The record-union., 1899-10-31
PROVED A SUCCESS.
Messages are Carried Twenty-one
Miles by Wireless Telegraphy.


NEW YORK, Oct 30.-Over twenty
nine miles of the Atlantic Ocean, over
house tops, church spires, towering Of
flce buildings, the Marconi electrical
ripples carried and dropped mess
ages between two moving warships to-
day. The naval test at sea proved that
within radius of twenty-one miles
messages can be transmitted by wire
less telegraphy with all the accuracy
and precision of an ordinary land line.
This proved that hills, high buildings
and wires do not break the force of the
electrical waves, and do not interfere
in the slightest degree with the trans
mission of messages.
BY Encouragement operations on
board the New York We're conducted
by Marcon1 himself. One of his assist
ants named Bradfeld operated the in
strument on the Massachusetts,, while
Telegrapher Bowden, another Marconf
expert, was stationed in the lighthouse
on the highlands of Navesink From
the Marconi transmitter on the lower
floor of the lighthouse an extra wire
was carried through the window up the
tall hagstaH and up a sort of topmast,
making its total hight above the ground
about 80 feet Through the hatchways
of the two warships the wires were
extended to the same hight
The message which the New York as
she passed down the North River sent
to the Massachusetts, lying at her
anchorage at Thirty-fifth street was
read plainly in dots and dashes at
Navesink, nineteen miles away 1t was:
Follow US down at l p. M
This message was the overture to the
telegraph testing program. which in
cluded about seventy-five messages, all
of which had been prepared by the
naval board, and were especially diff
cult. Every five minutes during her
course down the river the New York
teiegraphed over the constantly increas-
ing distance to the Massachusetts and
the battleship replied to the flagship
without break. All the messages in
the correspondence We're caught lat
NaVeslnk, and q. careful record of them
was kept by Lieutenant Blish, the ma
val representative at the lighthouse
1t was during the voyage down the
river that an official test for ''interfer-
ence' was made. Without any warm
ing TO Marcon1 the operator at Nave
SINK, at the direction of Lieutenant
Blish, sent several messages in quick
succession to the flagship. The result
was a message from the Massachusetts
to the New York: "Navesink has sue
cessfully interfered
But few minutes later the light
house caught Marconi's explanation
that one of the ground wires on the
New York had not been secured prop
erly, which allowed the stray messages
to break in on the conversation be-
tween the two warships
1t was a long time after the tele-
graphing began before either of the
warships was visible from the light
house. Without wire, without any
apparent connection, messages kept
dropping out of space as if some super
natural power We're hurting them down
from the clouds.
The New York came in sight about
IL O'Clock, and although messages from
the Massachusetts, continued to rain
down as fast as the instruments could
reel them off, it was two hours be-
fore she could be made out by the spy
glasses, creeping slowly toward the
flagship.
achuSetts: Put out to sea in a straight
line, keeping careful account of your
distances
The black smoke of the Massachu-
setts a few minutes later trailing back
toward the Highlands showed that she
was obeying.
The telegraphing continued for more
than an hour with as much accuracy as
that of the two operators between YOn-
kers and New York Then when about
fourteen miles of gray ocean We're be-
tween the two ships syllables began to
drop out words. Sentences were re-
ceived in particles, and propositions
were missing. Later longer words be-
gan to disappear, until finally the Mas
sachusett's messages became unintelli-
gible at the lighthouse, although she
was evidently in communication with
New York still.
The last ineligible message from the
Massachusetts was sent at 3:12 p. m.,
when she was twenty-one miles from
shore and eighteen miles from New