Iowa County democrat. [volume] (Mineral Point, Wis.) 1877-1938, 1908-04-16

D. c. The government and private in
diyiduals at the national capital keep
the wires hot through official and
business hours. Nowhere else is the
telephone day SO long, because in the
evening and past midnight newspaper
correspondents are sending hurried
telephone messages over the wires in
to editorial offices anywhere from a
score of miles to 1900 miles away
Nowhere does the telephone company
find the demand for it's facilities
spread over longer day. Yet a glance
at the fuctuation of the curve of the
days business rising from low
point before seven o'clock in the
morning to a high peak at about
eleven and to still higher elevation
in the early evening, tells a graphical
story of facilities which have to be
provided for business hours only,
For your telephone message cannot
be forwarded for you after you are
tucked away in bed. In contrast
with the operation Of the telegraph
COMPANIES, President Vail shows that
the telephone company is at a dis
tinct disadvantage in meeting the
fluctuations of traffic. At the offices
of the Western Union or Postal your
message from, say, New York to Chi
cago will be handled for you even II
| two score other people are croWdlng
| to get in communications which must
be handled over half a score of avail
able circuits. The kilograms are sim
ply handed in and filed before an
operator who dispatches them in or
der This practice enables the tele-
graph company to distribute its bust
| ness somewhat more evenly over the
working hours. During the night
hours the lines ar used for press mes
sages or for long distance messages
| in transit.
| But when you want to telephone
you want to do it now. Your mes
sage cannot be tied up in phono
garph, because somebody must talk
with you at the other end. One con
versation must succeed another over
| the circuit, and the subscriber has to
do lis own talking. The telephone
engineers for technical reasons cannot
even build up the phantom circuits
! familiar in Geographic operation, for
| the phantom has only very limited
| field of usefulness in telephone opera
! ton.
All which means that only about
half the facilities are utilized to fair
part of the capacity during business
hours only. The rest are utilized
only to a fractional part of the ca,
pacity at any time. Mr.. Vail makes a
remarkable statement that If during
certain hours of the day messages IN
tended for long distance transmission
could be subjected to half an hour
delay the days traffic could be sc
spread out that the facilities required
could be reduced at least one-third
AS toll and long distance lines OF the
country now aggregate 1,664,OOO miles
! Of wire and 1913, 900 miles of poles, an
idea is easily given of the price that
has to be paid for perpetual readiness
| to serve subscribers.
That cheap rates for long distance
service, depending upon high average
use of facilities. are virtual impossf
biIity appears in Mr.. Wallis exposition
It is physically impracticable to crowd
in more than about SO many messages
on a given long distance circuit, ano
nv no chance can waste of time De
tween messages be eliminated. An
| expressive way of putting 1t is tha'
there are only certain number OF
! fve-minute intervals in each nour OF
fve-minute spaces on each clock. II
YOU want more time intervals or more
spaces YOU must take more hours or
| more clocks. In toll line business
everything above the normal capacity
of each circuit must be provided for
by additional circuits"
Most people think of the three
minute long distance message as mean
| ing Just three minutes use OF me
| circuit. But it takes time to get TWO
persons in communication with each