no doubt as to the place it will take among the scientific
accomplishments of the age. Merely as a scientific discovery or
invention, it ranks among the wonders of civilization. Much as the
tremendous leap of human voice across the line from New York to San
Francisco appealed to the mind, there is something infinitely more
fascinating in this new triumph of the engineer. The human mind can
grasp the idea of the spoken word being carried along wires, though
that is difficult enough, but when we try to understand its flight
through space we are faced with something beyond the comprehension of
the layman and almost past belief.
We have seen how communication has developed, very slowly at first,
and then, as electricity was discovered, with great rapidity until man
may converse with man at a distance of five thousand miles. What
the future will bring forth we do not know. The ether may be made to
accomplish even more wonderful things as a bearer of intelligence.
Though we cannot now see how it would be possible, the day may come
when every automobile and aeroplane will be equipped with its wireless
telephone, and the motorist and aviator, wherever they go, may
talk with anyone anywhere. The transmission of power by wireless is
confidently predicted. Pictures have been transmitted by telegraph. It
may be possible to transmit them by wireless. Then some one may find
out how to transmit moving pictures through the ether. Then one might
sit and see before him on a screen a representation of what was then
happening thousands of miles away, and, listening through a telephone,
hear all the sounds at the same place. Wonders that we cannot even now
imagine may lie before us.
APPENDIX A
NEW DEVELOPMENTS OF THE TELEGRAPH
_By F.W. Lienan, Superintendent Tariff Bureau, Western Union Telegraph
Company_
The invention of Samuel F.B. Morse is unique in this, that the methods
and instruments of telegraph operation as he evolved them from his
first experimental apparatus were so simple, and yet so completely met
the requirements, that they have continued in use to the present day
in practically their original form. But this does not mean that there
has not been the same constant striving for betterment in this as in
every other art. Many minds have, since the birth of the telegraph,
occupied themselves with the problem of devising improved means of
telegraphic transmission. The results have varied according to the
point of view from which the subject was approached, but all, directly
or indirectly, sought the same goal (the obvious one, since speed is
the essence of telegraphy), to find the best means of sending more
messages over the wire in a given time. It will readily suggest
itself that the solution of this problem lies either in an arrangement
enabling the wire to carry more than one message at once, or in some
apparatus capable of transmitting messages over the wire more
rapidly than can be done by hand, or in a combination of both these
principles.
Duplex and quadruples operations are perhaps the most generally known
methods by which increased utilization of the capacity of the line has
been achieved. Duplex operation permits of the sending of two messages
over one wire in opposite directions at the same time; and quadruples,
the simultaneous transmission of four messages, two going in each
direction. Truly a remarkable accomplishment; but, like many other
things that have found their permanent place in daily use, become so
familiar that we no longer pause to marvel at it. These expedients
constitute a direct and very effective attack on the problem how to
get more work out of the wire with the existing means of operation,
and on account of their fundamental character and the important place
which by reason thereof they have taken in the telegraphic art, are
entitled to first mention.
The problem of increasing the rapidity of transmission has been met by
various automatic systems of telegraphy, so called because they embody
the idea of mechanical transmission with resulting gain in speed and
other advantages. The number of these which have from time to time
been devised is considerable. Not all have proven to be practicable,
but those which have failed to prove in under actual operating
conditions none the less display evidence of ingenuity which may well
excite our admiration.
To mention one or two which may be interesting on account of the
oddity of their method--there was, for instance, an early device,
similar in principle to the calling apparatus of the automatic
telephone, which involved the turning of a movable disk so that a
projection on its circumference pointed successively to the letters to
be transmitted. Experiments were made with ordinary metal type set up
in a composing-stick, a series of brushes passing over the type faces
and producing similar characters on a tape at the other end of the
line. In another more recent ingenious device a pivoted mirror at the
receiving end was so manipulated by the electrical impulses that a ray
of light reflected from the surface of the mirror actually wrote the
message upon sensitized paper, like a pencil, in a fair handwriting.
In another the receiving apparatus printed vertical, horizontal, and
slanting lines in such manner that they combined to make letters,
rather angular, it is true, but legible.
These and other kindred devices are interesting as efforts to
accomplish the direct production of legible messages. In experimental
tests they performed their function successfully, and in some cases
with considerable speed, but some of them required more than one line
wire, some were too sensitive to disturbance by inductive currents
and some developed other weaknesses which have prevented their
incorporation in the actual operating machinery of to-day.
In the general development of the so-called automatic telegraph
devices which have been or now are in practical operation, two lines
have been pursued. One involves direct keyboard transmission; the
other, the use at the sending end of a perforated tape capable of
being run through a transmitting machine at high speed. One type of
the former is the so-called step-by-step process, in which a revolving
body in the transmitting apparatus, as, for instance, a cylinder
provided with pegs placed at intervals around its circumference in
spiral fashion, is arrested by the depression of the keys of the
keyboard in such a way that a type wheel in the receiving apparatus
at the distant end of the line prints the corresponding letter.
This method was employed in the House and Phelps printing telegraphs
operated by the Western Union Telegraph Company in its earlier days,
and is to-day used in the operation of the familiar ticker. In
another type of direct keyboard operation the manipulation of the
keys transmits the impulses directly to the line and the receiving
apparatus translates them by electrically controlled mechanical
devices into printed characters in message form.
The systems best adapted to rapid telegraph work are predicated on the
use of a perforated tape on which, by means of a suitable perforating
apparatus, little round holes are produced in various groupings, each
group, when the tape is passed through the transmitter, causing a
certain combination of electrical impulses to pass over the wire.
The transmitter as a rule consists of a mechanically or motor driven
mechanism which causes the telegraph impulses to be transmitted to the
line, and the combination and character of the impulses are determined
by the tape perforations. The rapidity with which the tape may
be driven through the transmitter makes very high speed operation
possible. Of course it is necessary that there should be at the other
end of the wire apparatus capable of receiving and recording the
signals as speedily as they are sent.
As early as 1848 Alexander Bain perfected a system involving the use
of the perforated transmitting tape; at the receiving station the
messages were recorded in dots and dashes upon a chemically prepared
strip of paper by means of iron pens, the metal of which was, through
the combined action of the electrical current and the chemical
preparation, decomposed, producing black marks in the form of dots and
dashes upon the paper. The Bain apparatus was in actual operation in
the younger days of the telegraph. Various systems, based on similar
principles, involving tape transmission and the production of dots and
dashes on a receiving tape, have from time to time been devised, but
have generally not succeeded in establishing any permanent usefulness
in competition with more effective instrumentalities which have been
perfected.
The hardiest survivor of them is the Wheatstone apparatus, which
has been in successful operation for years. Originally the
perforating--or, to use the commonly current term, the punching--of
the Wheatstone sending tape was accomplished by a mechanism equipped
with three keys--one for the dot, one for the dash, and one for the
space. The keys were struck with rubber-tipped mallets held in the
hands of the operator and brought down with considerable force. Later
this rather primitive perforator was supplanted by one equipped with a
full keyboard on the order of a typewriter keyboard. At the receiving
end of the line the messages are produced on a tape in dots and dashes
of the Morse alphabet, and hence a further process of translation is
necessary. This system has proven very useful, particularly in times
of wire trouble and scarcity of facilities, when it is essential to
move as many messages as possible over the available lines.
The schemes devised for combining automatic transmission by the
perforated-tape method with direct production of the message at
its destination in ordinary letters and figures, eliminating the
intervening step of translation from Morse characters, have been
many. Their individual enumeration is beyond the scope of the present
discussion, and would in any event involve a wearisome exposition of
their distinguishing technical features. Several of these systems are
at present in practical and very effective operation.
One of the forerunners of the printing telegraph systems now in use
was the Buckingham system, for many years employed by the Western
Union Telegraph Company, but now for some time obsolete. The receiving
mechanism of this system printed the messages on telegraph blanks
placed upon a cylinder of just the right circumference to accommodate
two telegraph blanks. The blanks were arranged in pairs, rolled into
the form of a tube and placed around the cylinder. When two messages
had been written a new pair of blanks had to be substituted. This was
a rather awkward arrangement, but at a time when more highly developed
apparatus had not been perfected it served its purpose to good
advantage.
The printing telegraphs of to-day produce their messages by the
direct operation of typewriting machines or mechanisms operating
substantially in the same manner as the ordinary typewriting machine.
The methods by which the electrical impulses coming over the line are
transformed into mechanical operation of the typewriter keys, or what
corresponds to the typewriter keys, vary. It would be difficult to
describe how this function is performed without entering upon much
detail of a highly technical character. Suffice it to say that means
have been devised by which each combination of electrical impulses
coming over the line wire causes a channel to be opened for the motor
operation of the typewriting key-bar operating the corresponding
letter upon the typewriter apparatus. These machines write the
messages with proper arrangement of the date line, address, text, and
signature, operating not only the type, but also the carriage shift
and the line spacing as required. A further step in advance has
been made by feeding the blanks into the receiving typewriter from
a continuous roll, an attendant tearing the messages off as they are
completed. The entire operation is automatic from beginning to end and
capable of considerable speed.
There remained the problem of devising some means by which a number of
automatic units could be operated over the same line at the same
time. This is not by any means a new proposition. Here again various
solutions have been offered by the scientists both of Europe and of
this country, and different systems designed to accomplish the desired
object have been placed in operation. One of the most recent, and
we believe the most efficient so far developed, is the so-called
multiplex printer system, devised by the engineers of the Western
Union Telegraph Company and now being extensively used by that
company. Perhaps the best picture of what is accomplished by this
system can be given by an illustration. Let us assume a single wire
between New York and Chicago. At the New York end there are connected
with this wire four combined perforators and transmitters, and four
receiving machines operating on the typewriter principle. At the
Chicago end the wire is connected with a like number of sending and
receiving machines. All these machines are in simultaneous operation;
that is to say, four messages are being sent from New York to Chicago,
and four messages are being sent from Chicago to New York, all at the
same time and over a single wire, and the entire process is automatic.
The method by which eight messages can be sent over a single wire at
the same time without interfering with one another cannot readily
be described in simple terms. It may give some comprehension of the
underlying principle to say that the heart of the mechanism is in
two disks at each end of the line, which are divided into groups of
segments insulated from each other, each group being connected to one
of the sending or receiving machines, respectively. A rotating contact
brush connected to the line wire passes over the disk, so that, as it
comes into contact with each segment, the line wire is connected in
turn with the channel leading to the corresponding operating unit. The
brushes revolve in absolute unison of time and position. To use the
same illustration as before, the brush on the Chicago disk and the
brush on the New York disk not only move at exactly the same speed,
but at any given moment the two brushes are in exactly the same
position with regard to the respective group of segments of both
disks. If we now conceive of these brushes passing over the successive
segments of the disks at a very great rate of speed, it may be
understood that the effect is that the electrical impulses are
distributed, each receiving machine receiving only those produced by
the corresponding sending machine at the other end. In other words,
each of the sets of receiving and sending apparatus really gets the
use of the line for a fraction of the time during each revolution
of the brushes of the distributer or disk mechanism. The multiplex
automatic circuits are being extended all over the country and are
proving extremely valuable in handling the constantly growing volume
of telegraph traffic.
What has thus been achieved in developing the technical side of
telegraph operation must be attributed in part to that impulse toward
improvement which is constantly at work everywhere and is the most
potent factor in the progress of all industries, but in large
measure it is the reflex of the growing--and recently very rapidly
growing--demands which are made upon the telegraph service. Emphasis
is placed on the larger ratio of growth in this demand in recent years
because it is peculiarly symptomatic of a noticeably wider realization
of the advantages which the telegraph offers as an effective medium
for business and social correspondence than has heretofore been in
evidence. It means that we have graduated from that state of mind
which saw in the telegraph something to be resorted to only under
the stress of emergency, which caused many good people to associate
a telegram with trouble and bad news and sudden calamity. There are
still some dear old ladies who, on receipt of a telegram, make a rapid
mental survey of the entire roster of their near and distant relatives
and wonder whose death or illness the message may announce before they
open the fateful envelope, only to find that up-to-date Cousin Mary,
who has learned that the telegraph is as readily used as the mail and
many times more rapid and efficient, wants to know whether they can
come out for the week-end. When Cousin Mary of to-day wants to know,
she wants to know right away--not only that she has her arrangements
to make, but also because she just does not propose to wait a day or
two to get a simple answer to a simple question.
Therein she embodies the spirit of the times. Our ancestors were
content to jog along for days in a stuffy stage-coach; we complain
that the train which accomplishes the same distance in a few hours is
too slow. We act more quickly; we think more quickly. We have to if we
want to keep within earshot of the band.
This speeding up makes itself quite obviously most apparent in our
business processes. No body of business men need be told how much
keener competition is becoming daily, how much narrower the margin by
which success must be won. Familiar phrases, these. But behind them
lies a wealth of tragedy. How many have fallen by the way? It is
estimated that something less than ten per cent. of those who engage
in business on their own account succeed. How terrible the percentage
of those who fail! The race has become too swift for them. Driven
by the lash of competition, business must perforce move faster and
faster. Time is becoming ever more precious. Negotiations must be
rapidly conducted, decisions arrived at quickly, transactions closed
on the moment. What wonder that all this makes for a vastly increased
use of the quickest method of communication?
That is but one of the conditions which accounts for the growing use
of the telegraph. Another is to be found in the recognition of the
convenience of the night letter and day letter. This has brought
about a considerable increase in the volume of family and social
correspondence by telegraph, which will grow to very much greater
proportions as experience demonstrates its value. In business life the
night letter and day letter have likewise established a distinct place
for themselves. Here also the present development of this traffic can
be regarded as only rudimentary in comparison with the possibilities
of its future development, indications of which are already apparent.
It has been discovered that the telegram, on account of its peculiar
attention-compelling quality, is an effective medium not only for
the individual appeal, but for placing business propositions before
a number of people at once, the night letters and day letters being
particularly adapted to this purpose by reason of the greater scope of
expression which they offer.
Again, business men are developing the habit of using the telegram
in keeping in touch with their field forces and their salesmen and
encouraging their activities, in cultivating closer contact with their
customers, in placing their orders, in replenishing their stocks,
and in any number of other ways calculated to further the profitable
conduct of their enterprises.
All this means that the telegraph is increasingly being utilized as a
means of correspondence of every conceivable sort. It means also that
with the growing appreciation of its adaptability to the every-day
needs of social and business communication a very much larger public
demand upon it must be anticipated, and it is to meet this demand with
prompt and satisfactory service that the telegraph company has
been bending its efforts to the perfection of a highly developed
organization and of operating appliances of the most modern and
efficient type.
APPENDIX B
Through the courtesy of J.J. Carty, Esq., Chief Engineer of the
American Telephone and Telegraph Company, there follows the clean-cut
survey of the evolution of the telephone presented in his address
before the Franklin Institute in Philadelphia, May 17, 1916, when he
received the gold medal of the Institute.
More than any other, the telephone art is a product of American
institutions and reflects the genius of our people. The story of its
wonderful development is a story of our own country. It is a story
exclusively of American enterprise and American progress, for,
although the most powerful governments of Europe have devoted their
energies to the development and operation of telephone systems, great
contributions to the art have not been made by any of them. With very
few exceptions, the best that is used in telephony everywhere in the
world to-day has been contributed by workers here in America.
It is of peculiar interest to recall the fact that the first words
ever transmitted by the electric telephone were spoken in a building
at Boston, not far from where Benjamin Franklin first saw the light.
The telephone, as well as Franklin, was born at Boston, and, like
Franklin, its first journey into the world brought it to Philadelphia,
where it was exhibited by its inventor, Alexander Graham Bell, at
the Centennial Exhibition in 1876, held here to commemorate the first
hundred years of our existence as a free and independent nation.
It was a fitting contribution to American progress, representing the
highest product of American inventive genius, and a worthy continuance
of the labors of Franklin, one of the founders of the science of
electricity as well as of the Republic.
Nothing could appeal more to the genius of Franklin than the
telephone, for not only have his countrymen built upon it an
electrical system of communication of transcendent magnitude and
usefulness, but they have made it into a powerful agency for the
advancement of civilization, eliminating barriers to speech, binding
together our people into one nation, and now reaching out to the
uttermost limits of the earth, with the grand aim of some day bringing
together the people of all the nations of the earth into one common
brotherhood.
On the tenth day of March, 1876, the telephone art was born, when,
over a wire extending between two rooms on the top floor of a building
in Boston, Alexander Graham Bell spoke to his associate, Thomas A.
Watson, saying: "Mr. Watson, please come here. I want you." These
words, then heard by Mr. Watson in the instrument at his ear,
constitute the first sentence ever received by the electric telephone.
The instrument into which Doctor Bell spoke was a crude apparatus, and
the current which it generated was so feeble that, although the line
was about a hundred feet in length, the voice heard in the receiver
was so faint as to be audible only to such a trained and sensitive ear
as that of the young Mr. Watson, and then only when all surrounding
noises were excluded.
Following the instructions given by Doctor Bell, Mr. Watson with his
own hands had constructed the first telephone instruments and ran the
first telephone wire. At that time all the knowledge of the telephone
art was possessed exclusively by those two men. There was no
experience to guide and no tradition to follow. The founders of the
telephone, with remarkable foresight, recognized that success depended
upon the highest scientific knowledge and technical skill, and at once
organized an experimental and research department. They also sought
the aid of university professors eminent for their scientific
attainments, although at that time there was no university giving the
degree of Electrical Engineer or teaching electrical engineering.