Invention of the telephone Gray's led to the myth that Bell had arrived at the Patent Office earlier. Bell was in Boston on February 14 and did not know this happened until later. Gray later abandoned his caveat and did not contest Bell's priority. That opened the door to Bell being granted US patent 174465 for the telephone on March 7, 1876. In 1906 the citizens of the City of Brantford, Ontario, Canada and its surrounding area formed the Bell Memorial Association to commemorate the invention of the telephone by Alexander Graham Bell in July 1874 at his parent's home, Melville House, near Brantford.
Elisha Gray and Alexander Bell telephone controversy and Gray's sponsor Samuel S. White to abandon the caveat and not to file a patent application for the telephone. Whether Bell's application was filed before or after Gray's caveat no longer mattered, because Gray abandoned his caveat and did not contest Bell's priority, which resulted in Bell being granted for the telephone on March 7, 1876. Several conspiracy theories were presented during trials and appeals (1878–1888) in which the Bell Telephone Company sued competitors and later when Bell and his lawyers were accused of patent fraud. These theories were based on alleged corruption of the patent examiner Zenas Wilber