Childs, William A.

Childs, William A., the final surviving charter member of the Englewood Club of Englewood, New Jersey, passed away Sunday at his home in Los Angeles at the age of 87. News of his death was shared locally by his son, Alfred D. Childs of Englewood. He is survived by his wife, Julia Minor Selleck, whom he married in 1869; two sons, Theodore S. Childs of Riverside, California, and Arthur E. Childs of San Diego; a daughter, Mrs. Charles De H. Brower of Swarthmore, Pennsylvania; as well as nine grandchildren and two great-grandchildren. Childs lived in Englewood from 1868 until relocating to California in 1909. During his four decades in the community, he played a significant role in its early civic and technological development. He was among those responsible for introducing the first telephone service to the town, personally visiting homes and businesses to secure subscribers for the new system. He also served several terms on the City Council. Professionally, Childs worked as a superintendent for life insurance agencies before turning to communications technology. In 1874, he organized the Law Telegraph Company, a firm that created a system allowing lawyers’ offices to communicate quickly with local courts through dial-printing telegraph instruments. The company later developed an early form of telephone switchboard, or “central office,” which remained in use after telephones replaced the earlier telegraph devices. When the Bell Telephone Company of New York assumed control of the local telephone business around 1878, the Law Telegraph Company continued producing and installing switchboards for telephone exchanges in cities such as Philadelphia and St. Louis. The enterprise was eventually sold to Western Electric, marking the culmination of Childs’s involvement in one of the earliest phases of American telecommunications development.