Hugh Cossart Baker Jr.

Hugh Cossart Baker Jr. (9 December 1846, in Hamilton, Canada West – 18 March 1931) was a businessman and telephone pioneer.

[1] On June 20, 1877, Baker started up the first commercial telephone service in Canada in the city of Hamilton, Ontario.

[2] The following season on 15 May 1879 he made Hamilton the site of the first commercial long-distance telephone line in the British Empire.

[2] In 1880, (April 29) Hugh Cossart Baker Jr. received a charter to build a national telephone company in Hamilton, Ontario.

[1] Baker learned of Alexander Graham Bell's invention in 1877 at the Philadelphia International Exposition and from there decided to test the communication tool in Hamilton.