[f. prec. sb.]
1. a. intr. To convey sound to a distance by or as by a telephone; esp. to send a message or communicate by speaking through a telephone.
1880. Times, 22 Sept., 7/6. Mr. Bell … has succeeded in telegraphing, or rather ‘telephoning,’ along a beam of light.
1881. Chicago Times, 4 June. Mr. Smith … telephoned immediately to headquarters about the matter.
1899. Westm. Gaz., 25 July, 4/2. Instruments by which telephoning without wires can be successfully accomplished.
b. trans. To convey or announce by telephone (in quot. 1879 by sound generally).
1879. Calderwood, Mind & Br., 139. He will interpret such signs as whistling, calling,… and … proceed to the execution of the fresh orders so ‘telegraphed,’ perhaps I should say ‘telephoned.’
1882. Daily News, 25 Aug., 3/1. You may safely defer setting out … until No. 2 has been telephoned.
1888. Encycl. Brit., XXIII. 127/1. This [Wheatstone’s ‘magic lyre’] only answers for telephoning musical sounds to short distances.
1888. Montreal Weekly Witness, 13 June, 1/4. The news was at once telephoned to Mrs. Cleveland.
c. To speak to or summon by telephone.
1889. Westgarth, Austral. Progress, 153. As he might be there, they would ‘telephone’ him.
1894. Howells, in Harper’s Mag., Feb., 378. She telephoned you on the impulse of the moment.
2. To furnish with telephones; to establish a system of telephones in (a place).
1901. Speaker, 14 Dec., 296/1. The London County Council prepared … estimates for telephoning London in 1898.
1904. Daily News, 19 April, 2. If the United Kingdom were ‘telephoned’ in the same proportion there would be nearly 800,000 instruments on its various exchange systems, instead of some 250,000 only.
Hence Telephoned ppl. a.; Telephoning vbl. sb.; also Telephoner, one who telephones.
1884. Whitaker’s Almanack, 385/1. Remarkable trials of long distance telephoning.
1891. Cent. Dict., Telephoner.
1894. Telephoned words [see TELEGRAPHED].
1902. Westm. Gaz., 26 Aug., 1/3. When one has had actual experience of a thoroughly telephoned town.
