COLUMBUS, Ga. (WRBL) — The cell phone is celebrating 50 years of its first call on April 3.

Motorola executive Martin Cooper called Joel S. Engel of Bell Labs on April 3. 1973, in front of reporters on a New York City street corner. An inventor and pioneer of wireless communications, Martin Cooper is considered the father of the cell phone.

Alexander Graham Bell invented the telephone in March 1876 and the car phone was in use since 1946. But the invention of the cell phone was not possible until 1973.

Cooper developed many products including the portable police radio system for the Chicago Police Department in 1967. His first cell phone was called Brick Phone because it was large and heavy like a brick.

Although Cooper invented the cell phone in 1973, it took 10 years to bring the product to the market.