Daily globe. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1878-1884, 1881-09-05
MACHINE TELEGRAPHY.
A SCHEME FOR co nPETITION WITH
THE WESTERN UNION.
The Newly-Formed Company of Which
Line to Chicago Promised by Next Janu-
New york Sun

"The Potosi Telegraph company is the
name of an organization that has just
been formed. 1t is the result of a con-
solldation of a number of proposed enter
prises in the direction of machine tele-
graphy. James r. Keene is its president,
and Chas. H. Haskins, the former gener-
al manager and superintendent of the
| northwestern Telegraph company, is its
vice president. Among its sixteen direct
| Ors are II. Victor Newcombe, president
of the United States National bank; Jonas
III. French, of the Maverick bank, Bos-
ton; Charles L. Mitchell, president Of
| New Haven bank; Thomas Wallace,
president of bank in Ansonia George
| D. Roberts of this city,. Elisha Gray of
Chicago, a banker and inventor of the
Gray telephone and of the harmonic tele-
graph system; S. " White, Chester
Snow, and Henry Cummings One of
the above named directors, who is active.
ly engaged in managing the affairs of the
company, made the following statements
yesterday afternoon to reporter of the
Sun: 1
| In the first place, the history of tele-
graphy shows that no company has ever
been profitable in the face of Western I'm
ion opposition, and no company ever will
with the present methods of transmitting
dispatches. 1t is true that Jay Gould on
two occasions forced the Western Union
to unite with opposition companies, but
this is never likely to be done again, be-
cause, in the first place, the Western
| Union was never so strong as it is now,
and, in the second place, there is no
other Jay Gould. We hold it as an ak
iom that messages cannot be sent by hand
any cheaper than they are now sent by
the Western Union company. The only
resource left to new company is to
transmit its messages by machine. For
example:
" The late President Orion testified be-
fore postal committee that the actual
cost of sending ten words to Chicago
from this city was twenty-seven cents.
| The charge for sending such message
now is fifty cents. Now if we, by the use
of machines, can afford to send twenty
words for twenty-five cents, that is; dou-
BILE the number of words for half the
| price, it will be seen that the use of our
machines gives US right to exist and a
fair prospect of success.
"Before explaining further let me tell
you what we ale going to do. We do not
want dollar from anybody outside OF
| those at present interested in this compa-
| ny. Before the end of next January we
shall have estabisdee line of two wires,
without any intermediate stations, from
| New York to Chicago, and ON this line
we shall do all the business between these
two cities. We shall charge twenty five
cents for twenty words to be delivere d
| by our messengers More than this.
we shall for twenty-five cents, agree to
transmit thirty words and mail the mes
sage in either city, stamped and addressed
| to any place desired. This will be one of
the features of our system. Its advant-
age will be instantly seen when it is re-
membered how long it frequently takes
a message, under the present system, to
arrive at its address, and when tell you
that we shall be always able to transmit
a message immediately on its receipt.
| ssWhen we do all this on the line be-
tween New York and Chicago, we shall
| have demonstrated, not only satisfac-
torily, but, wha: is quite different thing,
commercially, that we can do the cOun-
try's Geographic business. After that
| we shall rapidly extend our lines all over
| the country. 1t will not take us much
longer to build our line from New York
to Chicago than it will to build line
fifty miles long, becase we shall let it out
in sections. Now, as to the machines
and patents that will enable US to do this.
"Our great advantage is that after a
message is once prepared it's transmission
takes hardly any time at all, and it does
not take long to prepare it. We can send
i n ND do TO 4 hot VIZ
| shall have to look out for is to have
| enough operators in the receiving offices
| to prepare promptly all messages as we
exactly the same rapidity that message
is sent over Western Union wire and. in
a very similar manner, but the operator
who is preparing the message is not all
the time monopolizing wire. Take an
| extreme case. Suppose we should get
| fifty written messages all at once of vary
ing length, and that we had fifty oper-
ators ready to 60 to work on them. 1t is
probable that a few minutes after the
longest message had been prepared all OF
the messages would haye been ground
out over the wire and would be in the
Chicago office.
"The messages are prepared IN this
way: An operator sits down and taps at
a key. AS he works the message appears
in the Morse alphabet on a cylinder.
When he has finished, the cylinder is put
in circuit and rapidly turned. You will
say that this is precisely the same thing
that is done by another system through
perforations in paper. 1t is not. The
perforation of the paper is not an easy
| job, and, besides that, the paper has
some thickness. The result is that when
the point of the conducting stylus passes
rapidly over a perforation it does not
drop instantly down to the bottom of the
shallow pit, but leaps over the paper
precipice and strikes the conducting
metal at some distance from the edge
This causes the Morse characters
reproduced at the other end
Of the line to 'tail of, -
and they are thus rendered indistinct.
''In the Lego automatic machine
which we use there are no perforations.
The Morse alphabet is formed by the de-
post of an insulating ink, which has
practically no thickness For this rea-
son the point of the stylus glides smooth
| ly over the surface, and the cylinder may
| therefore be turned with great rapidity
At the opposite end of the line the alpha
bet is reproduced by pencil made of a
material which dissolves when current
is passing through it, and thus is able to
] make mark. The message received is
in sharp and distinct characters, and
must then be written out by sight. We
might have to employ more operatives in
our principal offices, but the chief cost
| of telegraphy is not in salaries
"But we have other advantages The
gray harmonic multiple and the war du
pick system that makes one of our wires
equivalent to six; while our wires them
selves, being made of steel, with a thick
deposit of copper around the cone, have
a conductivity seven times greater than
iron wires. We shall not have to load
| our poles with large number of them,
and they are SO strong and so light thai