A first book in American history with European beginnings . rockets wereused in signaling on the battlefield, and to notify troopsof the approach of the enemy. The heliographic system was still another form of sig-naling, and was carried out by reflecting the suns lightfrom one station to another by means of mirrors. Helio-graph signals have been sent more than one hundred andfifty miles. But even this system had its drawbacks. Itwas only a daylight and pleasant-weather system, dark-ness or cloudy weather putting an end to communicationbetween the stations. So you see that the invention of the
A first book in American history with European beginnings . rockets wereused in signaling on the battlefield, and to notify troopsof the approach of the enemy. The heliographic system was still another form of sig-naling, and was carried out by reflecting the suns lightfrom one station to another by means of mirrors. Helio-graph signals have been sent more than one hundred andfifty miles. But even this system had its drawbacks. Itwas only a daylight and pleasant-weather system, dark-ness or cloudy weather putting an end to communicationbetween the stations. So you see that the invention of the telegraph supplied316 S. F. B. MORSE AND HIS SUCCESSORS a great and pressing need. Here was a means of rapidcommunication, one that could be used by night as wellas by day, and could carry a message long or F. B. Morse was the inventor of the telegraph. SAMUEL MORSE AND THE TELEGRAPH Morse was a Massachusetts boy, born there in in college at Yale, Morse had for professors twoof the most noted scientists of the day in this country,. Signals by Means of the Heliograph. and through them he first became interested in , at the time of graduation his ambition was tobecome an artist, not a scientist. Accordingly he went toLondon, where he worked for four years with splendidresults and where, through his fathers influence, he cameto know many prominent Englishmen. In 1815 he came back to America and set about earn-22 317 A FIRST BOOK IN AMERICAN HISTORY ing his living through his art. He seems to have been atrue Yankee with an active, inventive mind. At dinnerone night, in 1832, when he was returning from anothervisit abroad, the conversation turned on electricity. Thenand there the thought flashed through his mind that thismysterious force might be employed in sending messages. For the next eleven years Morses principal interest inlife was pushing and perfecting the idea of an electric tele-graph. Poor! He was so poor that it was with greatd
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