Wireless Telegraphy across the English Channel

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The recent experiments of Marconi in telegraphing without wires across the English Channel have entirely removed his work from the region of mere experiment and established it among the practical and extremely useful inventions. The main facts of the recent test are already familiar to our readers and require no reiteration here, but we wish to draw attention to the fact that we publish in the current issue of the S IPPLEMENT illustrations of the terminal telegraphic station at Wimereux, on the French coast, which cannot fail to be of extreme interest. One of the photographs from which the illustrations are made shows the terminal steel mast or rod with its guys in position, erected on the beach in front of a small villa, in one of the front rooms of which the receiving and transmitting apparatus is located. Another of the photographs shows the interior of the room and two of Marconis assistants engaged in receiving a telegram from the English coast, thirty miles distant. Messages are dispatched with perfect freedom from the vertical mast on the French coast to that on the English coast, and vice versa. At the time that the photograph was being taken the Cassini, with M. Lockroy, Secretary of the French Navy, on board, passed down the Channel within view of the French coast. The assistants on noticing the ship transmitted the news across the Channel, and in less than a minute a reply was received, If the secretary comes to see you, give him a good reception. The Morse receiver is used, and the message is written on the tape in the usual dots and dashes of the Morse code. In view of the large amount of visionary speculation that has been indulged in by some of the investigators of wireless telegraphy, there is something decidedly refreshing in the businesslike methods and practical results- which have characterized the work of this brilliant young Italian.

SA Supplements Vol 47 Issue 1217suppThis article was published with the title “Wireless Telegraphy” in SA Supplements Vol. 47 No. 1217supp (), p. 260
doi:10.1038/scientificamerican04291899-19514asupp

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