The Tacoma times. [volume] (Tacoma, Wash.) 1903-1949, 1909-03-09
Snap! Flash! First Wireless Message Comes : :
Sputtering Across Swift Moving Train

\ IN Hour--Wireless Telegraphy
Now In Railroading; Wireless
Telephony Next.
ERIE, Pa, March 9.z"Wire-
less messages from train?" The
old graybeard stared at the Wire
less Special on the Lake Shore
reilroad, which he had driven II
miles from Northeast Pennsylva-
MIA to see. then shook his head
BY crickee, there amt no such
thing"
Small wonder the farmer didn',
believe 1t. Wireless messages on
q rafting, rocking train, which
whistled over the rails at 80 miles
an hour--why, how could it be
possible?
But it was. The test was made
lately by Frederick Thompson
advertising genius, owner of the
Via Wireless" melodrama, in O
t40-mile trip from Buffalo to Chi
cagO.@ The test was successful
The special scattered aerograms
AL along the way.
Thompson-Have ordered mo-
torboat prizes.-Mugen." Thus
read the first message ever sent
over q train wireless. 1t was a
business telegram from Thomp-
sons secretary in New York. Not
any awesome What Hath God
Wrought" like the first telegram.
Simply business dispatch, char
acteristic of the age and the en-
terprise.
Lake Shore officials watching
the experiment said arrangements
would be made at once to place a
permanent wireless equipment in
the Twentieth Century limited, the
palace train running between New
York and Chicago in IS hours.
And listen to this: The Lake
Shore hopes to be able later to
supplant the wireless telegraph on
Its trains with the wireless phone.
You might well agree with the
North East farmer that the world
is getting along.
New York railroad officials
aboard the train were Just as
astonished as the farmer. They
were on the train to see IL the
wireless would work.
They didn't take much stock in
the experiment.
There was a little fellow chew
ing at a cold cigar who walked a
dozen times around the wireless
train as 1t was standing in the
Buffalo yards with q critical eye
upon the Marconi workmen string
ing the sending wires along the
K car roofs.
This was Frederick Thomson.
Who risked 5000, the cost of the
special, on his belief that the en-
terprfse would succeed.
The train started. The officials
smiled at Operator Sammis fixing
things up in the barber shop Of
the buffet car. His storage bat
teries we're under the wash basin.
He made ground connection with
the warm water tap. He placed
his sending key on the brush and
comb shelf. The first 80 miles
out of Buffalo he simply tested his
apparatus. Finally he set his spark
generator across the arms of the
chair, connected a couple of loose
wires and touched the key.
Ten dignified officials, who had
been getting interested in spite of
themselves, jumped into the air
and rubbed their ears.
For when Sammis touched the
key the heavy charge of electric
fty jumped four inches across the
spark gap. giving in the small
room about as good an imitation
OF q clap of thunder as could be
devised.
More touches. Crash; Cr-r-rash!
6platters of jagged blue flame
seemed to fill the room. The noise
drowned the pounding of the
wheels. Blue ozone made the
nOEtrils smart.
"Snap-cr-r-ash-snap-snap!" Sam
mis- was trying to get Cleveland,
using the continental code. His re-
ceiyer was clamped to his ear.
Incredulity had given way to re-
spect for the evil1y sputtering
spark by this time.
Snap-cr-r-rash-cr-r still
trying for Cleveland. Impossible.
OF course. The train was passing
n. Girard. Pa, eighty miles from
Cleveland. Wait a while. Per-
haps--
Sammis' appraised hand stilled
the buzz of conversation. Impa-
tiently he pulled out plug and
struck his key again, then pushed
IN the plug and stood on tiptoe.
There wasn't a sound from the