AUGUST 16, 1858
It was a technological marvel which heralded a brave new world of international communications.
But, like many groundbreaking innovations, its development wasn’t without its problems.
In the 1840s and 1850s several people proposed or advocated construction of a telegraph cable across the Atlantic, and by 1850 a cable was run between England and France.
Once the plan to lay a cable across the Atlantic had taken off, two English firms were contracted to manufacture the wire rope. Only later was it discovered that the two cables were wound in opposite directions, meaning they could not be joined. Though a solution was found,
the mistake created bad publicity for the project. A first attempt at laying the cable, in 1857, failed due to repeated breakages, but the project succeeded the following year.
Test messages were sent out on August 10, then a telegram from Queen Victoria to President James Buchanan was prepared. Its 98 words took 16 hours to send.
Victoria hoped that the cable would prove “an additional link between the nations whose friendship is founded on their common interest and reciprocal esteem.”
The President responded: “It is a triumph more glorious, because far more useful to mankind, than was ever won by conqueror on the field of battle.”
A new era had begun.