In October 1861, he enlisted as a Musician in Company A, 8th New York Cavalry Regiment, to fight in the American Civil War.

It is not clear where his idea of an automatic telephone exchange was originally conceived, but his patent application identifies him as being a resident of Kansas City, Missouri, on March 10, 1891.

[1] Motivated to remove the intermediary operator, he invented the first automatic telephone exchange in 1889; he received its patent in 1891.

[3] While he may have come up with the idea, he was not alone in his endeavors and sought the assistance of his nephew William and others with a knowledge of electricity and money to realise his concepts.

[6] The company's engineers continued development of Strowger's designs and submitted several patents in the names of its employees.

He died, aged 63, of an aneurysm after suffering from anemia, at St. Petersburg, Pinellas County, Florida; he was buried in Greenwood Cemetery the next day.

The funds were used to develop a website to impart the history of the cemetery where Strowger is buried, and to restore two Civil War memorials.

The Greenwood Cemetery project won an organization achievement award from the Florida Trust for Historic Preservation.