Western Electric Main Line KOB Set, Telegraph Key and Sounder

How quickly can you send a text across the country? The electric telegraph was the first means of sending "instant messages" via long distances. Samuel B. Morse invented the first commercially practical telegraph in 1838. In 1851, the Western Union Telegraph Company was organized to create one unified system of transmitting messages throughout the United States. Western Union completed the first transcontinental telegraph line in 1861.

Western Electric manufactured much of the equipment used by Western Union, including this telegraph that was used at the railroad station in Nocona in northern Montague County. There, the operator used this key to tap out messages in Morse Code. The sounder received messages from other operators. The railroad station operated from 1887 until the mid-1950s, but Western Union continued telegraph service in Nocona until 2006.