One hundred years ago
THE electricians have at last given us what will prove an invention of infinite- ly more utility than the telephone — a writing telegraph. The telephone is absolutely useless for confidential com- munications, for it is impossible to be sure who is at the other end of the wire, and the messages can be overheard. The writing telegraph, which is said already to be superseding the telephone in America, secures complete secrecy, and is only liable, like all written communications, to forgery, since the handwriting of the sender is produced in exact facsimile. The sender writes, and as he writes, a thousand miles away a little pen, set in connection with two electro-magnets, is silently reproducing line for line the very strokes of his penmanship. It is almost impossible to overestimate the advantage which this invention will yield, not only to business-men and newspapers, but to the public at large. Imagine the con- venience of being able to take pen in hand and write a letter to Paris which the receiver will be able to put straight into an envelope and despatch to its destination! How much easier, too, will be the making of contracts by telegraph when there will be an authentic record of the proposals and acceptances on each side!
The Spectator, 17 September 1887
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