The pioneers of international telegraphy

Now that long distance digital telephony is well established we are apt to forget that there was an earlier digital technology, albeit operating at a significantly lower bit rate. The laying of the first Atlantic telegraph caught the public imagination; the failures and the successes were the soap operas of the day. The continuity of digital development was interrupted by a long period of analogue telephony which effectively ended with the installation of TAT-8. Now that we are well established in the long-haul optical cable generation we should be better able to reassess the impact of telegraphy. The aim of this paper is to look behind the glamour and razzmatazz of the big events of the early days, to look at the pioneers and at the pioneering technological developments in Atlantic telegraphy. The media men and the promoters at the time ensured that Cyrus Field, Charles Bright and other prominent individuals were foremost in the public mind. But who were the real pioneers and what were their achievements? The author contends that they were the cable financiers, the cable manufacturers, the cable layers, the cable operators and of course the cable users. He discusses the importance of each group and indicate how they contributed to the development of high-speed international telecommunications