||History (What? There's history involved in FMA?!)||

[Introduction: The 20th Century Begins]
FMA gives gives a brief educational lesson about the early 1900s. This was the time of inventing, as more and more products were being invented. Such as the Wright Brothers and their first flight at Kitty Hawk. This is a list of items we see in FMA along with a little information about it.

[Chronology:]
The older telephones we see in FMA, were used around 1901-1907. Telephones in the 1900s proved to be a big improvement, which allowed people to talk to others without leaving thier house. More phones were found in many places during this time unlike during the mid 1800s, only few had a phone of thier own. Since than, phones became more popular. In 1903, pay phones were introduced in New York. Each call was about 10 cents.
The above pictures shows a photograph of German Telephone(left) and next to is the phone Roy Mustang uses in his office. Apparently, the two look similar and help us get a general idea of what kind of phone they used. The picture of the German phone was used during 1901.
The phone Ed is using in the picture above is similar to a "Milord Piccolo," a Italian wall phone made from wood.

1906, First telephone directory featuring classified business advertising on yellow pages issued in Detroit by the Michigan State Telephone Company. The term "Bell System" is introduced in national advertising in 1908. The theme "One Policy, One System. Universal Service" is originated within AT&T to express the policy of eliminating dual telephone services wherever possible. Dual services were a result of competition which had been active since the expiration of the original Bell patents in 1894.

[Suitcase:]
The old suitcase Ed carries around is similar to the kind that immigrants used for the American Immigration to Ellis Island around 1860-1924. Back then they did not have suitcases that zip close or roll on wheels like today.

[Trains:]
At first trains weren't used to transport people. Trains were simiply used for carrying freight cars filled with materials that needed to be delivered to other states. It wasn't until the 1800s that they started taking passengers onbroad. As years went by, trains became a better progress in transportation.
Before electricity was used steam was the train power source. The first tracks were built from Pireas to Thissio. On February 1904 it was the month that the first steam train made the route Pireas to Thissio in 19 minutes. It pulled 6 wagons and it used a steam engine. In 1968 the first electric trains arrived in Greece. They were constructed by Baume & Marpent. The electric trains were made from wood.

[Pocket Watches:]
Before the modern wristwatch, there was the pocket watch. It was commonly used for conductors, which they called their pocket watch "railroad grade," telling his passengers when they will arrive. The major part of the development of modern timekeeping can be documented by pocket watches. The development of escapements, spirals, the way from a single hand that indicated only the hours to a split-second chronograph, meaning all this can only be studied in pocket watches. Before the pocket watch was the "portable watch" and before that was a chronograph.
Edward's pocket watch in his case is a speical one. Only State Alchemists are given this pocket watch. It proves that Ed passed the test and became "the dog of the military," a achemist that works for the military and is under the Furher's command.

[Planes:]
1900, the Wright Brothers made their own glider and got it to fly 300 square feet. In 1903, they constructed the first airplane with a powered machine to spin the propellers. After that, people kept making better aircrafts. During WWI, biplanes proved to be quite effective in battle.
The above picture is a diagram of the glider that the Elric Brothers use in the FMA PS2 video game (FMA and the Broken Angel).

[Zeppelins:]
The grandest and most dramatic machine of 1914 was surely the great airship. They were large as an ship and about four times as fast.

On August 1914 when WW-I begun, Germany turned airships to bombers. Two Zeppelins made their way to Yarmouth in January, 1915. They damaged the town square, killed 4 townspeople and wrecked random small buildings. The next month Germany tried attacking again but lost 2 Zeppelins in a storm overin Denmark.

Sept. 8, 1915, Germany had their airship methods under control. That night, four Zeppelins rose up over the North Sea and made their way for London. Their prime target was the Bank of England. The air raid did great damage to civilian property and left 109 people homeless.