about America from the U.S. Census Bureau, online at <www.census.gov>.
Saturday, March 8th. The inventor of the first practical automatic dishwasher was born on this date in 1839 and was perhaps an unlikely candidate for the distinction. Josephine Cochrane was a socialite and devised the dishwasher out of some annoyance at how her domestic staff damaged her china. Awarded a patent in 1886, Cochrane sold her machines in the 1890s mainly to restaurants and hotels. Her company eventually became KitchenAid, now part of the Whirlpool Corporation. In 2011, the Census Bureau’s American Housing Survey found that of the nation’s more than 132 million housing units, almost 86 million had automatic dishwashers. They are sold at the nation’s 8,500 household appliance stores in addition to department stores. Profile America is in its17th year as a Public Service of the U.S. Census Bureau.