History of Saint Louis City and County, from the earliest periods to the present day: including biographical sketches of representative men, Part 96

Author: Scharf, J. Thomas (John Thomas), 1843-1898
Publication date: 1883
Publisher: Philadelphia : L.H. Everts
Number of Pages: 1358

USA > Missouri > St Louis County > St Louis City > History of Saint Louis City and County, from the earliest periods to the present day: including biographical sketches of representative men > Part 96

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"SPRINGFIELD, ILL., May 31st. " The editors of the State Register shake hands with the edi- tors of the Republican, with a slight variation, as the preacher said about the creation of women. Strike out Whig candidates and insert Cass and Butler and we are with you, but whatever the result may be, we hope always to remain friends."

On the 12th of August, 1848, the telegraph was completed to Dubuque, Iowa, and on the 19th of January, 1849, notice was given that O'Reilly's line of telegraph had been opened through from Louisville to New Orleans " day before yesterday,"_i.e., on the

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17th ; that dispatches had been received at St. Louis from Baton Rouge, and that it was expected that dispatches would be received direct from New Orleans in a very few days. On the 21st of March, 1850, telegraphic communication was opened between St. Louis and Cape Girardeau. This was the last north- ern link on the St. Louis and New Orleans telegraph. On the 22d of the following month, April, 1850, Henry O'Reilly invited the attention of the people of St. Louis to a scheme for constructing a telegraph from St. Louis to San Francisco. Mr. O'Reilly de- clared that he would ask no aid from the government, except in building stockades at intervals along the line to serve as telegraph stations, and for the protection of immigrants and the property of the telegraph com- pany. One of the arguments advanced in favor of the project was that the stockades would form the nucleus of settlements for the supply of persons trav- eling to and from California. On the 27th of July of the same year a telegraph line from St. Louis to New Orleans was completed under the direction of Mr. O'Reilly, and dispatches passed over the wires be- tween the two cities. It was known as O'Reilly's or the " People's Line of Telegraph."

The use of masts for supporting the telegraph wires across the Mississippi River having proved unsatis- factory, it was determined on the 23d of September, 1850, to lay wires cased in gutta-percha at the bottom of the river from Bloody Island to the St. Louis shore. The work was completed by the 7th of Oc- tober, and the telegraphic instruments were removed from East St. Louis to St. Louis. The submerged wire was found to be a marked improvement on the system previously in use. In the Republican of October 8th the announcement was made that the wire for Morse's Southern telegraph had been sus- pended across the Mississippi, and that " the ‘Bos- tona' passed under it with the greatest ease." In the summer and fall of 1850 the work of extending the telegraph from St. Louis to St. Joseph, Mo., was actively prosecuted by T. P. Shaffner & Co., and on the 8th of October it was announced that the posts for the line had been put up to within thirty miles of Jefferson City. On the 4th of October, 1851, a tele- graph-office was opened at Weston, and it was an- nounced that the line would be completed to St. Joseph in the course of a week or two. Wade's tele- graph line from Cincinnati to St. Louis, by way of Indianapolis, Terre Haute, and Alton, was com- pleted during the same year to the east side of the Mississippi opposite St. Louis, and it was announced that " gutta-percha wire upon a new principle would be immediately laid across the river."

On the 6th of December, 1851, the Republican mentioned that the delay and inconvenience to which the Morse Telegraph Line had been subjected at Cape Girardeau had been remedied by the use of gutta-percha wire across the river at that place. " Messages can now be sent without interruption at that point to Nashville, and from thence to New Orleans by one line, and to Louisville and all the in- land and Atlantic cities by other connected lines." In the same issue of the paper appears a notice of a " sumptuous supper" with which the O'Reilly Tele- graphic Lines " celebrated their triumph last Thurs- day night in successfully crossing the river." This celebration marks the third attempt to solve the problem of safely transmitting telegrams across the Mississippi. Two wires belonging to the Northern and Eastern O'Reilly Telegraph Companies, as the corporations were styled, were successfully laid across the river above Bissell's Ferry landing, and the con- nection with the lines on either shore was soon per- fected. For nearly four years the company had been experimenting in the hope of securing a permanent submarine telegraph. It never quite succeeded, but to St. Louis probably belongs the honor of having first utilized, with comparatively satisfactory results, the gutta-percha wire for laying telegraph cables below the surface of the water. The idea of a submarine telegraph was not a novel one, the electrician Salvá having, it is said, suggested as early as 1797 that a line be laid between Barcelona and Palma, in the island of Majorca.

On the 18th of October, 1842, Professor Morse laid a copper wire, insulated by means of a hempen strand coated with tar, pitch, and India rubber, from Governor's Island to the Battery, N. Y., and next morning was beginning to receive messages over it, when the wire became entangled in the anchor of a vessel and was hauled on board. In 1843, Samuel Colt laid a submarine cable from Coney and Fire Islands at the entrance of New York Harbor up to the city, which was operated with success. On the 28th of December, 1844, at Washington, D. C., Mr. Colt exhibited a submarine battery, of which he was the inventor, and succeeded in exploding several of his " combustible substances" at a considerable distance under water. He proposed to the government to per- manently fortify any harbor by this means at a cost not exceeding that of a steamship of war. In 1845 gutta-percha became an article of commerce, but its insulating qualities had not then been discovered. In that year Professor Morse attempted to insulate a wire with a composition of beeswax, asphaltum, and cotton yarn, and failed. In 1848, Ezra Cornell and

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HISTORY OF SAINT LOUIS.

Professor Morsc endeavored to lay a cable across the Hudson River to Fort Lee, by the use of a mixture of asphalt and hemp, and afterwards strung the wire with glass beads and inclosed it in a lead pipe, but without success in either case. Professor Faraday first made public the insulating properties of gutta- percha in 1848, and the first submarine telegraph thus insulated was laid across the Rhine from Dcutz to Cologne by Licut. Siemens, of the Prussian Artil- lery. On the 22d of November, 1847, some months before Faraday's patent was granted in England, George B. Simpson drew up an application for a patent for the insulation of telegraph with gutta- percha. It was filed in the United States Patent Office in January, 1848, more than a month before Faraday's announcement. In November, 1848, Simp- son exhibited his invention at the Washington Hall Fair in Baltimore, where it was tested and found suc- cessful, and received the unanimous commendation of the press of that city. As early as December, 1847, he had exhibited his invention to the late Amos Kendall and F. O. J. Smith, in Cincinnati. His patent was rejected by the Patent Office in 1850, and a long litigation ensued, which resulted in Simpson's favor in 1867, shortly before his death.

H. W. Cleveland, an assistant of Professor Morse in the Baltimore office, invented a submarine telegraph in April, 1847, which he tested across the bed of the strcam at Gunpowder River drawbridge, between Baltimore and Havre de Grace, and it was eminently successful. In 1850 a copper wire covered with gutta- percha was laid from Dover to Calais by the electrician Brett. It was in the same year that the first sub- marine wire was laid across the Mississippi.1

1 Following are the St. Louis Republican's accounts of var- ious attempts to overcome the difficulties in the way of main- taining constant communication with the eastern bank of the Mississippi :

" In October of last year a wire was sunk from the shore, near the termination of the Biddle Street sewer, to the opposite side. This wire had been first insulated with gutta-percha, and after- wards placed at distances of every thirty fect in leaden cylin- ders eleven inches long by four inches in diameter, and weigh- ing each about twenty-five pounds. These cylinders, the manu- facture of Mr. E. W. Blatchford, while partially protecting the wire, afforded great resistance to the current, and weighed the wire securely to the bed of the river. In this manner the line had worked well for a time, when the agents of the city, in prosecu- ting some work on the Levee, broke the wirc. It was taken up and the damage repaired, but a second accident again put a stop to its usefulness. Several plans of suh-river telegraphic connection were afterwards considered by the directors and agents of our companies, but the dangers of a swift current, of snags continually appearing, and the large quantities of sedi- ment continually shifting its locality made it difficult to sug- gest one adapted to every emergency. The one finally adopted

Early in November, 1852, the stockholders of the St. Louis and Missouri Telegraph Company elected the following officers :

and put into use yesterday appears the best calculated for effec- tive resistance to every obstacle, and will, we trust, afford a reliable means of communication. It is this : A wire of the ordinary size is encased in three heavy coats of gutta-percha, and the whole protected with a sheeting of lead-continuous, and water- and air-tight-a little less than the eighth of an inch in thickness.

"To cross the river twice at the point mentioned required six thousand five hundred and seventy feet of gutta-percha wire, allowing eighteen hundred fect for the irregularities of the bed of the river, drifting, etc. Mr. Blatchford encountered many serious and annoying difficulties in the accomplishment of his task, by the breakage of dies, etc .; but after an assiduous application he finally succeeded in manufacturing the whole. The lead shecting was turned out in pieces sixty feet long, and afterwards turned and soldered on the gutta-percha and secured together. The weight of the whole when finished was ten thou- sand pounds.

" The wire was placed on a ferry-boat, and at an early hour in the day taken to the north end of the city, to be laid under the direction of Mr. J. N. Alvord, superintendent of the 'Ohio and Mississippi' Line, Mr. C. F. Johnson, of the ' Illinois and Mississippi Company,' and Mr. Blatchford. Numerous doubts existed as to the practicability of running the wire on the plan proposed, but the result has set them at rest. One end having been secured to the Missouri shore, the process of laying the first line commenced precisely at twelve o'clock, and was termi- nated at sixteen minutes past twelve. The boat then returned, and the second line was laid in precisely twelve minutes, no ob- stacle whatever having been experienced either time, and a little over three-fourths of the wire only having been used. To assure themselves that the wires had sustained no injury in de- positing it, Mr. Alvord and Mr. Johnson, in the afternoon, com- municated with them from the opposite shores with perfect success.

"The operators on the Northern and Eastern Telegraphic Lines have received and sent their reports to Illinoistown for the past ten months. The difficulty of sending or receiving reports after night has proven an annoyance to every one. It is ex- pected, and certainly it is much hoped, that this inconvenience is entirely removed."-St. Louis Republican, Dec. 5, 1851.

" The first lines that were constructed to this city were sus- pended across the river by the erection of high masts, but owing to the distance from shore to shore and consequent weight of the wire between the masts, they were constantly breaking from sleet, storms, and even by birds alighting thereon in great quan- tities. This plan has then, owing to its imperfection and ex- pense, been abandoned, and the lines were laid across the bed of the river hy wire insulated with gutta-percha, and sunk by means of leaden weights. This, too, soon failed, and at the time Mr. A. Wade came to the city for the purpose of finishing the Cincinnati and St. Louis line, all our telegraphing was done on the Illinois side and brought across by ferry. Since that time, however, there have been two wires laid across the river by the O'Reilly Telegraph Company, insulated with gutta- percha, and then inclosed in lead pipes, but from some unknown cause one of them has already failed.

" Amid all these discouraging circumstances Mr. Wade has devised and executed a plan which, in the opinion of scientific men and those best acquainted with telegraphing, will prove as effectual in resisting every ohstacle with which it may have to

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Isaac M. Veitch, president; John W. Morris, secretary ; Directors, T. P. Shaffner, G. B. Allen, John How, S. H. Laflin, E. K. Woodward, St. Louis ; E. B. Cordell, Jefferson City ; Wil- liam H. Trigg, Boonville; Robert Aull, Lexington; William McCoy, Independence ; Hon. Sol. P. McCurdy, Weston ; E. Liv- ermore, St. Joseph.

In 1859 a new cable was laid across the Mississippi. " The Western Union Telegraph Company," says a St. Louis paper of August 22d of that year,

" some time since deputed Mr. Ed. Creighton to superintend the making and laying of a new electric cable across the Mis- sissippi River at this point. The cable is now finished, and will be laid to-morrow. . ..

" Formerly a wire was stretched from a very tall pole on the island, but there were frequent accidents, which rendered com- munication uncertain and irregular. The flood of 1852 washed down the giant mast on the island, and since that time suspen- sion wires have been abandoned and subaquatic cables substi- tuted. But here, too, were obstacles to be met, for the impulsive current of the Mississippi presented difficulties in the way of telegraphic intercourse between this city and the opposite shore which have never to this day been overcome successfully. A great many cables have failed from breaking, loss of insulation, etc., and this sometimes after but a few months'-sometimes weeks'-service. Mr. Creighton thinks he has made a cable which will now withstand the force of the rushing waters and endure for years.

" The cable to be paid out to-morrow is manufactured of four® pieces of the Atlantic cable purchased of Tiffany, New York, ... together with twenty-one strands of No. 9 iron wire, and all securely bound every six inches with the same (No. 9). Each piece of the Atlantic cable has fifty-six strands of wire, so that in the present cable there are two hundred and forty-five wires. Two miles of the Atlantic cable are used in the Mississippi ' cord,' and the whole length of the latter is two thousand six hundred and fifty feet. Its diameter is something over two inches. The total weight is five tons and a half, and the cost is about three thousand dollars. It is now coiled in an immense

contend as it has thus far proved perfect in its working, and if so, must supersede all others now in use. . . . A No. 9 wire of the best quality, well connected and annealed, is covered with several coatings of gutta-percha to the thickness of about three- fourths of an inch. To protect this from driftwood, snags, floating ice, sand, chafing against rocks, and other like causes, the whole outer surface of the gutta-percha is covered with No. 10 annealed iron wire, running parallel with and confined thereto, in a round cable formed by iron-wire bands, within six or eight inches of each other, the whole weighing about eight thousand pounds to the mile, and possessing a strength equal to a three-quarter inch bar of solid iron.

"Great care has been taken to give to the outer wires the greatest tension, so as to protect the gutta-percha from any sud- den wrench or strain. This cable is laid so as to touch the bed of the river in any part, and in such a way that should the channel become deeper at any one place than it now is, it will settle to the bottom.

" It is imbedded in the earth at each shore to the depth of six feet, extending from extreme low-water mark to a pole two hundred fect distant, where the inside wire alone is connected with the main wire of the line, while the outside wires are firmly attached to the pole. The length of this cable is but little over half a mile, and upwards of ten miles of wire were used in its construction."-St. Louis Republican, Dec. 20, 1852.

reel, and will be stretched by one of the Higgins ferry-boats, the termination on this side being near the foot of Biddle Street."

In the early part of 1859 a few gentlemen of St. Louis formed an association for the purpose of extend- ing the then existing line running westward from St. Louis, and also for the purpose of building other lines with the view of inducing the California trunk lines to converge at St. Louis. This enterprise finally be- came of sufficient importance to justify the formation of an incorporated company. A charter was granted by the Legislature which was very liberal in its pro- visions. It had fifty years to run, and permitted a capital stock of a million dollars. The style of the company was the " Missouri and Western Telegraph Company," which was formed for the purpose of " building, buying, leasing, maintaining, and operating a telegraph linc or lines west of the Mississippi River."

Messrs. S. H. Laflin, J. H. Lightner, A. C. Goddin, Charles M. Stebbins, J. H. Wade, Isaac R. Elwood, and Anson Stager, the persons named as the cor- porators of this company, met at the Planters' House in August, 1860, and perfected their organization by the clection of Charles M. Stebbins, of St. Louis, president; Edward Creighton, of Omaha City, general agent ; and R. C. Cloury, of St. Louis, secretary and superintendent.

This company absorbed the " Missouri River Tele- graph Line," extending from St. Louis to Kansas City ; the " Kansas Telegraph Line," extending from Kansas City through Leavenworth and Atchison to St. Jo- seph ; and the "New Line," finished a short time before to Springfield, Mo. It had already raised nearly enough money to complete a linc to Omaha City and Council Bluffs. It owned the exclusive right to use the Morse, Hughes, and House telegraph patents in all of Missouri south of the Missouri River, in all of Kansas Territory, and in all of Nebraska Ter- ritory south of the Platte River, with the right to ex- tend to Sante Fé, Fort Smith, St. Joseph, Omaha City, and Council Bluffs.

On the 30th of May, 1865, the " United States Telegraph Line" commenced operating at the Mer- chants' Exchange.

In 1879 the American Union Telegraph Company was incorporated, and began operations in St. Louis as an auxiliary to the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad telegraph system. In 1881 the corporation was ab- sorbed by the Western Union Telegraph Company, since which time the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad Company has been conducting a telegraph business on its own account. It has a large number of offices at the principal business points of the city, and has lines

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in successful operation running to all the leading eities of the world.

UNITED STATES MAILS, POST-OFFICE, AND CUSTOM- HOUSE.

At the time of the transfer of Louisiana to the United States the mail facilities of the then French village of St. Louis and its modest neighbor, Vide Poehe (or Ca- rondelet), were quite inconsiderable. A weekly pair of saddle-bags from the East, that had run the gauntlet of the Indian tribes of the Northwest, brought New York and Philadelphia letters and papers from one to six months old. To the west of St. Louis the mail was mostly transported in the hats and breeches-poekets of hunters, trappers, courriers du bois, and occasional immigrants from Kentucky going into the central portions of Missouri. For many years the largest portion of the letters for people in eentral Missouri were brought by travelers or explorers, generally directed to some one in the " Boone's Lick country," and were stuek up in the bar-room or some log tavern to be ealled for by the owners. As the "Boone's Liek country" embraced a territory equal in size to some of the smaller States, it was esteemed a fortu- nate ehanee if a letter reached the person addressed. After remaining stuek up and unealled for for a num- ber of months they were considered "dead letters," and settlers in the neighborhood who were anxious to get news from their old homes in Kentucky would peruse them for the benefit of whom they might eon- cern. The delays and disappointments oceasioned by the lack of a regular mail system were naturally a source of much inconvenience, and long periods elapsed -quite frequently many months-before a reply eould be obtained from any distant point. Such was the gay, contented character of the French residents, however, and such their happy, careless abandon, so thoroughly absorbed were they in the oeeupations, interests, and amusements of their comparatively isolated frontier life, that delays which in our day and generation would be considered altogether monotonous and unbearable were tolerated by them not always with patience, to be sure, but with a mild and good- humored resignation. The introduction of saddle- bags as a means of transporting letters was a note- worthy innovation, and was liailed as a marked advanee in providing facilities for postal communication. When the transfer to the United States, however, had been effected, the new government at once proceeded to establish a regular mail service for St. Louis and other important points in the newly aequired territory, and post-offices were speedily established at St. Louis, St. Charles, and Ste. Genevieve. From 1804 until about 1823 there was only one mail line from St.

Louis to Philadelphia, running through Cahokia, Vincennes, New Albany, Louisville, Limestone (now Maysville), Wheeling, Pittsburgh, and Chambersburg, the two latter places in Pennsylvania. The distance traversed from St. Louis to Chambersburg was ten hundred and fifty miles, on which portion of the route the mail was carried on horseback, and from St. Louis to Philadelphia the distance was about twelve hundred miles. Between Chambersburg and Philadelphia there was a stage line making two trips a week.

There were two mails a week from Philadelphia to Pittsburgh, and one mail a week from Pittsburgh to the Western settlements. Letters from the East and from Europe were respectively six weeks and three months in reaching St. Louis. In 1804 a turnpike had been built between Philadelphia and Laneaster, Pa., a distance of sixty-five miles, and a few years later it was finished to Harrisburg. In 1819 it was extended to Pittsburgh, and for a long time was the only turnpike that crossed the Alleghenies. As the building of this and other great highways progressed there was of course a corresponding improvement in the transportation of the mails, which was still fur- ther accelerated by the introduction of steamboats on Western waters. At first steamers were six weeks in making the trip from Louisville to St. Louis, but as early as 1825, such had been the progress made [in steam navigation that a letter could be sent from St. Louis to Philadelphia in twenty days. Subsequently the time was reduced to fifteen days. After the Na- tional road had been completed to Columbus, Ohio, and graded to Indianapolis, stages ran through from St. Louis to Philadelphia in ten days, and this was the most rapid transit prior to the introduction of railroads.

The first postmaster at St. Louis was Col. Rufus Easton, who was appointed Jan. 1, 1805, and hield the office for ten years. Col. Easton was a prominent and influential citizen, and represented the Territory as a delegate in Congress from 1814 to 1816, sueeeed- ing Edward Hempstead. By the regulations of the postal department, Col. Easton was required to publish a quarterly statement of letters which remained un- claimed in the post-office, and until the establishment of the first newspaper in 1808 he posted a written notice, giving the quarterly list of unclaimed letters, on the post-office door. On the 2d of August, 1808, the following list was advertised :

" A list of letters remaining in the post-office at St. Louis, quarter ending June 30, 1808: James Ashley, Charles Apple- gate, William Bradley, William Bonham, James W. Coburn, John Chitwood, John Calaway, William McDaniel, John Davis, Samuel H. Dunn, Cornelius R. French, Samuel Gibson, Lieut. Daniel Hughs, Philip Leduc, Jacob Horine, John Mullanphy,

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Philip Miller, Robert Owens, Louis Pre Pillet, Joseph Perkins, William Rodgers, George G. Rooney, Hannah Radcliffe, Moses Riddle, Messrs. Raugh & Ermatinger, Antony Sanders, William Shay, George Smith, Solomon Townsend, Thomas Vinson, Simon Vanarsdale, Daniel Walker, James Ward, Robert Westcott, Anne Wolfort, William R. Willis, Hezekiah Warfield, John Zomwale.

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History of Saint Louis City and County, from the earliest periods to the present day: including biographical sketches of representative men, Part 96

Author: Scharf, J. Thomas (John Thomas), 1843-1898 Publication date: 1883 Publisher: Philadelphia : L.H. Everts Number of Pages: 1358

Author: Scharf, J. Thomas (John Thomas), 1843-1898
Publication date: 1883
Publisher: Philadelphia : L.H. Everts
Number of Pages: 1358