Rewiring the History of the Telegraph and the Telephone

Most American historians, I suspect, would nowadays assume that the history of both the telegraph and the telephone have been thoroughly studied, leaving little new ground to cover. But these two books prove otherwise. In complementary works that cover roughly 1840 through 1920, David Hochfelder and Richard John revise the traditional historical focus on technological breakthroughs and on their economic consequences. These books happily replace the long-outdated standards by Alvin Harlow, Old Wires and New Waves: The History of the Telegraph, Telephone, and Wireless (1936), and, by Robert Thompson, Wiring a Continent: The History of the Telegraph Industry in the United States, 1832–1866 (1947).

To be sure, both authors hardly neglect technical and economic developments. Thus Hochfelder explains the telegraph’s evolution from single-circuit, sender-to-receiver transmissions to self-relaying quadruplex systems able to transmit numerous messages all at once over single wires. John offers comparable coverage for other developments, including from the pre-1840 period. True, John says little or nothing about linemen, switchboard operators, or repairmen. Moreover, his discussion of the devices’ use during World War I is limited to the home front rather than expanded to the battlefield. Still, these are comparatively minor omissions.

These revisionist studies remind me of the confession made by Claude Fischer in his prize-winning America Calling: A Social History of the Telephone to 1940 (1992). To his own surprise, his book was the first social history of the American telephone. Prior studies had all been technical and economic in nature. Analyzing three San Francisco–area communities, Fischer illuminated how the telephone became integrated into the private worlds and the community lives of ordinary Americans. This was particularly true for women, who were primarily spouses and mothers and who had long been dismissed by early telephone makers and promoters as having little need for their products. John’s book might have been enhanced by greater attention to telephone users.

What also surprised me back in 1992 was Fischer’s confession that, prior to his research, he, as a historically sensitive sociologist, had subscribed to “technological determinism”: the once-prevailing but now largely discarded notion that technology shapes culture and society. Fischer’s research and writing, however, led him to conclude that the telephone “did not radically alter American ways of life; rather, Americans used it to more vigorously pursue their characteristic ways of life.”¹

Admittedly, technological determinism is far from dead in many cutting-edge academic programs such as New Media. More often, though, the foremost true believers are historically ignorant technological gurus like former Vice President Al Gore and former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich and those Silicon Valley visionaries who blissfully venture beyond their technical expertise. Yet both Hochfelder and John offer provocative rethinking on technological determinism. On the one hand, Hochfelder readily claims that the telegraph was a “revolutionary” (p. 2) invention that changed the world; that it “proved as significant to the human experience as the invention of writing in the ancient world and the printing press revolution of early modern Europe.” For it “forever liberated communication from transportation” (p. 3). Certainly this is the voice of technological determinism! On the other hand, Hochfelder offers these partial qualifications that, despite being densely written, appear to be akin to Fischer’s point regarding the telephone:

While cultural, business, and political considerations shaped the ways in which telegraphy transformed American life, change arose from—and did not exceed—the specific attributes of the technology itself. Furthermore, individuals and institutions did not simply adopt the telegraph—they adapted themselves to it. Telegraphy did not fulfill its potential as a driver of social change until its users reshaped their actions, organizations, perceptions, and expectations around it. This development occurred fully after about 1860.

[p. 3]

When, after...