Revealed: The world's first mobile phone was the size of a dustbin lid - and had a range of just half a mile in 1902

The world's first mobile phone could hardly be more different to today's devices, which are small enough to slip inside a pocket and can call almost anywhere in the world.

But its inventor, Nathan Stubblefield, is finally being recognised as the father of mobile phone technology exactly 100 years after he patented his design for a "wireless telephone".

The melon farmer came up with his invention in 1902 after devoting every spare hour and penny he had to establishing a telephone service in his rural home-town of Murray, Kentucky.

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Field test: Receiver in hand, Nathan Stubblefield demonstrates his invention in his orchard (the mast can be seen in the centre of the picture)

He constructed a 120ft mast in his orchard, which transmitted speech from one telephone to another using magnetic fields.

However, the total amount of wire required for the coils in the phones was far longer than what would be required to simply connect them - but the invention allowed mobility.

The self-taught electrician demonstrated his device in the town's public square on New Year's Day in 1902, broadcasting music and speech to five receivers.

And in 1908 he patented a new version designed to communicate with moving vehicles such as stagecoaches and boats.

Unfortunately, his phones were not commercially successful in his lifetime and he died virtually penniless in 1928.

But now a book has credited him with being the father of the modern mobile phone and he is being honoured with his very own page on the Virgin Mobile website to mark the anniversary of his creation.

Virgin's founder Sir Richard Branson said: "Nathan is the father of the mobile phone and I'm thrilled we can celebrate the 100-year anniversary of his invention that in some way went on to change the way the world communicates."

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Professor of journalism Bob Locke, author of a 2001 book called Kentucky Farmer Invents Wireless Telephone!, said Stubblefield was a pioneer who had never been given enough credit for his invention.

"It is very hard to be absolutely-sure that he invented the world's first mobile phone but he was definitely granted the first patent," he said.

"So it is very likely on that basis that he invented the first one but his invention never really took off.

"It was quite impractical and people did not really have the foresight at the time to see where it might end up.

£Stubblefield was a good man who just wanted to help his local community by connecting the houses, which were some distance from each other, with a telephone service."

Sadly, Stubblefield never sold a single unit of his design.

He had always been obsessively secretive and never allowed his family to leave the farm without him, and was loath to let visitors on to his property because he feared they might steal his inventions.

His family - he had six children - lived in abject poverty, with any spare money funnelled into his electrical experiments.

His wife left him and Stubblefield lived the last decade of his life as an itinerant hermit.

He died in 1928 and was buried in an unmarked grave.

There are an estimated 2.5billion mobile phone handsets in use worldwide.

• As many as 10,000 mobile phones are stolen every month in the UK.

• Thirteen per cent of UK households have a mobile phone instead of a landline.

• There are 95 mobile phones for every 100 people in Europe.

• Six million mobiles are bought every month in India.

• There are more than 50,000 mobile phone masts in the UK.

• A Swedish study found using a mobile phone for ten years or more increases the risk of ear tumours by four times.

• Ninety per cent of under-16s in Britain own a mobile and one in ten spends more than 45 minutes a day using it, according to one survey.