Our very first lecture topic was on telegraph and let me tell you this, before joining the programme I had a clue of what telegraph was and honestly speaking I wasn’t very thrilled about it. But as our lecturer Kat began talking about it, I got curious to learn more about it. Since I like reading about history and about how things have evolved so much in the past few years, I was interested to know more about it.
In today’s world, we are all aware of the power of technology and how easy it is to spread and exchange information in a matter of time through various social media apps no matter how far you are from each other. However, life wasn’t always this easy and simple especially back in 90s people had to go through various troubles to pass a message or to communicate. So how did people manage to communicate then? It was through a device known as the Telegraph. I bet some of you are thinking what is telegraph? Well, at least that’s what I asked myself when I heard about it the very first time. If so, worry not, allow me to take you on a journey to back in the 19th century to run you down through the telegraph history.
What is telegraph? Developed in the 1830s and 1840s by Samuel Morse (1791-1872) and other inventors the telegraph is a communications system which transmits the information over a wire through a series of electrical current pulses, usually in the form of Morse code which assigned a set of dots and dashes to each letter of the English alphabet and allowed for the simple transmission of complex messages across telegraph lines. The term telegraph comes from the Greek words “tele,” meaning “at a distance” and “graphien,” meaning “to write.” First of all, the telegraph was most commonly used by the military to communicate with the commanders during the battlefield and generate strategies quicker and act faster.
Morse’s original design of the single-wire telegraph
Next, it was also used by the French government to keep control of the provinces and to communicate with people from further distances. It was also popular with newspaper industries as the telegraph helped deliver more UpToDate news. The workload lessened and delivering news was more efficient and suddenly people were interested in far-off places and the news. Although the telegraph had fallen out of widespread use by the start of the 21st century, replaced by the telephone, fax machine and Internet, it laid the groundwork for the communications revolution that led to those later innovations.
Looking now to 21st century, with access to an abundance of information, and all the electronic devices around us we practically live in a technology and media-suffused environment. Now, everything can be done in a matter of time. For example; you can watch movies from your smartphones or laptops, you can shop online without having to get out of your bed. Communication has come far from handwritten letters delivered by horses to texting, emails or just calling via smartphones/ devices.
All in all, life has become more comfortable and its all thanks to the telegraph because if it wasn’t for the telegraph we might not have been able to experience this luxurious life. I am honestly blown away by how smart people are to come up with such inventions and super excited to see the other magnificent inventions that are going to occur in coming days.
References
History.com Editors. (2009, November 9). Morse Code & the Telegraph. Retrieved September 15, 2019, from https://www.history.com/topics/inventions/telegraph.
Rouse, M., & Rouse, M. (n.d.). What is telegraph? – Definition from WhatIs.com. Retrieved September 12, 2019, from https://searchunifiedcommunications.techtarget.com/definition/telegraph.
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