The CBC recently interviewed Lavina Shaw, Past International President of the Morse Telegraph Club. In this biographical documentary, Lavina talks about her experiences working as a railroad and commercial telegrapher as well as her experiences as a woman working in a man's world. Like many telegraphers of her era, Lavina had a front-row seat to history. In addition to railroad and commercial operations (telegrams, cablegrams), the telegraph was widely used in a variety of applications such as stock brokerage operations, commodities and board of trade work, press operations, and so forth. Even the telephone company used Morse telegraphy extensively for its internal operations well into the post war era. Radio amateurs in general, and CW operators in particular, will undoubtedly find this video interesting, not just for the human interest content, but for its insights into the antecedents of radiotelegraphy. The Morse Telegraph Club is a non-profit historical and educational association dedicated to preserving the history and traditions of telegraphy and the telegraph industry. MTC members and chapters demonstrate telegraphy at historical events, design and construct historically correct museum exhibits and conduct presentations on the history of telegraphy. MTC also publishes an excellent quarterly journal entitled "Dots and Dashes, which includes articles on telegraph history and first-person accounts of telegraph industry employees. For more information on MTC membership, please contact James Wades (WB8SIW).
While I personally did not do railroad telegraphy, I knew a number of railroaders who had. I had the same job of Clerk/Telegrapher, but they now called it "Clerk Operator". We transmitted the same Form 19's, we just did it with a direct phone line to the dispatcher that was activated with a foot pedal. In some of the offices where I worked, the old telegraph key was still there, but idle; don't think it was hooked up anymore. My terminal agent, an old clerk/agent from way back, had a key on his desk that still had a sounder, but it didn't go "out" anywhere. Mr. McKenna demonstrated/used the key to show us new clerks how it was in the old days. He was pretty good, too! I'm sure if the dispatcher had come on with an order, he'd felt right at home! While, again, it was not telegraphy, I remember that the old train order offices were very busy--especially on 2nd trick (shift). That's when most of the southbound "hotshot pig" trains were built, and train orders were a-flyin' and the printers were buzzin' with waybills. Very hectic and stressful; you could not make a mistake. Orders had to be exactly accurate, no mispells, no white-outs, no strike overs! These would get you "ground time" (a week or two with no pay), and a good scolding! The stress was enormous. I had 3 Division dispatchers all converging on Charlotte, sometimes all 3 would be buzzing me on the wire to copy 19's. I couldn't talk to but one at a time, and the Main line had priority. One night after a particularly hectic shift, I was copying orders for the Main line, and the Asheville Sub was fairly hopping off the wall! When I finished with Charlotte, I switched over to Asheville and called, "Asheville, Charlotte". The dispatcher up there was kind of a "character" known to fly off the handle, and fly off he did! He began screaming at me about why I didn't answer him, and "the next time I call you, you better ANSWER ME--blah, blah"!! I said, Mr. Wolfe, I've got 3 Divisions coming in here with pig trains out my tail, an' all you got is one measly local to clear................ "DON'T YOU DARE SASS ME, BOY, I'LL HAVE YOU OUTTA SERVICE............" Just about that time, my Terminal Agent walked by my office, and I hailed him, "Mr. McKenna, co'mere!" Red was still on the wire yelling. Mr. McK grabbed the headset, and hearing how Red was carrying on, he shouted back and it was ON!!!!!!!! I just sat back and grinned. You'd think they were coming to blows, but after a few huffs and puffs, they were talking about golf at Charlotte's Quail Hollow Golf Club!
Thanks. The life of an agent/telegrapher/operator WAS a hectic one--whether one used the key or a wire line. I suppose that would apply to a Western Union operator, too. Sometimes the two offices were combined. Sometimes the railroad telegrapher handled railroad traffic only. Those offices with the "idle" telegraph keys? I believe the Southern RR abandoned the key between 1962 and '65 on a piecemeal basis. Quite a few clerk telegraphers were still working in the 70's, and I worked with some of them. One of them was Buck Cash who was a clerk at Charlotte when I was. I was on the Extra Board, and one day I was working at an outlying station alone, and I came across a complicated waybill I had never done before. The shipper was then giant Cannon Mills. This was a multi-car shipment that was split between destinations. One car went to New Orleans, another car of the same shipment went to Houston, the final car went to Los Angeles. Like WOW! Now HOW do I do THAT? No, you could not split it into 3 different shipments/waybills; I asked about that. It had to be waybilled on the SAME 'bill. I was stumped! So I called Buck down at Charlotte. If anybody knew how to do such a waybill, it would be Buck. He was a 45-year + clerk, experienced in all phases of Line of Road clerical, and that included the old telegraph key. It took about an hour on the phone, but ole Buck walked me thru it! If it had been a matter of simply writing up the waybill longhand, I could've simply written it up in triplicate and copied to each one. But we were now on computer, and it took a special way to force the system to produce the waybills in the correct way and ROUTE the cars properly. We wouldn't want the cars routed OFF the proper line or 'Road; that would cost a lot of money to get 'em back on line. Buck saved my bacon that day!
A few years back, I read a story of a woman telegrapher for the Southern Pacific Railroad in Cabazon, California. The story appeared in the Riverside Press Enterprise. Here is a link (I hope it works!). You WILL FIND THIS INTERSTING... https://www.pe.com/2015/11/29/back-in-the-day-bailiff-canyon-named-after-true-railroad-stalwarts/ Tom, KR4BD
What a great video. I am a past employee {brakeman} of the MISSOURI PACIFIC RR out of Coffeyville, Ks. R 135. Those were great years. I loved the article and video.
I was born in Arkansas, lived in Dardanelle until I was 5. I remember the MoPac trains making a run for the hill in hopes of getting over without stalling. Sometimes they did slip down, and there was a huge "symphony" of steam locomotives and and whistles as they called for extra helpers. The engines would echo across the hills far into the night and thunderous exhausts pounded the summer evenings! Little did I know that I, too, would answer that call of the rails (Southern), and spend the major portion of my working career under the sounds of railroad machinery, handing up orders, and standing outside in the cold 'watching trains by' for dragging equipment, shifted lading, and hotboxes. I even handled some steam engines as our railroad had an extensive summer excursion program. That's about the scared'est I was when I had to stand trackside and stand STILL while a big 4-8-4 locomotive bore down on me awaiting running orders. Me feets kept telling me to RUN! That's quite a sight when there's this huge huffing and puffing machine a-bearin' down, but you HAVE to stand there to hand up Form 19's!
What a wonderful strong woman. The end of the video, about how telegraphy changed communications, is discussed in a fun book, The Victorian Internet. (In fact, you can go further, http://atlantic-cable.com/ has a lot of information on the 1858 and 1866 Trans-Atlantic cables. Reading the operators just conversing across the ocean sounds like two hams rag chewing!) Incidentally, in the U.S. you can still get a commercial radiotelegraph operator's license. The only place I can see to ever use mine is on a couple of museum ships and the KPH memorial station, but it's nice to know the challenge is still out there.
GREAT show. Several years ago, and have to say it was a LONG time ago, I went to work for Western Union as a W&R Tech. One of the first assignments I had was to copy and send Morris Code. and set up a telegraph circuit, Still remember the old slow wire, W15. W15 was also used for very low priority TTY and clock reset when needed. Once a year for one to two days several old telegraph operators would come into Cleveland Ohio office and sit at the old city board and send messages around the US. We had several old keys and sounders mounted there. When they finally dismantled the board, I took several old keys and sounders that was mounted there. Just couldn't see them go to the trash. For my Son's science show, I pulled out several keys and sounders, mounted them on a board and made a small telegraph station. The kids really got a kick out of it. Thanks for keeping the memories going. K8BBE Chuck
Great story.... My Uncle Estel Barnes was a railroad telegrapher back in the day and he had keys and sounders all over his farm near Terre Haute, Indiana... He also taught the local kids the American Morse Code and they would send messages back and forth mostly during the summers there... His wife was my father's half-sister...
