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BE Informed No. 68 HISTORIC PLACES
FOR PRE-RADIO TELEGRAPHY ENTHUSIASTS TO VISIT ●▬ ▬ ●●●▬ ▬ ▬●●● ● While over-night in Poughkeepsie, NY, on a motor-trip a few summers ago, we discovered that we were near the Locust Grove Estate villa designed in 1851 for portrait painter Samuel F. B. Morse. The next morning we took the tourist tour through the property and learned something of his role in the development of telegraphy and how it came to bear his name. This summer, we visited historic Speedwell, NJ, and learned even more of that fascinating story from the exhibits and from the thorough explanations by our excellent guide. Historic Speedwell, near Morristown, preserves part of the Vail Homestead Farm. It is a building complex that portrays mid-19the Century life at Speedwell, at the time when the Alfred Vail and Samuel Morse were making telecommunication history. Below is the Speedwell Iron Works Factory building where their experiments were conducted and the site of a landmark public demonstration.  In 1837, during a visit to New York University, his alma mater, Vail saw a demonstration of a very early experimental version of Morse’s telegraph. Morse had learned of the electromagnetic phenomena from another passenger while traveling aboard an ocean liner, and immediately saw its telegraphy potential. Morse signed a contract giving Vail an interest in the Morse patents in return for Vail’s technical and financial assistance. Returning to Speedwell, Vail fabricated experimental telegraphy apparatus in the family Speedwell Iron Works Factory building. Morse visited Speedwell several times to see Vail’s innovations, to suggest experiments, and to paint portraits of Alfred’s parents. Both paintings are on display in the Vail Mansion at Speedwell.  The apparatus they developed, initially, was not the hand-keyed on-off tone system that we know; it was a visual graphic paper-marking apparatus, hence the term telegraphy. The receiver consisted of an electromagnet that moved an inked pen sideways, marking with short and long excursions a moving strip of paper (below).  The sending mechanism also was not the telegraphy key that we know. It consisted of a strip holding a series of small metal pieces, shown below; one for each alphabet and numerical character. Each piece was configured with a unique cipher of notches. The sending operator loaded the strip with pieces assembled to make words, then passed the strip under a stylus that, while tracing over the notches, keyed the battery-powered circuit. Some of the dot-dash letter ciphers are similar to the international Morse ciphers that we use today.  In January 1838, there was a successful public demonstration of the system carrying messages over two miles of wire strung about the Speedwell Iron Works Factory building. Subsequently, Morse and Vail demonstrated a much simpler - and more recognizable to us - version of their paper-marking telegraphy system to members of Congress. In 1844, they received a $30,000 appropriation to construct an experimental Washington to Baltimore line. Morse and Vail were the first two telegraphers on that line. On May 23, 1991, with replica apparatus provided by
Western Union for the 1944 centenary of the telegraph from the Smithsonian Institution, there was a Bicentennial Celebration
recreation of their first message sent from our U.S. Capitol building: What hath God wrought. (Photo
below.)
 Above photo: May 23, 1991, recreation at the U.S. Capitol Building. Seated: Architect of the Capitol George White W3HDO portraying Samuel F.B.Morse. Standing L to R: Mrs. Jo Ann (Long) Morse; David Siddall K3ZJ; Judge Robert Findley Breeze Morse (great-great-grandson); Frank Donovan W3LPL, and Bill Hider N3RR.  Above photo: Telegraph key commemorating the May 23, 1991, Samuel F. B. Morse Bidentennial Celebration. After becoming operational, telegraphers soon learned to greatly speed up the process by mentally deciphering the word-forming characters from the clicking sounds made by the receiver’s electromagnet. One such was Thomas Alva Edison (1847 – 1931), who plied his itinerant trade in Indianapolis, Cincinnati, Memphis, and Louisville before working in Boston for Western Union (1864 – 1869). In West Orange, NJ, we visited the fabulous Edison National Historic Park, and – among the many artifacts on display – saw a telegraphy recording device that he invented. He used it to recover and fill in any sent text that he had missed receiving. He later credited the device with being the inspiration for his sensational phonograph. We also saw some of the numerous other devices that he invented as well as the laboratories and factory buildings where they were developed and manufactured (below).  Edison was born in Milan, OH, another historic site we have visited. He is credited with building the first industrial research laboratory, in Menlo Park, NJ (1876–1881). We have visited that recreated building in Greenfield Village, Dearborn, MI. We have also visited his Fort Myers, FL, Seminole Lodge winter retreat and laboratory and his Llewellyn Park Glenmont home of 44 years in West Orange, NJ (below).  It wasn’t until the turn of the 20th Century that telegraphy communication without wires became practical. Some of our very earliest amateur operators learned the Morse code on wireline systems before there was radio. For anyone having a curiosity in the history of pre-radio telegraphy, all of these sites are recommended for a visit. Thanks for Frank Donovan W3LPL for the following list of some other interesting locations to visit: The restored Supreme Court Chamber in the U.S. Capitol where Morse sent the "What Hath God Wrought" message. The
B&O Railroad Museum, the depot where Alfred Vail received the "What Hath God Wrought" message
then retransmitted it back to Morse in the Capitol. The Library of Congress, where Morse's paper tape of the "What Hath God Wrought" message from
Vail is sealed in a gas filled container. http://www.historyexplorer.si.edu/artifacts/resource.asp?id=4166 http://memory.loc.gov/mss/mmorse/071/071009/0001d.jpg The French Cable Station Museum on Cape Cod. http://frenchcablestationmuseum.org/index.htm Grave site of S.F.B Morse in Greenwood Cemetery, Brooklyn NY. http://www.flickr.com/photos/kevystew/3366171612 http://www.flickr.com/photos/davidberkowitz/5676934483 Samuel F.B. Morse papers, Library of Congress: http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/sfbmhtml/sfbmhome.html S.F.B. Morse statue in Central Park, NYC. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Morse_statue_72_jeh.JPG Porthcornu Telegraph Museum, http://www.porthcurno.org.uk Western Union Collection, Smithsonian Institution http://invention.smithsonian.org/resources/fa_wu_index.aspx Alice Springs Telegraph Station (Frank has visited there.) http://www.nt.gov.au/nreta/heritage/visit/pdf/asts.pdf Morse's most ambitious and last painting, "Gallery of the Louvre"
(1833) is on loan to the National Gallery of Art and on exhibit on the main floor of the West Bldg at 6th and Constitution.
http://www.nga.gov/exhibitions/morseinfo.shtm This isn't pre-radio, but interesting none the less: http://www.nasm.si.edu/collections/artifact.cfm?id=A20030065012 Thanks to Hal Wallace for the following: The original Morse prototype Canvas Stretcher and Port Rule units are on display in the Smithsonian American Art Museum until January 8, 2012. http://www.americanart.si.edu/exhibitions/archive/2011/wonders/ There is a second What Hath God Wrought register tape currently in storage at the Smithsonian Institution. The one at the Library of Congress is the message that came off Vail’s register in Baltimore. The Smithsonian tape is the confirmation message that Vail sent back down the line to be printed out on Morse’s register at the Capitol. ●▬ ▬
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October 17, 2011 Supersedes all prior editions |
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