Communications - Overview
Tools of communication have transformed American society time and again over the past two centuries. The Museum has preserved many instruments of these changes, from printing presses to personal digital assistants.
The collections include hundreds of artifacts from the printing trade and related fields, including papermaking equipment, wood and metal type collections, bookbinding tools, and typesetting machines. Benjamin Franklin is said to have used one of the printing presses in the collection in 1726.
More than 7,000 objects chart the evolution of electronic communications, including the original telegraph of Samuel Morse and Alexander Graham Bell's early telephones. Radios, televisions, tape recorders, and the tools of the computer age are part of the collections, along with wireless phones and a satellite tracking system.
"Communications - Overview" showing 10 items.
French carte postale
- Description (Brief)
- A celluloid postcard or carte postale, made in France. The front is decorated with a pop-up design: a hanging basket, made of paper, and three large flowers, with attached butterflies, dangling off it by silk ribbons. If you pull a ribbon at the top, the flowers holding the butterflies unfold and move the butterflies up.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- 1908
- ID Number
- 2006.0098.0036
- catalog number
- 2006.0098.0036
- accession number
- 2006.0098
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
- No Image Available
Anglo-American Telegraph Company Records, 1862-1947
- Notes
- The Anglo-American Telegraph Company was organized in 1865 as a joint British-American venture to lay an Atlantic telegraph cable. After three failed attempts by other telegraph companies, Anglo-American Telegraph Company successfully laid and operated the first trans-Atlantic cable in 1866. The company operated cables until 1912, when they were leased to Western Union
- Summary
- Records relating to the organization of the company, corporate and financial records. Corporate records include two volumes of the company's acts, charters, contracts and agreements, 1862-1883; minutes of board meetings relating to varied subjects, such as agreements between the company and other telegraph companies such as Western Union Telegraph concerning sales of property, details of trnsactions or purchases undertaken by the company. Financial records consist of nine volumes of "journals" showing monthly records of receipts, 1866-1912; nineteen volumes of ledgers reveal a detailed financial status of the company, 1866-1912; and nine volumes of cash books consist of the financial transactions of the company, 1904-early 1941. See also 1 folder of the Anglo-American Telegraph Company telegrams in the Warshaw Collection under the heading "Telegraphs"
- Cite as
- Anglo-American Telegraph Company Records, 1862-1947, Archives Center, National Museum of American History, Washington, DC
- Date
- 1862
- 1862-1947
- 1860-1920
- 1900-1950
- author
- Anglo-American Telegraph Company, Ltd
- collector
- Electricity and Modern Physics, Division of, NMAH, SI
- Subject
- Western Union Telegraph Company
- Data Source
- Archives Center - NMAH
An Etching Society Outing
- Description
- This light-hearted etching by Stephen Ferris, the Philadelphia Society of Etchers Outing in 1900, recalls the sixth such event held by the Society on the Neshaminy River near Doylestown, Pennsylvania. Etching, eating, and games were the outing’s major activities.
- Ferris was a founding member of the Society, organized in 1880, and its first treasurer. Initially, it was an important source for information in the Philadelphia area about the newly revived technique of etching. The group met monthly during the summer for more than twenty years, offering occasions for its members to exchange prints.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- Date made
- 1900
- graphic artist
- Ferris, Stephen James
- ID Number
- GA*14476
- accession number
- 94830
- catalog number
- 14476
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
The Heliograph Station--signalling between land and naval forces--near Pasay, Philippine Islands. Copyright 1899 by Underwood & Underwood. [on negative] 20943 Photonegative 1899
- Notes
- Company catalog card included
- Currently stored in box 3.1.51 [100]
- Date
- 1899
- 1890-1900
- publisher
- Underwood & Underwood
- Local number
- RSN 16110
- Data Source
- Archives Center - NMAH
Confederate Signal Station, Lookout Mountain, Chattanooga, Tenn. [Active no. 5745 : interpositive.]
- Notes
- Currently stored in box 3.2.51 [114]
- Date
- 1900
- 1910
- Civil War, 1861-1865
- 1900-1910
- publisher
- Underwood & Underwood
- Local number
- RSN 26753
- Data Source
- Archives Center - NMAH
Electroytpe of a "Carrying-basket in usual position"
- Description
- This electrotype of “Carrying-basket in usual position” was prepared by the Government Printing Office in Washington, D.C.; the image was published as Plate 15 (p.37) in an article by David I. Bushnell, Jr. (1875-1941) entitled “The Choctaw of Bayou Lacomb St. Tammany Parish, Louisiana” in the Bureau of American Ethnology Bulletin 48, (1909).
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- 1909
- publisher
- Bureau of American Ethnology
- printer
- Government Printing Office
- author
- Bushnell, Jr., David I.
- ID Number
- 2000.0207.089
- catalog number
- 2000.0207.089
- accession number
- 2000.0207
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Electrotype of "Toshkachito holds a Choctow blowgun in shooting position"
- Description
- This electrotype of “Toshkachito holds a Choctow blowgun in shooting position” was prepared by the Government Printing Office in Washington, D.C.; the image was published as Plate 20 (p.37) in an article by David I. Bushnell, Jr. (1875-1941) entitled “The Choctaw of Bayou Lacomb St. Tammany Parish, Louisiana” in Bureau of American Ethnology, Bulletin 48, (1909).
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- 1909
- publisher
- Bureau of American Ethnology
- printer
- Government Printing Office
- author
- Bushnell, Jr., David I.
- ID Number
- 2000.0207.091
- catalog number
- 2000.0207.091
- accession number
- 2000.0207
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
- No Image Available
William K. Applebaugh Papers, 1857-1926
- Notes
- Telegrapher during the U.S. Civil War
- Summary
- Archival materials documenting the life and career of William K. Applebaugh, and his activities as a telegrapher during the U.S. Civil War
- Cite as
- William K. Applebaugh Papers, 1857-1926, Archives Center, National Museum of American History
- Date
- 1857
- 1857-1926
- Civil War, 1861-1865
- 1840-1940
- 1850-1900
- 20th century
- 1850-1910
- creator
- Applebaugh, William K
- collector
- Electricity and Modern Physics, Division of, NMAH, SI
- Local number
- 1985.0183 (NMAH Acc.)
- Data Source
- Archives Center - NMAH
- No Image Available
William Dandrige Terrell Papers, 1911-1965
- Notes
- Terrell, born in rural Virginia, performed government services for 22 years in the communications field, specific duties unknown. In 1911, after this service, he was appointed to a New York civilian post, to ensure the smooth operation of the freshly pioneered wireless on all Atlantic-based Naval ships. This collection begins with Terrell's appointment. In 1915, he was transferred to Washington, where he was given a trans-national staff of 35 and interdepartmental duties among the armed forces divisions. As Chief of Radio Division in the Commerce Department, he was responsible for monitoring the institution of radio into the nation's defense forces. After 19 years in this field, he was promoted to Chief of Field Operations for the Federal Radio Commission, created 1934. He continued in that post even when the FRC was changed into the FCC. After granting a special FCC request that he serve for a few more years after normal retirement age, he finally retired to Florida in 1943 at 72
- Summary
- Collection documents Terrell's life from his 1911 appointment to the years immediately before his death in the mid-1960s. Includes: a brief, partial autobiography and descendant listing; a large body of correspondence ranging from financial planning to insurance policies to appointment notices; a program from an American Wireless Operators convention held in his honor; several retirement announcements and best wishes; business correspondence concerning Terrell's inspection job, largely covering 1911-1914; and 4 photographs of Terrell, family, and friends
- Cite as
- William Dandrige Terrell Papers, 1911-1965, Archives Center, National Museum of American History
- Date
- 1911
- 1911-1965
- 20th century
- 1930-1950
- author
- Terrell, William Dandrige (radio communication specialist) 1871-1960s
- collector
- Electricity and Modern Physics, Division of, NMAH, SI
- Subject
- United States. Commerce Department
- United States. Federal Radio Commission
- Local number
- 1997.3094 (NMAH Acc.)
- Data Source
- Archives Center - NMAH
- No Image Available
Charles Cohill Harris Collection, ca. 1906-1976
- Notes
- Harris, radio engineer and executive, served in various capacities in the Tropical Radio Telegraph Company, a subsidiary of the United Fruit Company, 1916-1963
- Summary
- Correspondence, notes, articles, and photographs assembled by Harris on the history of the United Fruit Company and Tropical Radio Telegraph Company (TRT), 1904-1961. Also includes manuscript histories of companies; material on the application of teletypewriters to radio circuits; blueprints, schematics, reports, and manuals concerning the technical work on TRT; and a scrapbook of William Edgar Beakes, president of TRT, 1939-1943
- Cite as
- Charles Cohill Harris Collection, ca. 1906-1976, Archives Center, National Museum of American History
- Date
- 1906
- 1976
- ca 1906-1976
- 20th century
- collector
- Harris, Charles Cohill 1898- (radio engineer)
- Beakes, William Edgar
- Subject
- Fessenden, R.A
- Tropical Radio Telegraph Company
- United Fruit Company
- Data Source
- Archives Center - NMAH
