To the Transcontinental Telephone

Helerin Raikerus

North America – from east to west – a bit less than 4000 km!

4000km

Horizon – 4km +- from terrain types

Smoke

On foot – 50km (80 days)

By ship – a month

On a horse – up to 160km

(25 days)

Pony Express – 10 days

Telegraph

Railroad (3.5 days)

Voice transfer

Digital data transfer

http://ohhs65.com/images/SmokeSignals.gif

The Pony Express

• William Russell, hoping to get a government contract for more rapid mail delivery service, started the Pony Express in 1860, cutting delivery time to ten days. He set up over 150 stations about 15 miles (24 km) apart.

http://www.legendsofamerica.com/photos-oldwest/PonyExpressMap.jpg

The Pony Express

• William Russell, hoping to get a government contract for more rapid mail delivery service, started the Pony Express in 1860, cutting delivery time to ten days. He set up over 150 stations about 15 miles (24 km) apart.

http://www.legendsofamerica.com/photos-oldwest/PonyExpressMap.jpg

http://www.nps.gov/archive/poex/hrs/images/fig4.jpg

Milestones• Otto von Guericke invented a machine that produced static

electricity in 1660.• In 1800 Alessandro Volta invented the Voltaic Pile.• Samuel Thomas von Sömmering - 1809, Francisco Salvá i Campillo

-1804.• In 1816, Francis Ronalds set up a primitive telegraph.• Hans Christian Ørsted discovered in 1820 that an electric current

produces a magnetic field.• In 1832 an electromagnetic telegraph was created by Baron

Schilling in Russia.• In the United States, the telegraph was developed by Samuel Morse

and Alfred Vail in 1836.• Then in 1835 Joseph Henry invented the critical electrical relay, by

which a weak current could operate a powerful local electromagnet over very long distances.

What is a Telegraph?

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Building Connection

• On 6 January 1838 Morse first successfully tested the device at the Speedwell Ironworks near Morristown, New Jersey, and on 8 February he publicly demonstrated it to a scientific committee at the Franklin Institute in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

• In 1843 the U.S. Congress appropriated $30,000 to fund an experimental telegraph line from Washington, D.C. to Baltimore.

• 24th of May 1844, “What hath God wrought”• over 50,000 miles (80,000 km) of wire were laid

out to form a single national network

The Continental Telegraph• As the transcontinental telegraph was laid it passed through

Nebraska where Republican sympathizers prior to the American Civil War were eager to gain statehood for Nevada before the next presidential election so that Abraham Lincoln would have enough votes to win. They rushed to send the entire state constitution by telegraph to the United States Congress, which approved it and sent it to the President for signature. They did not believe sending it by train would guarantee it would arrive on time. The constitution was sent on 31 October, just eight days before the election on 7 November 1864.

• the continental telegraph was completed on October 24, 1861 - an existing network in the eastern United States was connected to the small network in California by a link between Omaha and Carson City via Salt Lake City

"Utah has not seceded but is firm for the Constitution and the laws of our once happy country."

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Railroad

• May 10, 1869• 83 hours and 39

minutes

1914