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Monday, April 26, 2010
Sunday, April 11, 2010
The USS Thresher Lost, April 10, 1963
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Today in 1963, the USS Thresher, an American nuclear-powered attack submarine, sank in the Atlantic Ocean 220 miles east of Cape Cod, Massachusetts. Everyone on board-129 officers, enlisted men and civilian technicians-went down with the ship. The disaster shocked the world and changed the way the US Navy operates and maintains its submarine fleet.
The Thresher was the lead ship in what was planned to be a 14-ship class when she was commissioned in August, 1961. She used a proven nuclear reactor design (the S5W built by Westinghouse) and carried four torpedo tubes amidships to make way for new and powerful bow-mounted sonar equipment. Her normal crew compliment was 16 officers and 96 enlisted men. Thresher could dive to 1,300 feet and run at over 30 knots (or 35 miles per hour) submerged. She was designed to hunt and kill Soviet submarines and surface warships and was the finest war machine her country could produce for that task.
In the spring of 1963, the Thresher was coming out of her first refit period and was made ready for post-overhaul trials. On April 9, the sub and her escort, the submarine rescue ship USS Skylark, headed for open ocean off the coast of Massachusetts. The next morning, she began deep-diving tests, staying in contact with the Skylark via underwater telephone.
Communications between the two ships soon became garbled. From what could be made out, Skylark reported that the Thresher had experienced some sort of difficulty and was still diving. Finally, a short message was understood clearly “...minor difficulties, have positive up-angle, attempting to blow.” It was the last message the submarine would ever send. Two days later, the Navy announced to the world that Thresher and aboard her were lost.
The water in the area of the sinking is 8,400 feet deep, far deeper than any normal submarine could go. The Navy used the deep-diving bathyscaphe Trieste and oceanographic surface ships to find the wreckage. Eventually, the ship was found to be in six major sections; smaller debris was found in an area of about 134,000 square meters.
A Naval Court of Inquiry determined that the ship probably sank due to a failure in the saltwater intake and piping system on the ship, which was not welded but used silver brazing to hold pipe joints together. Post-overhaul tests using ultrasound equipment found that 14% of the Thresher's brazed joints were problematic, but this was not considered a large enough risk at the time to warrant repair. The failure of one or more brazing joints at test depth could have caused the submarine to take on more water than the ship's ballast tanks, which create buoyancy, could have compensated for.
Later tests also showed that moisture in the sub's high pressure air flasks, which are used to blow seawater from the ballast tanks, could have caused ice to form inside the piping to the ballast tanks, leading to the flasks' inability to clear seawater from the ballast tanks. This would have made it impossible for the Thresher to surface.
Another problem, this one operational, could have contributed to the loss of Thresher. The officers and enlisted men tasked with running the ship's nuclear reactor received two years of intensive training in the Navy's Nuclear Power Program. At that time, the thinking was that in the event the reactor was shut down due to an electrical short or manually, it was imperative to keep the reactor warm so it could be restarted quickly. This means the secondary side of the reactor plant, which produces the steam which ultimately drives the vessel, would need to be cut off, leaving the submarine with no propulsion. Thresher's Reactor Control Officer was not on the boat the day of the loss---he was home with his wife who was recovering from an accident. Thus, the reactor plant was supervised that day by an officer only recently graduated from Nuclear Power School. Although we have no way of knowing if the rules were followed, it would have been drilled into every Power School officer to close the main steam valves leading to the ship's twin turbines if the reactor SCRAMed, meaning shut down. This likely occurred as seawater entering the aft of the boat shorted out electrical panels. Once shut, those valves had to be opened by hand. With Thresher sinking tail-first past her crush depth, it would not have been humanly possible to open those valves before pressure from the ocean outside crushed the sub. Would a more experienced Reactor Control Office have saved the ship by using all the steam at his disposal to drive the ship to the surface? We'll never know.
As a result of the loss of the Thresher, the Navy instituted the SUBSAFE program designed to ensure proper construction and maintenance of any component of a submarine which comes into contact with seawater. No SUBSAFE-certified ship has ever been lost.
The US Navy continues to monitor the area of the Thresher sinking to ensure that harmful levels of radiation are not released into the area. To this day, the nuclear fuel remains intact in the reactor and radiation remains typical of worldwide background levels.
The loss of the USS Thresher resulted in design changes to the other 13 ships of the class. The second ship of the class, the USS Permit, assumed the role of class leader after loss of Thresher. The last Permit-class submarine was retired from the US Navy in 1994.
Today in 1963, the USS Thresher, an American nuclear-powered attack submarine, sank in the Atlantic Ocean 220 miles east of Cape Cod, Massachusetts. Everyone on board-129 officers, enlisted men and civilian technicians-went down with the ship. The disaster shocked the world and changed the way the US Navy operates and maintains its submarine fleet.
The Thresher was the lead ship in what was planned to be a 14-ship class when she was commissioned in August, 1961. She used a proven nuclear reactor design (the S5W built by Westinghouse) and carried four torpedo tubes amidships to make way for new and powerful bow-mounted sonar equipment. Her normal crew compliment was 16 officers and 96 enlisted men. Thresher could dive to 1,300 feet and run at over 30 knots (or 35 miles per hour) submerged. She was designed to hunt and kill Soviet submarines and surface warships and was the finest war machine her country could produce for that task.
In the spring of 1963, the Thresher was coming out of her first refit period and was made ready for post-overhaul trials. On April 9, the sub and her escort, the submarine rescue ship USS Skylark, headed for open ocean off the coast of Massachusetts. The next morning, she began deep-diving tests, staying in contact with the Skylark via underwater telephone.
Communications between the two ships soon became garbled. From what could be made out, Skylark reported that the Thresher had experienced some sort of difficulty and was still diving. Finally, a short message was understood clearly “...minor difficulties, have positive up-angle, attempting to blow.” It was the last message the submarine would ever send. Two days later, the Navy announced to the world that Thresher and aboard her were lost.
The water in the area of the sinking is 8,400 feet deep, far deeper than any normal submarine could go. The Navy used the deep-diving bathyscaphe Trieste and oceanographic surface ships to find the wreckage. Eventually, the ship was found to be in six major sections; smaller debris was found in an area of about 134,000 square meters.
A Naval Court of Inquiry determined that the ship probably sank due to a failure in the saltwater intake and piping system on the ship, which was not welded but used silver brazing to hold pipe joints together. Post-overhaul tests using ultrasound equipment found that 14% of the Thresher's brazed joints were problematic, but this was not considered a large enough risk at the time to warrant repair. The failure of one or more brazing joints at test depth could have caused the submarine to take on more water than the ship's ballast tanks, which create buoyancy, could have compensated for.
Later tests also showed that moisture in the sub's high pressure air flasks, which are used to blow seawater from the ballast tanks, could have caused ice to form inside the piping to the ballast tanks, leading to the flasks' inability to clear seawater from the ballast tanks. This would have made it impossible for the Thresher to surface.
Another problem, this one operational, could have contributed to the loss of Thresher. The officers and enlisted men tasked with running the ship's nuclear reactor received two years of intensive training in the Navy's Nuclear Power Program. At that time, the thinking was that in the event the reactor was shut down due to an electrical short or manually, it was imperative to keep the reactor warm so it could be restarted quickly. This means the secondary side of the reactor plant, which produces the steam which ultimately drives the vessel, would need to be cut off, leaving the submarine with no propulsion. Thresher's Reactor Control Officer was not on the boat the day of the loss---he was home with his wife who was recovering from an accident. Thus, the reactor plant was supervised that day by an officer only recently graduated from Nuclear Power School. Although we have no way of knowing if the rules were followed, it would have been drilled into every Power School officer to close the main steam valves leading to the ship's twin turbines if the reactor SCRAMed, meaning shut down. This likely occurred as seawater entering the aft of the boat shorted out electrical panels. Once shut, those valves had to be opened by hand. With Thresher sinking tail-first past her crush depth, it would not have been humanly possible to open those valves before pressure from the ocean outside crushed the sub. Would a more experienced Reactor Control Office have saved the ship by using all the steam at his disposal to drive the ship to the surface? We'll never know.
As a result of the loss of the Thresher, the Navy instituted the SUBSAFE program designed to ensure proper construction and maintenance of any component of a submarine which comes into contact with seawater. No SUBSAFE-certified ship has ever been lost.
The US Navy continues to monitor the area of the Thresher sinking to ensure that harmful levels of radiation are not released into the area. To this day, the nuclear fuel remains intact in the reactor and radiation remains typical of worldwide background levels.
The loss of the USS Thresher resulted in design changes to the other 13 ships of the class. The second ship of the class, the USS Permit, assumed the role of class leader after loss of Thresher. The last Permit-class submarine was retired from the US Navy in 1994.
Wednesday, April 07, 2010
IBM System 360 Introduced, April 7, 1964
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Today in 1964, the International Business Machines Corporation, more commonly known as IBM, announced its System 360 line of computers. The System 360 represented a milestone in computer history that helped IBM to become the largest computer company in the world. The “360” in the name indicated the 360 degrees of a circle, meaning that the System 360 was designed to be a single computer family for all types of computer work. In the 1960s, this mainly meant doing both business administration-type tasks and computation-intensive engineering tasks. Previously, computers had been designed to do one or the other pretty much to the exclusion of anything else.
For those unfamiliar with the computers of the 1960s, it is worth pointing out how the System 360 machines looked. They were large refrigerator-like boxes, located in special computer centers with air conditioning and powerful power supplies, and tended to by specialists in white coats. A single computer could occupy several cabinets, and have many tape drives, disk drives, printers, and punched card readers attached.
Most importantly, the System 360 was not a single computer, but rather a whole range of computers with different price points and performance levels. Initially, IBM announced six different models and, over the coming years, many more were introduced. These computers would all run the same software programs, and let customers upgrade to bigger machines as their businesses grew. In today’s computer market, this is something we take for granted. For example, we can buy a 300 dollar netbook which essentially can run the same software as a 30000 dollar server, albeit slower. In 1964, this similarity was considered revolutionary. Many people within IBM doubted that it could be done at all. But it was done, and at its launch, the fastest System 360 machine was about 25 times faster than the slowest. In 1970, the System 360 models offered by IBM spanned a performance factor of 200.
The key to the System 360 design was the idea of using common instruction set architecture across a range of computers. For those less familiar with how computers work, the instruction set of a computer determines which programs it can run. Programs written to use one instruction set cannot run on a computer using a different instruction set. For example, programs for Apple’s iPhone do not work directly on Apple desktop machines, as they use different instruction sets.
Prior to the System 360, there had been ad-hoc efforts at making new computer systems run the same software as older computer systems. The System 360 made this an explicit promise, and machines were marketed as part of the family with a guarantee that existing software would work on the new machines.
Looking back at this decision from 2010, it can be seen to signify a maturing of the information technology field. Today, the common wisdom in the computer industry is that software is more important than hardware. People and businesses buy computers to run certain software on them, and the hardware is of secondary importance. We make the choice between Windows, Linux, or MacOS when buying a new computer. In the early days of the computer, the hardware was primary and the software was created after the hardware, and it was normal to rewrite all software when a new computer was acquired. As business usage of computers increased, more and more effort was invested in software, and the value of the software began to overtake the value of the computers on which it was run.
The System 360 proved very popular with customers and IBM's sales doubled from 1965 to 1970. In the mid-70s, IBM as a company was as big as the rest of the US computer industry combined. The success of the System 360 drove other firms to create compatible machines, creating for the first time a computer market in which different vendors sold machines that would compete on performance and price, but run the same software.
The System 360 was also copied by the Soviet Union and Eastern Bloc nations. In the 1970s, the Soviet Union decided to clone the System 360 architecture instead of using a homegrown design. The machines were called “ES EVM”, and more than 15000 were manufactured up until 1998. Thus, the IBM System 360 ended running the most important business computer systems on both sides of the iron curtain. When the Cold War ended, this turned out to be a blessing for IBM, as the old East provided a large pool of programmers skilled in the System 360 architecture, while Western computer science students had long moved on to newer technology like PCs and client-server computing.
Over the years, the architecture of the System 360 has been upgraded and developed. The first major upgrade was the System 370 announced in 1970, and in 1990, another redesign gave it the new name System 390. In 2000, the name was changed to “zSeries” following another major redesign to extend the amount of memory the computers could use. The “z” indicates “zero downtime”, the main selling point of mainframe computers today. The most recent generation of the System 360 lineage is the the “z10”. The z10 can essentially still run all the software written since 1964, as well as newer software which can take advantage of the new features of the System 370, System390, and zSeries. To an outsider, it can be quite surprising to realize just how much decades-old software is still in active use in many businesses, for the simple reason that there is no point in fixing what is not broken.
IBM “mainframe” computers, offered referred to as 'big iron' by IT workers, still run many of the most critical computer functions of our modern society, in particular in the financial system. The IBM mainframes have a reputation for outstanding stability and reliability, as well as services and support that -- while costly -- ensure that the computers never go down and that business never stops. IBM’s mainframe computers are not the dominant force in the computer industry that they once were, but they are still a major business, even if it is far out of the public eye. It is quite possible that the descendants of the System 360 will continue to be around for many decades to come. So far, all predictions about the death of the mainframe have proven to be false.
Today in 1964, the International Business Machines Corporation, more commonly known as IBM, announced its System 360 line of computers. The System 360 represented a milestone in computer history that helped IBM to become the largest computer company in the world. The “360” in the name indicated the 360 degrees of a circle, meaning that the System 360 was designed to be a single computer family for all types of computer work. In the 1960s, this mainly meant doing both business administration-type tasks and computation-intensive engineering tasks. Previously, computers had been designed to do one or the other pretty much to the exclusion of anything else.
For those unfamiliar with the computers of the 1960s, it is worth pointing out how the System 360 machines looked. They were large refrigerator-like boxes, located in special computer centers with air conditioning and powerful power supplies, and tended to by specialists in white coats. A single computer could occupy several cabinets, and have many tape drives, disk drives, printers, and punched card readers attached.
Most importantly, the System 360 was not a single computer, but rather a whole range of computers with different price points and performance levels. Initially, IBM announced six different models and, over the coming years, many more were introduced. These computers would all run the same software programs, and let customers upgrade to bigger machines as their businesses grew. In today’s computer market, this is something we take for granted. For example, we can buy a 300 dollar netbook which essentially can run the same software as a 30000 dollar server, albeit slower. In 1964, this similarity was considered revolutionary. Many people within IBM doubted that it could be done at all. But it was done, and at its launch, the fastest System 360 machine was about 25 times faster than the slowest. In 1970, the System 360 models offered by IBM spanned a performance factor of 200.
The key to the System 360 design was the idea of using common instruction set architecture across a range of computers. For those less familiar with how computers work, the instruction set of a computer determines which programs it can run. Programs written to use one instruction set cannot run on a computer using a different instruction set. For example, programs for Apple’s iPhone do not work directly on Apple desktop machines, as they use different instruction sets.
Prior to the System 360, there had been ad-hoc efforts at making new computer systems run the same software as older computer systems. The System 360 made this an explicit promise, and machines were marketed as part of the family with a guarantee that existing software would work on the new machines.
Looking back at this decision from 2010, it can be seen to signify a maturing of the information technology field. Today, the common wisdom in the computer industry is that software is more important than hardware. People and businesses buy computers to run certain software on them, and the hardware is of secondary importance. We make the choice between Windows, Linux, or MacOS when buying a new computer. In the early days of the computer, the hardware was primary and the software was created after the hardware, and it was normal to rewrite all software when a new computer was acquired. As business usage of computers increased, more and more effort was invested in software, and the value of the software began to overtake the value of the computers on which it was run.
The System 360 proved very popular with customers and IBM's sales doubled from 1965 to 1970. In the mid-70s, IBM as a company was as big as the rest of the US computer industry combined. The success of the System 360 drove other firms to create compatible machines, creating for the first time a computer market in which different vendors sold machines that would compete on performance and price, but run the same software.
The System 360 was also copied by the Soviet Union and Eastern Bloc nations. In the 1970s, the Soviet Union decided to clone the System 360 architecture instead of using a homegrown design. The machines were called “ES EVM”, and more than 15000 were manufactured up until 1998. Thus, the IBM System 360 ended running the most important business computer systems on both sides of the iron curtain. When the Cold War ended, this turned out to be a blessing for IBM, as the old East provided a large pool of programmers skilled in the System 360 architecture, while Western computer science students had long moved on to newer technology like PCs and client-server computing.
Over the years, the architecture of the System 360 has been upgraded and developed. The first major upgrade was the System 370 announced in 1970, and in 1990, another redesign gave it the new name System 390. In 2000, the name was changed to “zSeries” following another major redesign to extend the amount of memory the computers could use. The “z” indicates “zero downtime”, the main selling point of mainframe computers today. The most recent generation of the System 360 lineage is the the “z10”. The z10 can essentially still run all the software written since 1964, as well as newer software which can take advantage of the new features of the System 370, System390, and zSeries. To an outsider, it can be quite surprising to realize just how much decades-old software is still in active use in many businesses, for the simple reason that there is no point in fixing what is not broken.
IBM “mainframe” computers, offered referred to as 'big iron' by IT workers, still run many of the most critical computer functions of our modern society, in particular in the financial system. The IBM mainframes have a reputation for outstanding stability and reliability, as well as services and support that -- while costly -- ensure that the computers never go down and that business never stops. IBM’s mainframe computers are not the dominant force in the computer industry that they once were, but they are still a major business, even if it is far out of the public eye. It is quite possible that the descendants of the System 360 will continue to be around for many decades to come. So far, all predictions about the death of the mainframe have proven to be false.
Monday, April 05, 2010
Howard Hughes Dies, April 5, 1976
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Today in 1976, Howard Robard Hughes, Jr. died at the age of 70 while in route from Mexico to a hospital in Houston, Texas. Hughes died as one of the wealthiest men in the world, leaving behind him not only a legacy of well-publicized odd habits, but a mark on several major industries as well.
Hughes was born in 1905 in Houston, Texas. His father was the inventor of the dual cone roller bit, a tool which allowed oil drilling in areas previously considered unreachable. When his parents died while he was still a teenager, Hughes was left with a significant fortune and the company business, the Hughes Tool Company.
Hughes’ formal education was sporadic, but this did not stop him from at least trying to attain his goals. He set out for Hollywood while still in his early 20’s, convinced that he could make it as a movie producer. Despite the fact that he was not, at first, taken seriously by the establishment, he eventually made several very successful films including Hell’s Angels, Scarface and The Outlaw. It was during this time that Hughes’ reputation as a ladies’ man was first established. Rumors of his affairs and troubled marriages would follow him the rest of his life.
Hughes’ love of aircraft led him to become involved in the burgeoning aircraft industry in California. In 1932, he founded Hughes Aircraft Company as a division of Hughes Tools. In 1935, Hughes set a world speed record in the Hughes H-1 Racer, a plane that combined all the aerodynamic breakthroughs of the day and influenced the designs of many of the fighter aircraft used in the Second World War. Hughes also became the principal stockholder of T&WA, the airline which would become Trans World Airlines.
Hughes’ best-known aviation feat is the building and single flight of the H-4 Hercules, better known as the “Spruce Goose”. We highlighted the H-4 in November, 2005 on the anniversary of her first and only flight; you can find a transcript of that podcast at mattstodayinhistory.com.
Hughes survived a plane crash in 1946 while piloting one of his company’s experimental aircraft, the XF-11. It is during his recovery that he probably first became addicted to pain-killers, a demon that would be with him for the rest of his life. He began wearing his famous mustache after the crash to cover a scar on his upper lip.
Although it is not well-known, Howard Hughes probably did more to break the Mafia’s control of Las Vegas than anyone. In the mid-60’s, he decided to move to Las Vegas and begin investing in casinos. At that time, every major gambling establishment in the city was mob-controlled. He bought six large hotel/casinos from Mafia front organizations in an effort to change the city’s image into that of “a well-dressed man in a dinner jacket and a beautifully jeweled and furred female getting out of an expensive car.”
Suffering from obsessive-compulsive disorder and drug addiction, Hughes became more and more erratic as the years went by. When he died, he was nearly unrecognizable; fingerprints had to be used to positively identify his body. He is buried in Houston, Texas, his boyhood home.
Today in 1976, Howard Robard Hughes, Jr. died at the age of 70 while in route from Mexico to a hospital in Houston, Texas. Hughes died as one of the wealthiest men in the world, leaving behind him not only a legacy of well-publicized odd habits, but a mark on several major industries as well.
Hughes was born in 1905 in Houston, Texas. His father was the inventor of the dual cone roller bit, a tool which allowed oil drilling in areas previously considered unreachable. When his parents died while he was still a teenager, Hughes was left with a significant fortune and the company business, the Hughes Tool Company.
Hughes’ formal education was sporadic, but this did not stop him from at least trying to attain his goals. He set out for Hollywood while still in his early 20’s, convinced that he could make it as a movie producer. Despite the fact that he was not, at first, taken seriously by the establishment, he eventually made several very successful films including Hell’s Angels, Scarface and The Outlaw. It was during this time that Hughes’ reputation as a ladies’ man was first established. Rumors of his affairs and troubled marriages would follow him the rest of his life.
Hughes’ love of aircraft led him to become involved in the burgeoning aircraft industry in California. In 1932, he founded Hughes Aircraft Company as a division of Hughes Tools. In 1935, Hughes set a world speed record in the Hughes H-1 Racer, a plane that combined all the aerodynamic breakthroughs of the day and influenced the designs of many of the fighter aircraft used in the Second World War. Hughes also became the principal stockholder of T&WA, the airline which would become Trans World Airlines.
Hughes’ best-known aviation feat is the building and single flight of the H-4 Hercules, better known as the “Spruce Goose”. We highlighted the H-4 in November, 2005 on the anniversary of her first and only flight; you can find a transcript of that podcast at mattstodayinhistory.com.
Hughes survived a plane crash in 1946 while piloting one of his company’s experimental aircraft, the XF-11. It is during his recovery that he probably first became addicted to pain-killers, a demon that would be with him for the rest of his life. He began wearing his famous mustache after the crash to cover a scar on his upper lip.
Although it is not well-known, Howard Hughes probably did more to break the Mafia’s control of Las Vegas than anyone. In the mid-60’s, he decided to move to Las Vegas and begin investing in casinos. At that time, every major gambling establishment in the city was mob-controlled. He bought six large hotel/casinos from Mafia front organizations in an effort to change the city’s image into that of “a well-dressed man in a dinner jacket and a beautifully jeweled and furred female getting out of an expensive car.”
Suffering from obsessive-compulsive disorder and drug addiction, Hughes became more and more erratic as the years went by. When he died, he was nearly unrecognizable; fingerprints had to be used to positively identify his body. He is buried in Houston, Texas, his boyhood home.
Saturday, April 03, 2010
The First Pony Express Run, April 3, 1860
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Today in 1860, the first Pony Express run began in St. Joseph, Missouri. The run’s destination was Sacramento, California, a distance of more than 2000 miles that was covered in a little less than eleven days. The Pony Express proved that vast continental distances could be covered in relatively short periods of time with organization and good planning. The image of the Pony Express rider---young and alone, determined to see his mission through---is still part of the American image of the Wild West.
The Pony Express was born out of the need to get messages from the eastern United States to California. Between those two areas lay broad plains, treacherous mountain passes and Native American tribes. Normally, letters and parcels going west were carried by one of two overland routes or by sea to Panama, where cargo was ported over the isthmus and loaded into ships again for the Pacific half of the journey. Depending on the final destination, delivery could take weeks or even months. The founders of the Pony Express wanted to cut that time down to ten days.
The Pony Express route was divided into sections, with each section being about 10 miles long. The distance was used because it is the distance a horse can comfortably gallop. At the end of each section was a station where the rider would transfer his mail pouch to a new horse and continue on. A new rider took over every 100 miles or so. Thus would the routine continue all the way to California. Along with the direct route from St. Joseph, Missouri to Sacramento, there were other spur routes which split off from the main route and went to places like San Diego.
The men who began the Pony Express wanted to secure the $1,000,000 mail contract Congress had granted to another company to deliver mail to California using stagecoaches via a different route. Even though the 10 day delivery time promise was met, Congress only granted the Pony Express’s parent company (the Central Overland California and Pikes Peak Express Company) part of the contract running from St. Joseph to Salt Lake City, Utah. The original holder of the government contract, the Overland Mail Company, operated the Pony Express from Salt Lake City to destinations in California.
Even though the Pony Express cut delivery times dramatically, the world was changing. On October, 24, 1861, the first transcontinental telegraph line was completed. This meant that messages taking 10 days to deliver could now be transmitted coast-to-coast in minutes. The horse and rider had been outpaced by the electron.
Despite the fact that mail cost $5 per 1/2 ounce to send when the Pony Express began (eventually, the price dropped to $1 per 1/2 ounce), the service was a financial failure. But by the time the Pony Express service was ended in November, 1861, it had done a great service to settlers in California and had shown the best routes across the center of the nation, routes that would, in a few years, be used by the first transcontinental railroads.
Today in 1860, the first Pony Express run began in St. Joseph, Missouri. The run’s destination was Sacramento, California, a distance of more than 2000 miles that was covered in a little less than eleven days. The Pony Express proved that vast continental distances could be covered in relatively short periods of time with organization and good planning. The image of the Pony Express rider---young and alone, determined to see his mission through---is still part of the American image of the Wild West.
The Pony Express was born out of the need to get messages from the eastern United States to California. Between those two areas lay broad plains, treacherous mountain passes and Native American tribes. Normally, letters and parcels going west were carried by one of two overland routes or by sea to Panama, where cargo was ported over the isthmus and loaded into ships again for the Pacific half of the journey. Depending on the final destination, delivery could take weeks or even months. The founders of the Pony Express wanted to cut that time down to ten days.
The Pony Express route was divided into sections, with each section being about 10 miles long. The distance was used because it is the distance a horse can comfortably gallop. At the end of each section was a station where the rider would transfer his mail pouch to a new horse and continue on. A new rider took over every 100 miles or so. Thus would the routine continue all the way to California. Along with the direct route from St. Joseph, Missouri to Sacramento, there were other spur routes which split off from the main route and went to places like San Diego.
The men who began the Pony Express wanted to secure the $1,000,000 mail contract Congress had granted to another company to deliver mail to California using stagecoaches via a different route. Even though the 10 day delivery time promise was met, Congress only granted the Pony Express’s parent company (the Central Overland California and Pikes Peak Express Company) part of the contract running from St. Joseph to Salt Lake City, Utah. The original holder of the government contract, the Overland Mail Company, operated the Pony Express from Salt Lake City to destinations in California.
Even though the Pony Express cut delivery times dramatically, the world was changing. On October, 24, 1861, the first transcontinental telegraph line was completed. This meant that messages taking 10 days to deliver could now be transmitted coast-to-coast in minutes. The horse and rider had been outpaced by the electron.
Despite the fact that mail cost $5 per 1/2 ounce to send when the Pony Express began (eventually, the price dropped to $1 per 1/2 ounce), the service was a financial failure. But by the time the Pony Express service was ended in November, 1861, it had done a great service to settlers in California and had shown the best routes across the center of the nation, routes that would, in a few years, be used by the first transcontinental railroads.
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