Antonio Meucci
Inventor
Inventor of a communications device that is often considered the first telephone, which he developed from 1856 and 1870.
He studied mechanical engineering at the Florence Academy of Fine Arts.
Although he submitted his telephonic device to the U.S. Patent Office in 1871, five years before Alexander Graham Bell submitted his telephone, Bell is credited with creating the telephone because he had the forethought to include electromagnetic transmission of vocal sound in his patent.
He married costume designer Esterre Mochi in 1834 after meeting her while employed as a stage technician at the Teatro della Pergola in Florence.
He was a friend of nationalist Giuseppe Garibaldi.