Friday, February 03, 2006
Last Telegram
It appears that after more than 155 years during which millions of telegrams were delivered around the world, bringing news of births, deaths, weddings, wars and more, Western Union delivered its last telegram messages last Friday, ending a means of communication that began before the U.S. Civil War.
Western Union has confirmed that the company ended its telegram services quietly on Jan. 27 by laying off 30 workers who still operated the telegram business.
From a peak of 200 million telegrams in 1929, Western Union’s telegram business had plunged in recent years, and only 20,000 messages were sent in 2005, Wheeler said. “The telegram was the beginning of Western Union, and obviously, over time, with the introduction of the telephone, the Internet and e-mail ... Western Union changed its business and became a financial services company," he said. "Dropping the telegram services was the last step in becoming a full-time financial services business.”
In its heyday, Western Union telegrams were an important part of person-to-person communications across America. A message could be dictated at one end of the country, sent over telegraph lines strung nationwide, and printed out and delivered to its destination before telephones and other means of communication were available.
The telegram was transmitted via radio or wire communications usually via morse code but later on in its development the telex took over the actual encoding and sending which meant that some year prior to this historic cut of date for the Western Union Telegram, Morse Code was deregistered as an international language.
Source: Computer world
Western Union has confirmed that the company ended its telegram services quietly on Jan. 27 by laying off 30 workers who still operated the telegram business.
From a peak of 200 million telegrams in 1929, Western Union’s telegram business had plunged in recent years, and only 20,000 messages were sent in 2005, Wheeler said. “The telegram was the beginning of Western Union, and obviously, over time, with the introduction of the telephone, the Internet and e-mail ... Western Union changed its business and became a financial services company," he said. "Dropping the telegram services was the last step in becoming a full-time financial services business.”
In its heyday, Western Union telegrams were an important part of person-to-person communications across America. A message could be dictated at one end of the country, sent over telegraph lines strung nationwide, and printed out and delivered to its destination before telephones and other means of communication were available.
The telegram was transmitted via radio or wire communications usually via morse code but later on in its development the telex took over the actual encoding and sending which meant that some year prior to this historic cut of date for the Western Union Telegram, Morse Code was deregistered as an international language.
Source: Computer world
# posted by Peter Saville - IT Consultant @ 10:00 AM 
