"I Would Found an Institution": The Ezra Cornell Bicentennial

The Telegraph

While traveling in Maine, Ezra Cornell met F. O. J. Smith, editor of the Maine Farmer. When Congress appropriated $30,000 for the laying of a test telegraph cable between Washington, D. C. and Baltimore, Smith had taken a contract from the inventor, Samuel F. B. Morse, to lay the lead pipe that enclosed the telegraph wires. In the summer of 1843, on his second trip to Maine, Cornell visited Smith’s office and found him struggling to design a machine to lay the cable underground. At Smith’s request, Cornell created a plow that would both dig the trench and lay the cable. Morse came to Maine for a demonstration of the machine, approved it, and hired Cornell to lay the cable for the test line. In October 1843, Cornell went to Washington to begin laying the telegraph line. As the work proceeded, he became concerned that the insulation of the wires was defective. He notified Morse, who ordered the work stopped. Cornell then devised a machine for withdrawing the wires from the pipes and re-insulating them.

Cornell spent that winter in Washington, studying works on electricity and magnetism in the Patent Office library and the Library of Congress. His reading convinced him that underground wiring was impractical and that the wires should be strung on glass-insulated poles. He was retained as Morse’s assistant at the pay of $1000 per year. In the spring of 1844, Cornell built the overhead line from Washington to Baltimore, and on May 24, Morse tapped out the historic message: “What hath God Wrought.” Some of Cornell’s earliest telegraph communications relayed the results of the 1844 Whig and Democratic Conventions, which nominated Henry Clay and James K. Polk, respectively.

Ezra Cornell’s story is the story of the telegraph in America. Always confident of its great commercial future, he enthusiastically demonstrated it, enlisted capital, and built lines. Although doing so frequently left his family destitute, he always took a large part of his pay in stocks, and invested in the first telegraph company, which connected New York City and Washington. He built lines from the Hudson to Philadelphia and from New York to Albany, as well as lines in other parts of New York State, Vermont and Quebec, and west to Cleveland, Detroit, Chicago, and Milwaukee. He was involved in the rapid construction of subsidiary lines, especially in the Midwest, where the telegraph preceded rather than followed the railroad.

The early days of the telegraph industry were tumultuous. Many companies were formed, operated briefly, and died. Stronger companies managed to survive despite conflicts, deception, and numerous lawsuits. Service on the hastily-built lines was frequently unreliable. In 1851, the New York & Mississippi Valley Printing Telegraph Company was organized in Rochester by Hiram Sibley and others, with the goal of creating one great system with unified and efficient operations. Meanwhile, Cornell had bought back one of his bankrupt companies and renamed it the New York & Western Union Telegraph Company. Originally fierce competitors, by 1855 both groups were finally convinced that consolidation was their only alternative for progress. The merged company was named The Western Union Telegraph Company at Cornell’s insistence. Western Union rapidly expanded operations to most parts of the United States and Canada. While Cornell now took a less active role, he continued to have great faith in the telegraph. He held on to his Western Union stock, and for more than fifteen years was the company’s largest stockholder.

Patent to Ezra Cornell for “a new and useful Machine for cutting trenches and laying pipes.” February 28, 1844.
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A drawing and detailed description of the machine are attached to the certificate.

Samuel F. B. Morse. Letter to Archibald L. Linn. Washington, D. C., January 23, 1843.
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Ezra Cornell annotated this letter with Morse code on February 18, 1873.

Samuel F. B. Morse. Letter to Ezra Cornell. New York, January 10, 1846.
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I have just rec’d a letter from Mr. Vail who is desirous of having us communicate with him from Newark, but I shall write him by to-day’s mail that we will try through Fort Lee, and if possible to New York. I have written him the following regulations.

Original telegraph receiver, used in Baltimore for the receipt of the first telegraph message, May 24, 1844.
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On loan from the Cornell University College of Engineering

Original telgraph receiver. Albumen print photograph taken ca. 1880.
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Ezra Cornell Pocket Diary, 1846.
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Oct. 5, 1846. Recd. the appointment of superintendent of the New York, Albany & Buffalo Magnetic Telegraph Co. at a salary of $1750 per annum with directions to enter on duty at once.

Telegraph business records.
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Includes Articles of Association, Tariff of Charges, telegraph office rules, telegraph message to Ezra Cornell, Ezra Cornell’s stock certificate, Directors’ Statement, and telegraph cards.