Voices Heard By Wireless.

New York Times 100 years ago today, December 19, 1912:
Marconi Operator Picks Up Conversation 150 Miles Away.
Special to The New York Times.
    SAN FRANCISCO, Dec. 18.— A demonstration that wireless methods may be used for transmission of the human voice was made on the recent trip of the Pacific Mail liner San Jose, which reached here to-day from Panama. Last Monday, while off the Lower California coast, C. H. Kessler, the ship's Marconi operator, distinctly heard conversation while he was taking a wireless message. The conversation was a test of wireless telephones between Catalina Island and the mainland of California, and was carried on 150 miles from Kessler.
    At noon, when R. H. Shimek relieved Kessler, he also heard scraps of conversation, as well as music from a phonograph. As several passengers were around the wireless room he gave them individual receivers, and they heard ragtime music distinctly, and even danced around the deck to the tunes. The Captain was called in and heard the music.
    This experience is said to be the first of the kind ever recorded, and it suggests that the wireless at sea may yet be handled like the telephone, which would be a great economy in time of transmission, especially in the case of vessels in port.