Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1931-11-29
TELEGRAPH FIELD
REAL|GNMENT SEEN
New Mergers Are Probable
as A. T. & 7. Enters TeIe-
graph Competition.
BY DAVID LAWRENCE.

Communication service by telephone
and telegraph, cable and radio, will be
revolutionized as a result of significant
developments last week which may af-
feet the relationship to each other OF
all the Nations communication COM
panies, the assets of which amount to
$4,000, 600, 900.
These include the American Tele-
phone g. Telegraph Co. (known more
widely as the Bell SYSTEM, the West
ern Union Telegraph Co., the Radio
Corporation of America and the Inter
national Telegraph & Telephone Co,
which owns and controls the Postal
Telegraph Co. and the Commercial
Gable Co. as well as the Mackay Ra-
do Co.
Under existing law-the White act
no wire company can be merged with
radio transmission business ana no
communications companies of any kind
can be combined, whether they are
telegraph or telephone or radio, II the
result is to lessen competition. This
has heretofore prevented merger OF
the International Telephone & Tele-
graph Co. and the Radio Corporation OF
Americas communication company
though futile efforts were made TO Sc
cure an amendment of the law year
ago. This statute also has kept the
together and has precluded merger
between the Western Union and the
Radio Corporation of America.
situation Wholly Altered.
But now the whole competitive sit
nation has been materially changed py
I the announced entry of the American
Telephone g. Telegraph Co. into the
general telegraph business by means OF
the teletypewriter or printer telegraph
service for the general exchange OF
message business This move was
made. it has become known, only after
the A. T. & T. had offered to both the
Western Union and the Postal an OPP
portunity to combine in single COM
pany the new teletypewriter service.
The offer was declined by the western
Union.
Immediately after the A. T. g. T. an
nounced its plans to go ahead anyway,
tine Western Union and Postal COM
panies formed a working agreement to
. pool their printer telegraph facilities TO
furnish service to the subscriber over
She lines of either company direct to
any home or Office where the apparatus
might be installed.
This is the first time in the history OF
The two rival telegraph companies that
they have publicly agreed to permit the
use of their combined facilities. They
have more than IL 900 printer telegraph
instruments in use and they figured
! that it would take their new competi-
tor. the A. T. 81 T., long time to sell
the new service and install equipment.
One of the interesting phases OF the
situation is that the Western Electric
Co, which is owned by the A. T. 81 T.,
holds the patents and manufactures the
necessary teletypewriter apparatus not
only for the Bell companies but Tor
= the Western Union and Postal as wen.
Also the Western Union and Postal, by
virtue of rates made a couple years ago,
find it more economical to lease extra
wires from the A. T. g. T. than to
erect new telegraph lines themselves.
This is because every telephone wire
can be simultaneously used for tele-
graphic purposes without interfering
with voice communication.
Thus the A. r. g. T. has available
hundreds of thousands of miles of idle
telegraph wires and can afford to lease
TO the telegraph companies as many
wires for telegraph service as they can
possibly absorb.
Furnishes Equipment.
So the Bell System furnishes wires,
equipment and apparatus to its COM
petitorS, none of which, however, en-
cages in the domestic telephone busl-
ness. The A. T. & T. has heretofore
confined itself largely to the telephone
service, domestic, transoceanic and late
~ ship to shore, and to the leasing of
telephone wires to the companies broad
casting chain programs. Geographic
: service has been furnished by the A. T.
| & T. only through an initial lease for
: a minimum of eight hours per day to
/. press associations, newspapers, brokers
I and business houses with inter-com-
: pany offices.
Now the public has been offered
something akin to the instantaneous
/ communication by telegraph which has
] been enjoyed only by leased-wire sub
d. scribers. But instead of being required
/ to lease for a given period. anybody
now can have direct communication
with another person in the same city
or anywhere else in the United States
provided the party at the other end has
similar equipment. namely an instru-
ment with typewriter keyboard which
can be operated by an ordinary typist
And the service can be used for a few
minutes or for as long a time as the
2 subscriber wishes.
Although the Western Union and
Postal had installed keyboard sending
and receiving printers on tape for the