Part 256

"The European philosophers kept on groping. At the end of five years [after Oersted's discovery], one of them reached an obstacle which he made up his mind was so entirely insurmountable, that it rendered the electric telegraph an impossibility for all future time. This was [1825] Mr. Peter Barlow, fellow of the Royal Society, who had encountered the question whether the lengthening of the conducting wire would produce any effect in diminishing the energy of the current transmitted, and had undertaken to resolve the problem. … 'I found [he said] such a considerable diminution with only 200 feet of wire as at once to convince me of the impracticability of the scheme.' … The year following the announcement of Barlow's conclusions, a young graduate of the Albany (N. Y.) Academy—by name Joseph Henry—was appointed to the professorship of mathematics in that institution. Henry there began the series of scientific investigations which is now historic. … Up to that time, electro-magnets had been made with a single coil of naked wire wound spirally around the core, with large intervals between the strands. The core was insulated as a whole: the wire was not insulated at all. Professor Schweigger, who had previously invented the multiplying galvanometer, had covered his wires with silk. Henry followed this idea, and, instead of a single coil of wire, used several. … Barlow had said that the gentle current of the galvanic battery became so weakened, after traversing 200 feet of wire, that it was idle to consider the possibility of making it pass over even a mile of conductor and then affect a magnet. {773} Henry's reply was to point out that the trouble lay in the way Barlow's magnet was made. … Make the magnet so that the diminished current will exercise its full effect. Instead of using one short coil, through which the current can easily slip, and do nothing, make a coil of many turns; that increases the magnetic field: make it of fine wire, and of higher resistance. And then, to prove the truth of his discovery, Henry put up the first electro-magnetic telegraph ever constructed. In the academy at Albany, in 1831, he suspended 1,060 feet of bell-wire, with a battery at one end and one of his magnets at the other; and he made the magnet attract and release its armature. The armature struck a bell, and so made the signals. Annihilating distance in this way was only one part of Henry's discovery. He had also found, that, to obtain the greatest dynamic effect close at hand, the battery should be composed of a very few cells of large surface, combined with a coil or coils of short coarse wire around the magnet,—conditions just the reverse of those necessary when the magnet was to be worked at a distance. Now, he argued, suppose the magnet with the coarse short coil, and the large-surface battery, be put at the receiving station; and the current coming over the line be used simply to make and break the circuit of that local battery. … This is the principle of the telegraphic 'relay.' In 1835 Henry worked a telegraph-line in that way at Princeton. And thus the electro-magnetic telegraph was completely invented and demonstrated. There was nothing left to do, but to put up the posts, string the lines, and attach the instruments."

_P. Benjamin, The Age of Electricity, chapter 11._

"At last we leave the territory of theory and experiment and come to that of practice. 'The merit of inventing the modern telegraph, and applying it on a large scale for public use, is, beyond all question, due to Professor Morse of the United States.' So writes Sir David Brewster, and the best authorities on the question substantially agree with him. … Leaving for future consideration Morse's telegraph, which was not introduced until five years after the time when he was impressed with the notion of its feasibility, we may mention the telegraph of Gauss and Weber of Göttingen. In 1833, they erected a telegraphic wire between the Astronomical and Magnetical Observatory of Göttingen, and the Physical Cabinet of the University, for the purpose of carrying intelligence from the one locality to the other. To these great philosophers, however, rather the theory than the practice of Electric Telegraphy was indebted. Their apparatus was so improved as to be almost a new invention by Steinheil of Munich, who, in 1837 … succeeded in sending a current from one end to the other of a wire 36,000 feet in length, the action of which caused two needles to vibrate from side to side, and strike a bell at each movement. To Steinheil the honour is due of having discovered the important and extraordinary fact that the earth might be used as a part of the circuit of an electric current. The introduction of the Electric Telegraph into England dates from the same year as that in which Steinheil's experiments took place. William Fothergill Cooke, a gentleman who held a commission in the Indian army, returned from India on leave of absence, and afterwards, because of his bad health, resigned his commission, and went to Heidelberg to study anatomy. In 1836, Professor Mönke, of Heidelberg, exhibited an electro-telegraphic experiment, 'in which electric currents, passing along a conducting wire, conveyed signals to a distant station by the deflexion of a magnetic needle enclosed in Schweigger's galvanometer or multiplier.' … Cooke was so struck with this experiment, that he immediately resolved to apply it to purposes of higher utility than the illustration of a lecture. … In a short time he produced two telegraphs of different construction. When his plans were completed, he came to England, and in February, 1837, having consulted Faraday and Dr. Roget on the construction of the electric-magnet employed in a part of his apparatus, the latter gentleman advised him to apply to Professor Wheatstone. … The result of the meeting of Cooke and Wheatstone was that they resolved to unite their several discoveries; and in the month of May 1837, they took out their first patent 'for improvements in giving signals and sounding alarms in distant places by means of electric currents transmitted through metallic circuits.' … By-and-by, as might probably have been anticipated, difficulties arose between Cooke and Wheatstone, as to whom the main credit of introducing the Electric Telegraph into England was due. Mr. Cooke accused Wheatstone (with a certain amount of justice, it should seem) of entirely ignoring his claims; and in doing so Mr. Cooke appears to have rather exaggerated his own services. Most will readily agree to the wise words of Mr. Sabine: "It was once a popular fallacy in England that Messrs. Cooke and Wheatstone were the original inventors of the Electric Telegraph. The Electric Telegraph had, properly speaking, no inventor; it grew up as we have seen little by little."

_H. J. Nicoll, Great Movements, pages 424-429._

"In the latter part of the year 1832, Samuel F. B. Morse, an American artist, while on a voyage from France to the United States, conceived the idea of an electromagnetic telegraph which should consist of the following parts, viz: A single circuit of conductors from some suitable generator of electricity; a system of signs, consisting of dots or points and spaces to represent numerals; a method of causing the electricity to mark or imprint these signs upon a strip or ribbon of paper by the mechanical action of an electro-magnet operating upon the paper by means of a lever, armed at one end with a pen or pencil; and a method of moving the paper ribbon at a uniform rate by means of clock-work to receive the characters. … In the autumn of the year 1835 he constructed the first rude working model of his invention. … The first public exhibition … was on the 2d of September, 1837, on which occasion the marking was successfully effected through one third of a mile of wire. Immediately afterwards a recording instrument was constructed … which was subsequently employed upon the first experimental line between Washington and Baltimore. This line was constructed in 1843-44 under an appropriation by Congress, and was completed by May of the latter year. On the 27th of that month the first despatch was transmitted from Washington to Baltimore. … The experimental line was originally constructed with two wires, as Morse was not at that time acquainted with the discovery of Steinheil, that the earth might be used to complete the circuit. {774} Accident, however, soon demonstrated this fact. … The following year (1845) telegraph lines began to be built over other routes. … In October, 1851, a convention of deputies from the German States of Austria, Prussia, Bavaria, Würtemberg and Saxony, met at Vienna, for the purpose of establishing a common and uniform telegraphic system, under the name of the German-Austrian Telegraph Union. The various systems of telegraphy then in use were subjected to the most thorough examination and discussion. The convention decided with great unanimity that the Morse system was practically far superior to all others, and it was accordingly adopted. Prof. Steinheil, although himself … the inventor of a telegraphic system, with a magnanimity that does him high honor, strongly urged upon the convention the adoption of the American system." … The first of the printing telegraphs was patented in the United States by Royal E. House, in 1846. The Hughes printing telegraph, a remarkable piece of mechanism, was patented by David E. Hughes, of Kentucky, in 1855. A system known as the automatic method, in which the signals representing letters are transmitted over the line through the instrumentality of mechanism, was originated by Alexander Bain of Edinburgh, whose first patents were taken out in 1846. An autographic telegraph, transmitting despatches in the reproduced hand-writing of the sender, was brought out in 1850, by F. C. Bakewell, of London. The same result was afterwards accomplished with variations of method by Charles Cros, of Paris, Abbé Caseli, of Florence, and others; but none of these inventions has been extensively used. "The possibility of making use of a single wire for the simultaneous transmission of two or more communications seems to have first suggested itself to Moses G. Farmer, of Boston, about the year 1852." The problem was first solved with partial success by Dr. Gintl, on the line between Prague and Vienna, in 1853, but more perfectly by Carl Frischen, of Hanover, in the following year. Other inventors followed in the same field, among them Thomas A. Edison, of New Jersey, who was led by his experiments finally, in 1874 to devise a system "which was destined to furnish the basis of the first practical solution of the curious and interesting problem of quadruplex telegraphy."

_G. B. Prescott, Electricity and the Electric Telegraph, chapter 29-40._

ELECTRICITY: A. D. 1831-1872. Dynamo Electrical Machines, and Electric Motors.

"The discovery of induction by Faraday, in 1831, gave rise to the construction of magneto-electro machines. The first of such machines that was ever made was probably a machine that never came into practical use, the description of which was given in a letter, signed 'P. M.,' and directed to Faraday, published in the Philosophical Magazine of 2nd August, 1832. We learn from this description that the essential parts of this machine were six horse-shoe magnets attached to a disc, which rotated in front of six coils of wire wound on bobbins." Sept. 3rd, 1832, Pixii constructed a machine in which a single horse-shoe magnet was made to rotate before two soft iron cores, wound with wire. In this machine he introduced the commutator, an essential element in all modern continuous current machines. "Almost at the same time, Ritchie, Saxton, and Clarke constructed similar machines. Clarke's is the best known, and is still popular in the small and portable 'medical' machines so commonly sold. … A larger machine [was] constructed by Stöhrer (1843), on the same plan as Clarke's, but with six coils instead of two, and three compound magnets instead of one. … The machines, constructed by Nollet (1849) and Shepard (1856) had still more magnets and coils. Shepard's machine was modified by Van Malderen, and was called the Alliance machine. … Dr. Werner Siemens, while considering how the inducing effect of the magnet can be most thoroughly utilised, and how to arrange the coils in the most efficient manner for this purpose, was led in 1857 to devise the cylindrical armature. … Sinsteden in 1851 pointed out that the current of the generator may itself be utilised to excite the magnetism of the field magnets. … Wilde [in 1863] carried out this suggestion by using a small steel permanent magnet and larger electro magnets. … The next great improvement of these machines arose from the discovery of what may be called the dynamo-electric principle. This principle may be stated as follows:—For the generation of currents by magneto-electric induction it is not necessary that the machine should be furnished with permanent magnets; the residual or temporary magnetism of soft iron quickly rotating is sufficient for the purpose. … In 1867 the principle was clearly enunciated and used simultaneously, but independently, by Siemens and by Wheatstone. … It was in February, 1867, that Dr. C. W. Siemens' classical paper on the conversion of dynamical into electrical energy without the aid of permanent magnetism was read before the Royal Society. Strangely enough, the discovery of the same principle was enunciated at the same meeting of the Society by Sir Charles Wheatstone. … The starting-point of a great improvement in dynamo-electric machines, was the discovery by Pacinotti of the ring armature … in 1860. … Gramme, in 1871, modified the ring armature, and constructed the first machine, in which he made use of the Gramme ring and the dynamic principle. In 1872, Hefner-Alteneck, of the firm of Siemens and Halske, constructed a machine in which the Gramme ring is replaced by a drum armature, that is to say, by a cylinder round which wire is wound. … Either the Pacinotti-Gramme ring armature, or the Hefner-Alteneck drum armature, is now adopted by nearly all constructors of dynamo-electric machines, the parts varying of course in minor details." The history of the dynamo since has been one of a gradual perfection of parts, resulting in the production of a great number of types, which can not here even be mentioned.

_A. R. von Urbanitzky, Electricity in the Service of Man, pages 227-242._

_S. P. Thompson, Dynamo Electrical Machines._

ELECTRICITY: Electric Motors.

It has been known for forty years that every form of electric motor which operated on the principle of mutual mechanical force between a magnet and a conducting wire or coil could also be made to act as a generator of induced currents by the reverse operation of producing the motion mechanically. And when, starting from the researches of Siemens, Wilde, Nollet, Holmes and Gramme, the modern forms of magneto-electric and dynamo-electric machines began to come into commercial use, it was discovered that any one of the modern machines designed as a generator of currents constituted a far more efficient electric motor than any of the previous forms which had been designed specially as motors. {775} It required no new discovery of the law of reversibility to enable the electrician to understand this; but to convince the world required actual experiment."

_A. Guillemin, Electricity and Magnetism, part 2, chapter 10, section 3._

ELECTRICITY: A. D. 1835-1889. The Electric Railway.

"Thomas Davenport, a poor blacksmith of Brandon, Vt., constructed what might be termed the first electric railway. The invention was crude and of little practical value, but the idea was there. In 1835 he exhibited in Springfield, Massachusetts, a small model electric engine running upon a circular track, the circuit being furnished by primary batteries carried in the car. Three years later, Robert Davidson, of Aberdeen, Scotland, began his experiments in this direction. … He constructed quite a powerful motor, which was mounted upon a truck. Forty battery cells, carried on the car, furnished power to propel the motor. The battery elements were composed of amalgamated zinc and iron plates, the exciting liquid being dilute sulphuric acid. This locomotive was run successfully on several steam railroads in Scotland, the speed attained was four miles an hour, but this machine was afterwards destroyed by some malicious person or persons while it was being taken home to Aberdeen. In 1849 Moses Farmer exhibited an electric engine which drew a small car containing two persons. In 1851, Dr. Charles Grafton Page, of Salem, Massachusetts, perfected an electric engine of considerable power. On April 29 of that year the engine was attached to a car and a trip was made from Washington to Bladensburg, over the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad track. The highest speed attained was nineteen miles an hour. The electric power was furnished by one hundred Grove cells carried on the engine. … The same year, Thomas Hall, of Boston, Mass., built a small electric locomotive called the Volta. The current was furnished by two Grove battery cells which were conducted to the rails, thence through the wheels of the locomotive to the motor. This was the first instance of the current being supplied to the motor on a locomotive from a stationary source. It was exhibited at the Charitable Mechanics fair by him in 1860. … In 1879, Messrs. Siemen and Halske, of Berlin, constructed and operated an electric railway at the Industrial Exposition. A third rail placed in the centre of the two outer rails, supplied the current, which was taken up into the motor through a sliding contact under the locomotive. … In 1880 Thomas A. Edison constructed an experimental road near his laboratory in Menlo Park, N. J. The power from the locomotive was transferred to the car by belts running to and from the shafts of each. The current was taken from and returned through the rails. Early in the year of 1881 the Lichterfelde, Germany, electric railway was put into operation. It is a third rail system and is still running at the present time. This may be said to be the first commercial electric railway constructed. In 1883 the Daft Electric Company equipped and operated quite successfully an electric system on the Saratoga & Mt. McGregor Railroad, at Saratoga, N. Y." During the next five or six years numerous electric railroads, more or less experimental, were built." October 31, 1888, the Council Bluffs & Omaha Railway and Bridge Company was first operated by electricity, they using the Thomson-Houston system. The same year the Thomson-Houston Co. equipped the Highland Division of the Lynn & Boston Horse Railway at Lynn, Massachusetts. Horse railways now began to be equipped with electricity all over the world, and especially in the United States. In February, 1889, the Thomson-Houston Electric Co. had equipped the line from Bowdoin Square, Boston, to Harvard Square, Cambridge, of the West End Railway with electricity and operated twenty cars, since which time it has increased its electrical apparatus, until now it is the largest electric railway line in the world."

_E. Trevert, Electric Railway Engineering, appendix A._

ELECTRICITY: A. D. 1841-1880. The Incandescent Electric Light.