Note 1 — Chapter IX · OPPOSITION TO THE CENTRALIZATION OF THE GOVERNMENT—GENERAL PROSPERITY

The Volta prize has been awarded only three or four times. An award of particular interest to Americans was that made in 1880 to Dr. Alexander Graham Bell, the inventor of the telephone. The amount of the prize was a little less than ten thousand dollars. Dr. Bell, being already in affluent circumstances, upon receiving this prize, set it apart to be used for the benefit of the deaf, in whose welfare he had for many years taken a great interest. He invested it in another invention of his, which proved to be very profitable, so that the fund came to amount to one hundred thousand dollars. This he termed the Volta Fund. Some of this fund has been applied by Dr. Bell to the organization of the Volta Bureau, which collects all valuable information that can be obtained with reference to not only deaf-mutes as a class, but to deaf-mutes individually. Twenty-five thousand dollars has been given to the Association for the Promotion of Teaching Speech to the Deaf. Napoleon is thus indirectly the founder of one of the most interesting and valuable present undertakings of the country.