The Seattle post-intelligencer. [volume] (Seattle, Wash. Terr. [Wash.]) 1888-1914, 1892-11-13

Oh wire nao peen strung. not pole erected,
not single detail OF organization ar
ranged for. And when these men saw
these plans they had faith in them, and
decided TO invest their millions in the ex-
pertinent.
Some illustration will indicate the close
ness of Mr.. Pickerneli's calculations. Ex-
pense was OF course constantly in his
MIND, and he reduced his calculations for
the size OF the wire so closely that had he
made mistake of 1-l00th of an inch the
cost OF each circuit would have been in
creased Si6,OOO, and a mistake of 2-100ths
would have increased that cost S33 600.
Had he decided to use a wire such as is in
common use in Great Britain the increased
cost Tor wire alone for each circuit would
to see that mistakes respecting the size Of
the wire might have made the cost pro-
hlbitive so tar as commercial development
was concerned.
There were other problems to consider.
The crossing of streams was one of them,
ana most embarrassing one. Mr.. Pick
ernells estimates were such that in the
line proposed by him one mile of cable
such as Is necessary to use when crossing
stream was equivalent to twenty-four
miles of wire strung in the open air. Had
ne erred In these calculations, he might
have so greatly increased the cost that the
hnanciers would have regarded it unwise
to make the experiment. 1t might have
cost, for instance, as much to put the tele-
phohe line under ground between New
ork and Chicago as 1t would TO have con-
structed railway tunnel between the two
cities or fresh water canal, and that, of
course, would have made the telephone of
no avail for commercial uses; the charges
necessary to make in order to secure a re-
turn on the investment would have been
30 enormous as to have been prohibitlve.
The estimate which Mr.. Pickernell fur
nlshed provided for copper wire weighing
435 pounds to the mile, and two wires COM
prising the metallic circuit which he pro.
posed to build between New York and
Cnlcago had surface in the aggregate
which would have enabled them to have
completely covered a ten-acre lot. These
illustrations indicate the delicacy and the
closeness of Mr.. pickerneli's figuring. He
also reported to the financiers that it
would be necessary in some instances to
cut a swath through a forest as wide as
roadbed, for il twig or leaf of tree
should touch these wires anywhere they
would interrupt the work so that CONVEX.
sation would be difficult if not impossible.
ana 1t would therefore be necessary to
build the line so that contact with any
foreign object would be practically impos-
Sible.
Mr.. Pickernell. the engineer, having
made his demonstration on paper, others
were to come in and take up the work, ard
chief among these was E. j. Hall, who is
the general manager. Mr. Hall is another
of the young men of busy brain. mighty
energy, splendid intellectual parts VINO are
doing great things in these closing days Of
the nineteenth century. He is Yale man.
having been graduated from the scientific
department of that university when the
telephone was in its infancy. Its promise
fascinated him, and he entered the service
of local company in Buffalo, where he
n IoS far
ton which has had, perhaps, its
finest development in the completion
OF this long distance line. He stood
beside the instrument when the pubic
exhibition was going on. of quiet
manner, Of modest way, his face little
pale with excitement, and, as in the case
OF Pickerneil. it seemed at first glance
almost incredible that this young man
could have been the one VINO took up the
work where Pickernell's duty ended and
demonstrated as q fact what Pickerneil
had claimed as theory. He had to
organize great force of men. He had
mountains to surmount, streams to cross.
and he undertook to place the wire be-
tween Pittsburg and Chicago in four
months time, and did it. This genius for
organization thus manifested suggests in
some measure that capacity which took
the various struggling telegraph lines all
over the country and combined them into
one majestic organization. Mr.. Hall had
faith, perhaps greater than some of his
associates possessed. He had the enthusi-
asm of genius which had enabled him to
overcome commercial objections which
were at times even more difficult of
mastery than some of the problems Of
electric science.
BY Mr. Halls side stood man of splen-
did dignity, upon whose face was the
smile of content and JOY, and who sug-
guested in his countenance some RESENT
biance to a man who was a friend of his,
the late James Russell Lowell. A little
older than his associates, this man, the
president of the company, John f. Hud.
son, of Boston, is nevertheless young
man. He. too, is college man, a gradu-
ate of Harvard, and as a young lawyer
associated with some of the earlier teie-
phonic interests as counsel. OF judicial
mind both by training and by nature and
possessed of an Astounding faith in the
magnificent future of the telephone as a
commercial interest, Mr.. Hudson adj
vanced step by step until he was at last
chosen president of the corporation which
had the courage to risk millions expert
mentally in order to determine whether
the carrying of the voice over the wire for
long distances could be made a great COM
mercial industry like telegraphing or car.
rying the mails.
When Mr.. Pickernell made his report as
a scientist that the thing could be done
Mr.. Hudson and his associates turned to
Mr.. Hail and said: do it," and 1t was
done. and yet in that single direction these
associates had risked millions of dollars
upon their faith in the capacity of the
scientist and of the great organizer whom
they employed.
The question has often been asked:
Whose capital is it that has paid this
splendid tribute to science?" In the old
DAYS before there were telegraphs or many
railroads and when such thing as tele-
phone would have been regarded as abb
surd as proposition to make q journey
to Mars. the typical man of Boston
was the merchant in the East India
or West India trade. There were the
Bowdtches, and the Forbes. and the
Hudsons. and the Sears. and the Hub
baris, who made princely fortunes by
carrying on traffic over the waters Then
came the day of steam navigation, which
changed the occupation OF these men, and
which compelled their descendants to seek
new fields. These younger men no longer
send their vesse!s over the seas engaged in
traffic, but they are employed in furnish
ing the traffic of intelligent communion
ton over land. 1t was their money which
financed the original Bell telephone so
brilliantly. and it IS to considerable ex-
tent the money of these men which has
made this latest development of the tele-
phone a possibility.
There is another suggestion which wa.
made at this celebration of the opening of
the long distance line. Prof Bell said. as
he hooked around the room. that there
used t. be something said about the COL
lege man in politics. but that here was a