Longford history: Edgeworth's telegraphic message recalled

Another slice of history was recreated in Edgeworthstown over the weekend as locals came out in force to recreate an eighteenth century telegraphic message from Edgeworthstown to Castlepollard.

In the late eighteenth century Edgeworthstown was the site of experiments in cutting edge communication technology.

The first use of optical or semaphore telegraph-then known simply as the telegraph-was in revolutionary France.

They used visual signalling apparatus with moving arms set on top of towers to relay messages across long distances at astonishing speed.

Here in Ireland Richard Lovell Edgeworth began developing his own system in 1794.

It was his dream to construct a communications network of telegraph stations to cover the whole of Ireland.

In August of that year he demonstrated his optical telegraph by ‘conversing’ a distance of twelve miles between Edgeworthstown and Pakenham Hall (now Tullynally Castle) the seat of Lord Longford.

The ‘Tellograph’ was born. Thereafter Edgeworthstown in county Longford got its own place in the history of telecommunications.

On Sunday last a team led by retired telecommunications engineer Ray Jordan brought Edgeworth’s 1794 system back to life.

Now in his 90th year, Ray was an engineer with An Post & Telegraphs. In 1994 he became interested in the possibility of Telecom Eireann actually simulating Edgeworth’s semaphore system between Dublin and Galway.

Sunday was a very special occasion marking the ground-breaking event and Matt Farrell of the Maria Edgeworth Centre expressed his gratitude to Ray and his team for organising the event, also thanked the management and staff of the Manor for facilitating the occasion, John Mc Gerr and Janine Roder for all their help in organising the event and Octavia Tulloch Tourism Manager Tullynally Castle & Gardens.