463 West Street is a 13-building complex located on the block between West Street, Washington Street, Bank Street, and Bethune Street in Manhattan, New York City. It was originally the home of Bell Telephone Laboratories between 1898 and 1966. For a time, it was the largest industrial research center in the United States. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places and further designated as a National Historic Landmark, as Bell Telephone Laboratories.[1]
Many early technological inventions were developed here including automatic telephone panel and crossbar switches, the first experimental talking movies (1923), black-and-white and color TV, video telephones, radar, the vacuum tube, medical equipment, the development of the phonograph record and the first commercial broadcasts, including the first broadcast of a baseball game and the New York Philharmonic with Arturo Toscanini conducting. It also served as the headquarters for the company from 1925 to the early 1960s,[3] after which the headquarters moved to Murray Hill, New Jersey.