- Electrical telegraphs transmitted messages over a system of long-distance electrical wires between telegraphers, or operators, using Morse code. Later in their development, the machines were hooked up to a primitive text printer to produce a printed message called a telegram.
- At about the same time that it was being developed in England, Samuel Morse patented the first American electrical telegraph in 1837. He developed a system of dots and dashes to signal the alphabet for use with his machine. In 1861 the east and west coasts were connected by a transcontinental telegraph wire, causing the demise of the Pony Express.
- After several failed attempts, the first transatlantic telegraph cables were laid on the bottom of the ocean, connecting the United States to Europe, in 1866. Messages sent across this system were known as cablegrams, or cables.
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