The Victorian Internet: Nothing New Under the Sun

Tom Standage, in his book "The Victorian Internet," reminds us that sending messages around the world at the speed of light may seem to be a modern phenomenon, but one should keep in mind that our Victorian ancestors could send a correspondence from New York to London in the same amount of time it would take an email message to cover that same distance.

Standage also informs us that online romances are not new either; a close look at Victorian magazines and newspapers reveal several affairs of the heart carried out electronically, and the plot of "Wired Love," a novel published in 1879, is built around an online courtship.

In fact, as revolutionary as the Internet may seem, it all happened before in a technological innovation known as the telegraph. "The Victorian Internet" provides a readable and engaging account of the invention, growth and decline of the telegraph, and also sheds some light on the contemporary sociology of the Internet as well.

In turn, the modern-day Internet provides plenty of information on the history and science of telegraphy.

Whether you are a collector, historian, or a person with only a casual curiosity for the many facets of telegraphy, you will find something of interest at The Telegraph Office http://fohnix.metronet.com/~nmcewen/techno_weenies.html. This site provides an extensive listing of World Wide Web resources on telegraphy, a bibliography of books and periodical articles on the topic, and links to museums of telegraphy and wireless telegraphy.

Interested in the history of the telegraph giant Western Union? Then visit its Web site at http://www.westernunion.com/, or better yet, go to the Register of the Western Union Telegraph Company Collection pages kept at the Smithsonian Institution http://www.si.edu/lemelson/dig/westernunion.html.

The invention of the electric telegraph opened up a new source of employment for women. Most of the telegraphing in England was done by women, and in the United States a large number of females were employed as operators. Research resources for the history of telegraphy and the work of women in the telegraph industry can be found at The Telegrapher Web Page http://www.mindspring.com/~tjepsen/Teleg.html.

The site contains the full-text of several scholarly papers, links to biographical material, and sources of information on telegraphic apparatus. A link to a telegraphic romance, entitled "Carrie: The Telegraph Girl" (first published in 1901), also is provided.

Our online world isn't new, and as Standage points out in the closing paragraph of his book: "Time-traveling Victorians arriving in the late 20th century would, no doubt, be unimpressed by the Internet. They would surely find space flight and routine intercontinental air travel far more impressive technological achievements than our much-trumpeted global communications network. Heavier-than-air flying machines were, after all, thought by the Victorians to be totally impossible. But as for the Internet-well, they had one of their own."

For assistance in connecting to the World Wide Web via UB computer accounts, contact the Computing Center Help Desk at 645-3542.

-Gemma DeVinney and Don Hartman, University Libraries