New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1869-10-06

TELEGR1PHS IN THE OMITTED STATES.
The annual report of Mr.. William Orion,
President of the Western Union Telegraph
Company, shows the rapidity with which the
invention of Prof. Morse has been developed,
and the extent to which our people are learn
ing to use it in the transaction of their ordi-
nary business. 1t is only twenty five years
since the first line was constructed between
Washington and Baltimore, and the result of
its operation was SO unsatisfactory that the
Postmaster General officially reported his opin-
ion that under no conceivable tariff of charges
could its revenues be made to equal its expend-
itures. Yet to-day the various telegraph COM
panies in the United States own 1906 miles
of line, 13O695 miles of wire and 5000 stations
and their annual profits are not far from
$30OO,0O0 More than 80 per cent of the lines
are controlled by the Western Union Com
pany, which has been organized gradually dur
ing the past fifteen years by the purchase or
consolidation of many rival and connecting
lines, until its wires now extend from the
Gulf of st. Lawrence to theI Gulf of Mexico,
and from Southern California almost to the
Arctic circle, embrace all the States and Ter
ritories except Minnesota, New Mexico, and
Arizona, and reach through Nova Scotia and
New Brunswick, besides having connec-
tons with the telegraphs in the
other British Provinces, Minnesota, and
New-Mexico. and with the Atlantic and West
India Cables. So rapidly is this giant organi-
cation extending to the remotest parts of the
country that it has put up within the last
eighteen months more miles of new wire than
are owned by all other American lines COM
h.
stations at the average rate of oOne for every
day in the year. All the newspaper press as
sociations in the country are served by this
company and our readers will see how much
more extensively the telegraph is used for the
transmission of news by American pa
pers than those of any other ma
ton when they learn that the press
dispatches delivered by the Western Union
Company average more than million tcOrds
every night, and the tolls during the last year
amounted to $S83,5O9. Nearly all of this
service is performed at hours when the lines
are not required for private or commercial
correspondence, and the company is conse-
quently able to render it at reduced rates. We
are glad of the opportunity to bear testimony
TO the general promptness, fidelity, and courtesy
OF the ODeraCOIb, anu W COuCuI heartily III WI.
Orton's statement that the relations between
the company and the press are of the most
satisfactory character
The telegraph business is so fast becoming
consolidated under this one company that it
is important to inquire how far they have
manifested disposition to consult the public
interests. The rivalry to which they are now
exposed is hardly formidable enough seri-
ously to affect them, and if it were altogether
extnguished we do not suppose rates would
DO increased, except on very few routes
where messages are now transmitted at loss
The establishment of o Uniform tariff is one
of the most perplexing difficulties of telegraph
management. Under the old system of small
Independent companies, each had its own rates.
and the tolls on message that passed
over several lines had TO be ascer-
tanned by adding together las many
SEPARATE lcharms. The lines between