William Fothergill Cooke - First Perfected Commercial Electric Telegraph System (1840)

First Perfected Commercial Electric Telegraph System (1840)

The success of this telegraph demonstration caused Isambard Kingdom Brunel of the London and Blackwall Railway, to commence upon having Cooke install the world's first perfected commercial electronic telegraph communications system at the inauguration of the London and Blackwall Railway begun the first week of July 1840, and later, finally on Stephenson's London and Birmingham Railway. By this time, Stephenson finally saw the value of the telegraph.

Before a parliamentary committee on railways in 1840, Wheatstone stated that he had, with Cooke, obtained a new patent for a telegraphic arrangement; the new apparatus required only a single pair of wires. Yet, the telegraph was still too costly for general purposes. In 1840, for the London and Blackwall Railway installation, however, Cooke and Wheatstone succeeded in producing the single needle apparatus, which they patented, and from that time the electric telegraph became a practical instrument, soon adopted on all of the railway lines throughout the country. Another main aspect of the primary design also brought forth during the London and Blackwall Railway installation, was that of what became widely known as the "five dial" telegraph system.