The New York and Erie Telegraph Company

Reprinted from "INSULATORS - Crown Jewels of the Wire", August 1976, page 14

It was essential to Mr. Smith's plans that the arrangements for the construction of the lines from Buffalo to Milwaukee should be well organized before he mooted the idea of their continuation to the seaboard by a wholly independent route. Having accomplished this he entered into a contract with Ezra Cornell and J. J. Speed, Jr., to build the "New York and Erie" line from Dunkirk to New York by way of the southern tier of counties. This was to cut off the New York, Albany and Buffalo Telegraph Company from Western business. In the matter of the patent for this new line Smith became both vendor and vendee. The significant feature of the contract was as follows:

"And on the completion of said line with either one or two wires, and the payment of said sum of fifty dollars per mile, said Smith shall make, or cause to be made, the requisite conveyance of the exclusive right to use and construct for use said line of telegraph, under said Morse's letters patent, with all the rights and privileges conferred by said letters on said line, or that may accrue from or by any extension or renewal of said letters, and so as to invest in said Cornell and Speed one-half ownership thereof, and reserve in said Smith one like half ownership thereof; and thereupon the said Cornell, Speed and Smith shall unite in making the requisite conveyance to such articled company or association herein contemplated, the like title of, and under said letters patent, to the extent of the number of wires such company shall from to time put on said line, they paying therefor to said Cornell, Smith and Speed the sum of one hundred dollars per mile, as aforesaid, for each wire so added to the first one put up, and ready for use of (No. 9) number nine iron wire, of best quality, and equally insulated with the first wire so put up, the price so paid to be divided among and by said parties in manner aforesaid, to wit, one-half of the excess over the actual cost of the work to said Smith, and the other half to said Cornell and Speed."

The construction of the New York and Erie line was commenced in August, 1847. It was built with forty poles to the mile and was probably the first of that character. The apparent solidity of such a structure indicates what was expected from it. It was undoubtedly designed to carry the bulk of western business, which, in common justice, belonged to the New York, Albany and Buffalo Telegraph Company, one of the first and best lines constructed under the Morse patent, and in which Prof. Morse and Mr. Kendall held a large interest. Moral questions, however, had not much weight with Mr. Smith, in such cases. Against the construction of this line, for the purpose designed, Mr. Kendall vigorously protested. But Mr. Smith had a hook in his nose which Mr. Kendall did not realize until his partner drew the string. Mr. Kendall had quarreled with Theodore S. Faxton, the President of the Buffalo Company, respecting the rights of side lines, which Faxton either would not understand, or, what is more likely, would not concede. Mr. Faxton was not partial to concessions of any kind. Mr. Kendall had a temper of his own which, on occasion, asserted itself. In a somewhat unguarded moment, and under the irritation of Faxton's opposition to what lie regarded as essential to the interests of Faxton's company as well as his own, he favored a plan to coerce the old stage-driver, and wrote Smith as follows:

"WASHINGTON, October 14, 1846.

"Though Mr. Faxton conceded, at Albany, that a majority of the stock on the Buffalo line was against him, on the subject of connection with side lines, he has lately refused to form the connection we required, except with Livingston and Wells. I have remonstrated; have indicated that the stockholders will decide the question in spite of them; have stated that if we cannot obtain from them the connection we are morally bound to furnish, and which is necessary to give value to the side lines, we shall be compelled to run another line through the State for that purpose, leaving them a branchless trunk.

It would be a good business to run ANOTHER LINE THROUGH THE STATE, just to give these connections, particularly if it were extended to Erie on the one side, branching to Springfield and New York on the other."

This, of course, was uttered as a threat which he had no fixed purpose to carry out. Perhaps a fair interpretation of it might even limit its meaning to an outlet for side lines, although such a line could not but be regarded as a constant menace. Mr. Kendall could not afford to endanger his interests in the New York, Albany and Buffalo line. From it both he and Prof. Morse drew their earliest revenues, and its success had made possible, and had laid the basis of a very important personal contract between himself and Prof. Morse, which resulted in an ample fortune to both. When, therefore, Mr. Cornell, under Mr. Smith's directions, began the construction of the New York and Erie line, he protested against it. But Smith remembered Mr. Kendall's letter, drew it from its envelope and held it up in triumph. It was his vindication. He wrote to Mr. Kendall with a sarcasm quite characteristic, that he proposed to be his friend now and would help him to whip Faxton! He told Mr. Cornell to push on his work, and experienced a positive delight in knowing that his foot was, for once, on Mr. Kendall's corns.

The route of the New York and Erie line was along the public roads from New York through Harlem, White Plains, Sing Sing, Peekskill, Newburgh, Goshen, Middletown, Honesdale. Montrose, Binghampton, Ithaca, Dansville, Nunda and Pike to Fredonia. Its length was 440 miles. A line, previously built from Ithaca to Binghampton, was purchased and became a part of the main line. The terms of construction were $250 per mile for the first wire and $100 per mile for each additional wire. About $27,000 was raised in cash subscriptions. Number nine wire (plain) was used for the conductor. It is easy to see that with such charges for patent and construction, the cash subscribers held, when the capital came to be apportioned, but a small minority of the stock.

The company was organized October 1, 1849, as the "New York and Erie Telegraph Association." The trustees were Douglas Boardman, Nathan T. Williams and Henry W. Sage. Mr. Smith would not assent to organization as a company. In a manner quite his own, he sent Thomas M. Clark, formerly treasurer of the "Magnetic," to the meeting for organization, with directions to manage so as to be appointed not only director, but, if possible, secretary and treasurer, so as to secure control of its earnings. He imagined the New York and Erie line was to be a great conduit through which western gold would come clinking down to the sea, and he wanted a reliable man at the hopper. At the same time he advised Mr. Cornell not to assume the appearance of supreme control, and yet to direct, if possible, all arrangements. He also advised that the cash subscribers mortgage their stock at short date, to the patentees, for the cost of the patent, so as to secure its issue. All these measures showed how thoroughly he understood the meum of the case. In the meantime, also, he was heaping up a rapidly accumulating claim on Mr. Cornell for both patent money and profits of construction which, in after years, caused him bitterly to remember.

The motives for building the Erie line are thus stated by Mr. Cornell, and explains the point of dispute about side lines:

"I became interested in a line from Ithaca to Auburn, with certain rights as to connection with the Buffalo line at Auburn, a part of which was, that messages should go from. Ithaca to New York at the same charge that an equal distance was charged on the Buffalo line. This I promised the citizens of Ithaca; the line was built, and we were compelled to charge seventy-seven cents from Ithaca to New York, when the charge from Buffalo to New York was but fifty-two cents-the former distance only 350 miles and the latter over 500 miles. The patentees entered into an arrangement to correct the error. An agreement was made with Mr. Faxton to carry out the original agreement by paying him an equivalent, which they agreed to, giving his company the patent for the third wire. Mr. Faxton told me, afterward, that he knew the original agreement all the time, but here he saw a chance to compel the patentees to give up the right of putting up a third wire, and thought best to avail himself of it.

"At about this time I had become interested with Speed in the contract for the Erie and Michigan line, and I questioned Mr. Faxton, President of the New York and Buffalo line, as to his notions about the getting the western business to New York, and if he would have a wire put up to accommodate that business? His reply was that he would not as long as the business could be got over two wires by full working, or working day and night, as 'he had rather have more business than facilities, than to have more facilities than business.' Faxton, also, in disregard of the vote of his board of directors, connected himself with the O'Reilly lines at Buffalo. I am fully convinced that the policy of Mr. Faxton, which has been sustained by the majority of his stock on that line, justified myself and the patentees (meaning F. O. J. Smith) in the building of the New York and Erie line. If I had not occupied the ground O'Reilly would have done so."

If Mr. Faxton did assume the unwise position thus ascribed to him, it had no sympathy with his board. In the proceedings of Faxton's company an offer is broadly made to the Erie and Michigan Company, of an exclusive wire, of the best quality, to be erected for their special use, and which was afterward accepted.

Mr. Cornell organized a company to construct a line from Ithaca to Auburn, with the design of continuing it through to Clyde and the canal towns of western New York, the proper, though hitherto unoccupied territory of the New York, Albany and Buffalo Company. He had another company organized of which the Hon. John H. Selkreg was President, to run a line from Binghampton via Owego, Ithaca, Trumansburgh and Watkins to Corning. Still another line was given out to O. E. Allen & Co., of Poughkeepsie, for a line connecting that town with the village of Cold Springs, on the Hudson river, the patent of which was sold at $25 per mile, cash. Still another feeder was projected between Newburgh and Albany via Kingston, Catskill and Athens, the contract for which was assigned to Henry C. Hepburn of New York, and which was organized as the Hudson River Telegraph Company, but pledged to connect with the Erie. This line was built with a fine galvanized wire, but the patent was never paid for. It became a Bain line, and afterward formed a part of the "Merchants State Telegraph Company," constructed by Henry O'Reilly, of which Marshall Lefferts was the President, and was finally purchased, with that line, by the New York, Albany and Buffalo Company. With all these feeders, and with a line of 1,000 miles penetrating the thickest populations of the west, the "New York and Erie Telegraph " was a perpetual failure from the start. It was a great artery, but had no faculty for propelling blood.

While Mr. Cornell was constructing his lines through the southern counties, taking the wagon roads for his route, a man of keen eye and practical sense was watching him. Charles Minot was the superintendent of the Erie Railway Company. He early saw the value of the telegraph to railroads and how it might be employed to direct the movement of trains at every point along the road. It is not unlikely that his knowledge was largely acquired by conversations with Mr. Cornell, whose home was in Ithaca. Be that as it may, Mr. Minot induced his company to construct a line of telegraph poles and wires along the margin of the railroad property without reference to patents and without determining the machinery to be employed. It was constructed by the railroad workmen. Mr. Cornell supplied, insulators and also Morse machinery for the offices to be opened. The insulators, curiously enough, considering Mr. Cornell's practical knowledge of insulation, were of brimstone, inclosed in iron hats, and utterly valueless. By furnishing these articles he thus conveyed the idea that he approved the railroad movement and at which the patentees took great umbrage. On its completion Mr. Minot offered to purchase the Morse patent for railroad purposes, on fair terms. Mr. Smith refused to sell. He invited the Erie Railroad Company to become stockholders of the Telegraph Company, and thus acquire the right to use the Morse instruments. By this time, however, the Erie Telegraph had so shown its unreliable character that Mr. Minot declined the invitation, remarking that "he understood the Telegraph Company to be in a very doubtful state." He wrote, also, very placidly to Mr. Smith that his notion was, that after its completion "our company would make an arrangement with the Erie Telegraph Company to work it for us." It seems very probable that the line was built on some such understanding. It so happened that after a short struggle against circumstances the wire of the Erie Telegraph Company was, in 1852 and 1853, transferred from the poles along the, turnpike to those of the railroad company, and by gradual processes the line became merged with and faded into the property of that company. In 1852 the title of the company was changed to "The New York and Western Union Telegraph" Company, and on January 11, 1853, was leased to the New York, Albany and Buffalo Telegraph Company, for two years, with the option of three more, at the rate of $2,000 per annum. This closed the line as an opposition, the New York, Albany and Buffalo Company arranging to give the Erie and Michigan Company a special wire by way of Buffalo, for their exclusive use, to New York. The lease was so unproductive that it was abandoned at the close of the first two years. After that the New York and Western Union Telegraph Company gradually vanished away.

In 1851 the Erie Railroad Company, having constructed their telegraph, placed it under two superintendents. L. G. Tillotson was entrusted with the eastern section, Owego to New York, and Chapin from Oswego to Dunkirk. Much fierce controversy between Mr. Cornell, F. O. J. Smith, Mr. Kendall and the Railroad Company grew out of these arrangements in which the patent interest was practically lost. The constant occupation, also, of the wire, by the Railroad Company in the management of the road, rendered it useless for commercial business, and as a route for public telegraph business it long ceased to have any significance. In 1864, however, the right of way was given by the Erie Railroad Company to the Western, Union Telegraph Company to construct a line of several wires along the unoccupied side of the road bed under a contract for a certain division of the proceeds of offices which that company might open thereon. Under this right a new and thoroughly appointed line was constructed by Mr. Tillotson for the Western Union Company during the following year. This at once made the route valuable. Ample facilities were afforded for public business without interfering with the railroad service, and some of the most valuable through wires are now borne on the poles planted along the road bed of the Erie Railroad.

In 1866, Mr. Tillotson, who was too active and ambitious to be contented with the mere superintendence of the Railroad Telegraphs, having established a large and growing business in New York as a Telegraph and Railroad supply agent, and in which he has since acquired an ample fortune, resigned his superintendence and was succeeded by the present efficient occupant of that very important trust, Mr. W. J. Holmes. Mr. Holmes entered the service at Mast Hope, New York, in 1856, where he remained until 1859, when from a perception of his ability and fidelity to the company, he was appointed division operator of the Delaware Division, having an important jurisdiction over all the offices therein. In 1862 he was transferred to the headquarters of the Erie Railroad Company in New York, and in 1866 succeeded Mr. Tillotson as General Superintendent. 

Mr. Holmes is also District Superintendent of the Western Union Telegraph Company. and is much esteemed both for his personal qualities and his fidelity and efficiency as an officer of the company.

Although there may have been occasion for complaint at the manner in which the managers of the Erie Railroad Company "acquired" the use of the Morse apparatus, and in which the agent of the patent was chiefly at fault in the insane refusal to grant its issue even when a fair value was offered therefor, the loss was not complete. The Erie Railroad Company, through Mr. Minot, and especially through his successor D. C. McCallum, attracted the eyes of the whole country to the value of the telegraph as a vital agent in the management of railroads, the running of trains, and the safety of passengers. In an exceedingly lucid report read to the Board of the Erie Railroad Company by Mr. McCallum, he used the following language: "As a matter of actual value, and after much reflection and experience, I should greatly prefer a single track railroad with a telegraph by its side to direct its trains, than a double track without it. This language attracted universal attention. It had much to do in establishing the intimate connection between the railroad and the telegraph interests of the country which now everywhere exists to so much mutual advantage.

After the completion of the "New York and Erie," and all the numerous lines which Mr. Cornell had set in motion, Mr. Smith began to weary for his pay. He wrote to Speed "Cornell should now direct steps to have all outstanding lines squared up. His death would involve his family, myself, Kendall, Morse and Vail in a doleful melange. Die he must like all the rest of us." Smith wrote truth, which a very few years made solemn. Both are now dead. It will never be known how much of Mr. Cornell's fortune was needed to settle the long accumulating and carefully noted charges for that which Morse and Vail early refused to accept or share in, ---" the profits of construction."

Mr. Cornell never became warmly attached to Mr. Morse, and claimed for himself an early knowledge of some important features of practical telegraphy. He was well posted in the mechanic arts. He invented a plough to make a trench to receive the pipe which enclosed the wires of the government experimental line between Baltimore and Washington and which he exhibited to Professor Morse, in Portland, in 1843. The lead pipe referred to was made in New York and was a curiosity. It was constructed by first casting the lead into ingots of eighteen inches in length with a hole through each lengthwise, and then passing the ingots through rollers over a hollow mandrel through which the four conducting wires passed. The ends of the ingots were then soldered and the condition of the whole tested by an exhaust air-pump. Mr. Cornell objected to this plan and recommended a force-pump, which he claims would have made the pipe a success, by developing the defects which the other plan only aided the atmospheric pressure to conceal. Mr. Cornell also claimed that he suggested important improvements in the construction of the register which Prof. Morse adopted. These were entirely mechanical. The general principle was the same.

Mr. Cornell claimed also what he regarded as an important improvement in the relay magnet. Prof. Morse, he asserted, deemed 3000 convolutions of cotton covered number 16 wire round the core essential to a competent magnet. This is somewhat curious since Morse's earliest magnet was not more than two and a half inches in diameter. It is true, however, that very large magnets were constructed by Prof. Morse and Mr. Vail, both deeming it of advantage to diminish resistance to the lowest amount. Mr. Cornell says be first suggested small wire such as was in actual use in a galvanometer then before them during the tests connected with the government line. Prof. Morse objected to the galvanometer wire as offering such resistance as to cause heat and incandescence such as appeared in the experiments of Colt and Robinson with the sub-marine battery. As this seemed conclusive, Mr. Cornell began to make what came to be known as "wind mill" magnets, so named from their peculiar form.

Four magnets were arranged to act in concert upon the same number of armatures attached to the extremities of two brass arms fixed at right angles so as to form a cross. The helices of these magnets were four inches in diameter. Each helice contained two-thirds of a mile of wire. The first of these he used January, 1846, at Fort Lee. Mr. Cornell regarded these magnets as a great improvement on the large magnets first made, and in some degree they were. A better magnet was, however, constructed in Washington, as early as 1845, of number 32 silk covered copper wire, in Prof. Morse's rooms, by Charles T. Smith, now of New York, and no large magnets were constructed thereafter.

The following letter, while exhibiting the pleasant relations once existing between Prof. Morse and Mr. O'Reilly, in its allusions to the introduction of iron conductors and the modern fine wire magnets gives a proximate date to their introduction. Mr. O'Reilly had a keen eye for beauty, and seized, eagerly and enthusiastically, a practical suggestion. Mr. O'Reilly undoubtedly erected the first line having iron wire as the main conductor. Mr. Kendall directed him in December, 1845, to enquire into the practicability of its use, and on what terms it could be obtained, and hinting at the probable necessity of abandoning copper conductors. It was erected between Philadelphia and Baltimore, the section of which between the former city and the Susquehanna river was erected under my supervision and "tarred" by my own hands:

PHILADELPHIA EXCHANGE, March 10, 1846.

Professor Morse:

DEAR SIR -- On your return through this city, I hope you will delay over one train to examine the instruments I am having made from drawings by Mr. Reid. I think they will not be unworthy of the name (the Morseograph) which I propose to engrave on them. I have often expressed the opinion that no instruments should be used that were not approved by the patentees on any line.

I am now personally attending to cording the line to Baltimore with iron four strand cord which I have had made for the purpose. As to the power of transmitting the fluid, you would not have doubted it (if you did at all doubt) had you been with us when a shock was sent through. I am perfectly satisfied that it is needless to coat with gum to preserve from rust; but as some think it best to do so, the iron cord is coated with coal-tar, the best article I have found after many trials.

Our line between Lancaster and Harrisburgh works elegantly, and the main and local batteries are reduced to so small a force of cups that one may almost begin to imagine that your telegraph will work itself. The new instrument I am making will combine solidity with beauty, and form a fine association with your new miniature magnets.

HENRY O'REILLY.

The harp register, above referred to, was manufactured by Clark & Son, of Philadelphia, and greatly pleased Prof. Morse. Its workmanship was superior, and its appearance gave a touch of romance to its performance which would find no favor in these more practical times. In truth, all effort to carry beauty into telegraphic forms has been to the disadvantage of those who attempted it. It had no such effect on Henry O'Reilly, whose tastes were as fine as his hatreds were bitter.

At Ithaca, New York, December 9th, 1874, at the age of 67, after accumulating a large fortune, and after having, for some years, retired from telegraphic pursuits, Ezra Cornell was carried to his grave. Few men's fortunes have borne so abundant fruit in the work of elevating mankind.

Mr. Cornell was born at Westchester Landing, New York, January 11, 1807. At the age of 21 he went to Ithaca, New York, where he ever afterward resided. His earliest occupation there was in the machine shop belonging to the cotton mill of Otis Eddy, which occupied the site where now stand the stately buildings of Cornell University. Wisely retaining the stock issued to him by the companies he organized, it multiplied and increased in value until he became rich. It was then that, recollecting the years of his boyhood, when he struggled toward manhood with limited education and without the aids to acquire it which he now saw possible to provide for others, he conceived the idea of endowing a grand institution where instruction in any study, to any person, could be given. To this idea of a university he devoted the last ten years of his life, planning, with consummate perseverance, the foundations on which it was to rest. By a gift of $500,000 he secured for it a State appropriation of 989,000 acres of valuable western lands and a generous charter from the State of New York. He also presented 200 acres of land as the site of the University and a College of Agriculture in connection therewith. He made other gifts amounting to about $100,000, besides transferring to the institution the Jewett geological collection which had cost him $10,000. Thus nobly, and broadly, and generously, did Ezra Cornell, without the advantages of early culture, and with the refinement only of an honest purpose and a manly understanding, make his name immortal.

Mr. Cornell was without brilliant qualities. There was little of poetry or joyousness in his nature. He was remarkable chiefly for strong convictions, pertinacity, exactitude, sound, stem judgment. He was a rigid economist, both in his own living and in all he did, and yet in the breadth of plan and in the amplitude and method of the organization of the University, Mr. Cornell developed a comprehensiveness which justly entitles him to greatness. His personal frugality appears now as a sacrifice to a sublime design. In this view of him the public will remember and regard him. Not long before his death Mr. Cornell was sent, by his townsmen, to the State Legislature, as a Member of Assembly and became, soon after, a member of the Senate of the State of New York, positions which he filled honorably to himself and usefully to his constituents.