TATLOCK EARLY HISTORY

by John Tatlock

submitted through Laval Desbiens

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CHAPTER 4

Founding Bell Northern Research Labs & transfer to Bell Canada

Shortly after returning to the Montreal office from my project in the Arctic, I was offered the most interesting assignment -- creating the Bell Northern Research Laboratories.

This important state of affairs developed when the ancient association between Northern Electric and Western Electric came to an end.  In 1956 AT&T signed a consent decree which required, among other things, the de-association of these two companies. As a result, Northern Electric (and I in particular) no longer would have a direct access to research from the Bell Telephone Laboratories in the USA for new product development. 

This resulted in a decision in 1958 by Bell Canada and Northern Electric to start its own research laboratory in Canada.  Because of my prior experience with Bell Telephone Laboratories on new product development, I was fortunate to be selected to join with Vice-President. Brewer Hunt in being the founders of this now prestigious organization. 

Once again, a career change which guided my future along a very different course.  As a founding member of a team of three (which now included Bob Tanner of our Belleville plant) we planned the concept of building a complete telecommunications laboratory facility to perform basic scientific research directed toward final telecom product implementation. 

Another senior engineer, Neil Davidson was added to the team to assist with selecting a strategic location for the laboratory.  Step by step, starting with a study of building requirements and selection of the technical staff which were located in temporary facilities, we carefully laid out a foundation for the initial organization with its headquarters at Shirley’s Bay near Ottawa.  

This was a 75 acre site west of the city, closed to universities and other prominent research organizations, along with desirable characteristics for laboratory activities such as clean air, free from airport noise and vibration, in an appropriate cultural living area for its technical staff.  

Purchase of land and construction of buildings came first, then movement of the key technical personal already selected from parts of the company and later the hiring of additional scientific staff.  Equipment and design facilities were added.  By the middle of 1961 we were in full operation commencing the research and development of new products.  This was the basis for the foundation of a now prestigious world wide organization for telecommunication facilities design and development. 

It was initially named Northern Electric R&D Laboratories until in January 1971 this was changed to Bell Northern Research denoting its new relationship with both its parent companies.   In later years, when Bell Canada and Northern Electric separated, the Laboratories returned to its original affiliation with Northern Electric (now renamed as Nortel).

Many years later this organization had successfully spread its activities establishing branch  laboratories situated around the world, and I had moved on to other things.  For me, my contribution to the creation of this prominent institution was a notable milestone and possibly the foremost accomplishment in my engineering career. 

During the mid and late 1950’s phase of promoting our own product development, at Northern we had formed a group of senior engineers selected as “futurists” who met once a month to promote new visionary ideas in brainstorming sessions.  The group encouraged “way-out” thinking in the concept of future telecommunications applications. 

We realized that effective product planning began at the concept level where the products that we may “conceive” at that time usually appear to be less than technically or economically feasible under the present state of the art.  This was recognized as an accepted basis for successful future product development. 

Some of the visionary ideas discussed at that time (late 50’s) have already come into everyday service; others are still out there somewhere.  Two examples of those now in everyday use are:  one, the satellite transponder - that somewhere in outer space there would be positioned a radio transceiver by means of which anyone, anywhere, could communicate with anyone else on the ground - and another, today’s wireless “Wi-Fi hot spot”, providing wireless telecom repeater transceivers on every corner allowing subscribers to be in communication anywhere. 

I remember one other prediction that so far (year 2000) has not yet been developed - devices to fit on the tips of the fingers, multiplying the ability to perform numerous functions or applications by manipulating one’s finger tips.   The packing of biometric data on fingerpoint computer chips is a move in this direction.

Moving on, I transferred to Bell Canada (which owned Northern Electric at that time) to be placed in charge of an engineering staff to broaden my career in the telecom industry.  This post provided the planning and technical support for about one quarter of the Company in their Eastern and Central Areas. 

This was a fundamental change in my professional experience and benefited my post-retirement career - to qualify as a telecommunications consultant in a wide range of telecom assignments. 

While with Bell Canada, one particular project example stands out in my memory during this period.  In those days (late 60’s) mobile cellular radio was not yet available in the form it is today. We engineered and installed what I believe was the first major cellular radio system (at least in Canada).  It was for communication over a network serving the fleet of police cars used by the Quebec Provincial Police spread throughout the extensive territory of that large province. 

Bell Canada contracted with the province of Quebec to provide a means of communication between police headquarters and their mobile units no matter where they were at any time on the highways.  We examined the maps and the multitude of roads traversing the area including the mountainous regions, selecting strategic locations where antenna and transmitter cells could be installed to provide signal coverage in 90% of the region. 

This is similar to what is done in today’s modern cellular telecom system.  For the Quebec Police telecom service the design was completed and  ordered from local factories, installed, and finally placed in service with great public fanfare. 

The only difference between that cellular system and those of today was that there was no automatic signal hand-off as the cars moved out of the range of signal coverage of one cell into the range of another.  When that happened the radio contact was broken.  However, with only a manual twist of the selector switch on the radio panel the driver of the mobile unit could immediately pick up the adjacent cell’s radio signal.   

This system was used for several years prior to the availability of the modern cellular radio systems accessible to users today with seamless automatic hand-off between cells.  AT&T and Bell Telephone Laboratories (now part of Lucent Technologies) designed the first low-powered “cellular” transmission system in 1968.

New opportunities continued to appear on my career horizon.

END

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