Johann Philipp Reis, German physicist and academic, invented the Reis telephone (born 1834)

Johann Philipp Reis was a self-taught German scientist and inventor. In 1861, he constructed the first make-and-break telephone, today called the Reis telephone. It was the first device to transmit a voice via electronic signals and for that the first modern telephone. Reis also coined the term telephone.

The Reis telephon was an early sound transmitting device, invented by Philipp Reis in 1857. Reis's first successful work is dated to October 1861. When properly set up, it would allow verbal communication via electronic signals. Many sources credit Reis as the inventor of the first telephone. Others point to the prior work of Antonio Meucci, or to later work of Elisha Gray or Alexander Graham Bell. However it is generally agreed that Reis coined the word telephon -- which has been Anglicised to telephone.