How it started
Early years
The Sprint Corporation traces its origins to two companies, the Brown Telephone Company and Southern Pacific Railroad.
Brown Telephone Company
Brown Telephone Company was founded in 1899 by Cleyson Brown, to deploy the first telephone service to the rural area around Abilene, Kansas. In 1911, C. L. Brown consolidated the Brown Telephone Company with three other independents to form the United Telephone Company. C. L. Brown formed United Telephone and Electric (UT&E) in 1925. In 1939, at the end of the Great Depression, UT&E reorganized to form United Utilities.
In 1964, Paul H. Henson became president of United Utilities; two years later, he was named chairman. When Henson began working at the company in 1959, it had 575,000 telephones in 15 states and revenues of $65 million. Henson is credited with creating the first major fiber optic network, having recognized it as a way to handle more calls and provide better quality sound.
In 1972, United Utilities changed its name to United Telecommunications. In 1980, United Telecommunications began working on a 23,000 mile fiber optic network for long-distance calls. In 1989, this long-distance business became profitable for the company for the first time. In 1990, Henson retired from United Telecommunications; by this time the company's revenues had grown to $8 billion.
From Wikipedia’s article on Sprint Corporation, shared under CC BY-SA 4.0.3