Re: Telegraph wires

Todd...

Thank you for the excellent pictures!

The shot of Webster shows 9 wires...very possible the three Western Union wires I'm looking for were on the line there.

That would account for a C&S RR dispatcher's wire, a C&S RR message wire, and a couple of Western Union wires, perhaps one way wire and one "through" wire to Leadville....Plus the three W.U."transcontinental" wires 207, 208 and 209....Plus two unknown wires.

It could be that 7 of these 9 wires went all the way to Como and beyond, while the other two perhaps were Western Union wires that terminated at some intermediate point, perhaps some of those Resort hotels in the area.

The shots of Dome Rock and South Park from an earlier period show four wires on the line...

The detail photo of Dome Rock Depot pole shows break irons in all four wires, but only the two wires on the lower arm have open wire downleads taking each direction of the line wire down into the depot switchboard.

There clearly are only four wires involved in the downleads, which would be correct for dropping two line wires into that depot. Four pins and insulators show on the depot deadend arm on the east depot wall.

The two wires on the upper arm don't appear to have any downleads connected to the breakirons, which was a common way of providing a "test station" in "through" wires where it was not desired to have the wires enter the depot switchboard. a lineman would have to climb the pole and disconnect a jumper across the breakirons to open these wires to make a "test" for trouble.

I have uncovered information that indicates Western Union wires 207 and 208 predated wire 209 by some amount of time..
It could be that the top arm in the Dome Rock circa 1880's Photo shows W.U. 207 and 208.

Very nice photo work...



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 11/23/2009 09:29PM by Etrump.