Wednesday, Nov 19, 2003 7 p.m.-ish Carroll Clark, Snohomish gave a talk to Snohomish County Antique Study Club at the Waltz Building, the Subject: Lost Art of Telegraphy. Fifteen brave souls converged on the historic old Band Room of Snohomish High School back in the '30s now known as the Waltz Building - moved from SHS to its later site on Ave. B near First St. Snohomish. I say 15 brave souls because that morn. it had snowed at least 3 or so inches, a good part of Snohomish had lost power from about 5:28 a.m. 'til 11:45 a.m. that morn. Despite that hurdles, we did meet. I brought a telegraph key collection, showing the simplest of keys and likening the keys to a bell button to help understand the workings of a telegraph key. I took the group from the simple to the more complex in the keys, the codes used, how you learn code, including both railroad telegraphy, and radiotelegraphy. I related most all of my talk to telegraphy that was used in the Snohomish area for our railroads of old NP, GN, Milwaukee stations here; then brought in stories about telegraphers both male and female, as few realized that many of the telegraphers for railroads, telegraph lines, and radiotelegraphy were ladies who proved to be expert operators the world over. Our group had many questions along the way as I talked and I fielded those questions as completely as I could. I explained how I had tried to memorize dots and dashes of code when I was age 10 - it didn't work, but when a professional telegrapher, then retired from her long stints in London, Eng. and Chicago Ill utilizing both the "land line" type clicks or Morse Code to the Radiotelegraph Code used by wireless facilities using the International Morse Code. The two codes are different in sound: clicks, or tones and at least 13 of the letters are different. I explained how I come to teach telegraphy from age 15 when I had learned International Morse until the 1970s, '80s to help students from age 9 to say 70 yrs of age prepare for their ham radio or amateur radio exams which required them to receive 13 wpm to 20 wpm for their more advanced licenses as required by FCC (Federal Communications Commission) where they must pass code, radio/electrical theory, rules and regulations which are Federally required to operate radio transmitting equipment. All in all we had a goo 1.5 hr session of a bit of history, a bit of construction knowledge of keys, what code sounds like, even a brief teaching session of the letters E, I, S, H as examples for those present to learn to "hear" and recognize code signals sent by me using an "audio oscillator" - a means of making the sounds like those heard over a shortwave radio for radiotelegraphy. The evening turned out to be a very pleasant experience for those who went out of their way to attend, despite the inclement weather outside - we didn't lose electricity - and a good time was had by all. Many fed back to me that they enjoyed the information I imparted to them, for as dealers as some are, and others who have an interest from the historical standpoint, they profited from the talk. One lady phoned me to let me know that she had gone to a place that was selling "stuff" and discovered an album that was for telegraphic instruction, on 78 rpm. records as a result of my talk. Such items are becoming quite rare and collectible, or sought since the art of telegraphy is being lost. Lost, however, but not by many ham radio operators who cling on to communicate almost exclusively by telegraphy - and what is ironic is that most use the International Morse Code, but there are some "die hard" ex-railroad telegraphers who hook up their ham radio equipment so as to be able to hear the "clicks" using a converter and they send and receive the railroad Morse code to keep in practice talking to each other using the old "land line" Morse. I tried to listen in on those operators, but they go too fast and I confuse the Morse code with the International Morse too easily. I can send Morse, but I stumble around in receiving it at faster speeds, and these operators send it f a s t . Genealogically speaking, many of the code operators, Morse, or Internatioal Morse, taught some of their family members the type of code they used, and those family members became employed as operators. Oftentime, this was the case of the female operators. They had been taught the code by one of their family members, passing down the art of keying down through the generations. The Lady who taught me, Miss Manice, retired and aged in her 60s volunteered to teach International Morse at Snohomish High in the late '30s and that is how I was able to become successful with it. I in turn taught other students who were well prepared to in turn teach radiotelegraphy in the service during WWII. Miss Manice taught the subject out at the Paine Air Force Base, Everett during those war years. What a Legacy - it has been replaced like many other things in our lives are, and will be, but it was an long era of our history that has been well documented and respected. Your computer browser on Yahoo or Google will elixit "tons" of information about telegraphy, about lady telegraphers and all sorts of information about the subject. I know "you all" will be frantic to avail yourselves of that information, so I will sign off . . . _ . _ 73, from one who has been there, done that, and discovered that telegraphy is like music at the higher speeds where rhythm, timing, spacing, and the human cadence of it is like music to the telegrapher's ears. Code transmitting with the hand keys, whether the basic "Straight" keys or the "Bugs" (semi-automatic keys) were like fingerprints - each operator had a different "touch" which was quite distinguishable, and could become identifiable depending on the frequency (how often) the operators communicated with each other. Carroll in Snohomish * * * 30 * * * P.S. the "30" refers to the telegraphic times in which oftentime the news would be sent telegraphically and in between each article or story the opr would place a "30" to show a break from one story to another one. Also, I would signify "that's all" such as in the expression, "That's 30 for tonight". Walter Winchell broke his stories up using a "bug" telegraph key - he kept 2 of them beside his microphone and when he "keyed" them they did not spell anything - they only made sounds which were "supposed to be" telegraphic sounding. Do you remember the radio tower and the sound of telegraphy in the old RKO Motion Picture days? That was readl code which could be read by any of us who knew the code well - only a few letters were actually sent, but it did spell letters and brief words.