The definitive history of America's greatest incubator of innovation and the birthplace of some of the 20th century's most influential technologies From its beginnings in the 1920s until its demise in the 1980s, Bell Labs- officially, the research and development wing of AT&T-was; the biggest, and arguably the best, laboratory for new ideas in the world. From the transistor to the laser, from digital communications to cellular telephony, it's hard to find an aspect of modern life that hasn't been touched by Bell Labs. In The Idea Factory, Jon Gertner traces the origins of some of the twentieth century's most important inventions and delivers a riveting and heretofore untold chapter of American history. At its heart this is a story about the life and work of a small group