The Story and Legacy of the First Transatlantic Telegraph Cable - A Talk by Declan Fitzmaurice

In 1858 Queen Victoria sent an inaugural message over the newly laid transatlantic telegraph cable to the then US President James Buchanan via morse code. The time for a message to be transmitted from England to the USA was immediately reduced from two weeks to just a few hours. Within a few weeks however, the elation in London and New York turned into despair and anger as the cable failed and hopes were dashed. It would be eight years before another message could be transmitted, over a new cable. Now almost 98% of telephone and internet communications are transmitted through the network of undersea cables across the world, thanks to the extraordinary feats of the pioneers of the late 1800’s. The talk covers the development of sub-sea communications from the days of morse code to the current demand for the massive rates of data transmission required by AI. Declan Fitzmaurice lives in Armagh with his family and works as a consulting engineer. Declan is a past-Chairperson of the Society. His interest in the remarkable inventor Lord Kelvin, William Thompson of Belfast, led to an enquiry into the development of the first successful transatlantic telegraph cable, in which Kelvin played a significant role.