Fort Worth Daily Gazette

Telegraphing to a Moving Train.

Charles L. Buckingham in July Scribner.

The idea of telegraphing to moving trains had its inception as early as 1853, but of the many forms suggested all were impracticable in that they involved a mechanical contact between the train and the stationary conductor. Obviously it is not feasible to make a circuit, either through a sliding arm projecting from a car, or by so modifying the track of a railroad that its rails may be utilized as electric conductors.

But that this may be done by induction there can be no doubt, for its feasibility has been shown in daily practice upon the lines of the Lehigh Valley railroad for the past two years. A moving train may now receive messages passing along a neighboring wire almost as readily as New York communication with Philadelphia by ordinary methods. Nor does the great speed of the train interfere with successful communication. If it could attain the velocity of a meteor, signals upon the wire would fly across the intervening space, inductively impressing themselves upon the metal roofs of the cars with the same certainty as if the cars were motionless upon a side track; and it is not even essential that the train and line be separated by a clear air space, for non-conducting or non-magnetic substances may be interposed without impeding transmission. During the memorable blizzard of March, 1888, the capacity of the system, in this particular, was subjected to an instructive test on the Lehigh road.