Geography Reference
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that were it possible to do so, the thing would be of no practical value”
(quoted in Pinker 1997:82).
Newly formed telegraph companies immediately coalesced around the new
technology on both sides of the Atlantic. The network spread with fervor
across the face of Europe, although France was reluctant to abandon its old
optical system. By 1868 there were 22,000 miles of cable in Britain alone. In
Europe, such systems were operated as a public utility, in contrast to the U.S.
model, based on private capital and ownership. In the U.S., by 1850 20 com-
panies operated 12,000 miles of telegraph wire, with 10,000 more miles under
construction. The American Civil War was a powerful impetus to the growth
of the telegraph, for during the four years of its duration (1861-1865) more
than 15,100 miles of wire were erected. The telegraph melted the distances
between soldiers on the front and readers back home, helping to convey the
true horror of war and deromanticize it. In 1861, the transcontinental line
connected the U.S. with California. Pony Express riders, who took ten days to
cover the 1,800 miles between them, were instantly made obsolete. By the
1870s, duplex telegraphy allowed a single line to carry information in both
directions simultaneously, a technique perfected by subsequent multiplexing.
Rapid growth in the industry was accompanied by industrial restructuring
and, inevitably, waves of mergers and acquisitions. Western Union rose to a
near-monopoly position in this context, handling 80 percent of the nation's
telegraph tra
c in 1880.
The railroads adopted the new technology enthusiastically, to send news of
construction, accidents, and changes in schedule. Railroads were particularly
enthused because the telegraph allowed for information about train position
to be relayed accurately, thus improving safety and omitting the need for
double tracks. Thus, the temporal and geographical expansion of telegraph
systems closely paralleled that of the railroads; indeed, the two systems were,
spatially, almost indistinguishable. The relationship was symbiotic: telegraph
companies needed railroad rights-of-way, and in turn telegraphy formed the
nervous system of the railroads, allowing trains to pass on single-rail systems.
By 1870, two-thirds of Western Union's 12,000 of
ces were funded and man-
aged by railroads, fusing the two technologies into one integrated system
(Fields 1999). In these ways, telegraphy greatly facilitated the American con-
quest of its western domains in the late nineteenth century, expediting the
rationalization of agribusiness and allowing Midwest farmers and East Coast
markets to stay in close contact with one another.
After 1861, New York and San Francisco were linked in a dense network of
lines that o
ciency and declining costs. Telegraphy
became vital to stock markets, warehousing, shipping, and wholesaling.
Pred's (1973, 1977b) analysis of the American city-system pointed to the role
of telegraphy in the di
ff
ered steadily mounting e
erential growth of cities, which he theorized in terms
of circular and cumulative feedback loops. Telegraphy allowed suppliers to
reduce inventories as levels of uncertainty decreased, and they accelerated
the penetration of Midwestern regions by East Coast capitalists, initiating a
ff
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