Product Description

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1761812 in Books
• Published on: 2003-09-01
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 224 pages

From Booklist
An import from Britain, Cookson's account of the first transatlantic telegraph is more phlegmatic, and perhaps less dramatized, than historian John Steele Gordon's A Thread across the Ocean (2002). Whenever the cable laying goes awry, Cookson notes the fact, whereas Gordon shades the event with the heave of the ship or the snap of the parting cable. But in its quiet manner, Cookson's effort is just as appealing a saga. Assigning credit for the ultimate success in 1866 is one of her narrative's organizing principles; another is the financing of the endeavor. A chance encounter in a New York hotel lobby set it in motion in 1854, when a Newfoundlander telegraph engineer (Frederic Gisborne) was put in touch with a rich paper manufacturer (Cyrus Field) seeking a new world to conquer. Field persuaded fellow financiers to put up the cash, but they ran out of money by 1858 and yielded the project to British interests--though Field was an ever-present proselytizer. Handsome illustrations add value to Cookson's exposition on a popular topic. Gilbert Taylor
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Booklist
“Handsome illustrations add value to Cookson's exposition on a popular topic.”

From the Publisher
Gillian Cookson is the County Editor for Durham of the Victoria County History of England and is a lecturer at Durham University. She lives in Yorkshire.

Customer Reviews

Well-researched story of the Atlantic Cable
The Atlantic Cable, one of the great engineering feats of the Victorian era, is often thought of as an American project. While it's true that the impetus came from New York merchant Cyrus Field, and Field remained a constant force behind the cable for the 12 years it took for it to succeed, the engineering, manufacture, and laying of the cable were, for the most part, conducted by British companies. It's curious, then, that most histories of the cable have been written by Americans.

Gill Cookson, a British historian and researcher who has previously written articles on submarine telegraphy, as well as the definitive biography of cable engineer Fleeming Jenkin, is well-qualified to redress this balance with her new book, The Cable. Published in time for the 150th anniversary of the beginning of the project, The Cable tells the story of the Atlantic Cable, from the first vague proposals in the 1840s, through the pioneering days of the 1850s, to the eventual success of the 1860s. Written for a general audience, the book is a lively narrative of the failures and frustrations, the agonizing delays caused by financial, political, and technical problems, and the ultimate success of 1866, establishing the communications link between the Americas and Europe which by gradual evolution became today's fiber optic network circling the world.

As well as being a readable and entertaining history of the events, the book puts into context the development of materials, equipment, and cable-laying technique, the British and American financial and political climates which influenced the laying of the cable, and the persistence of Cyrus Field in seeing the project to its conclusion. With numerous black and white illustrations, and a full-color 32-page section of reproductions of early drawings and photographs of cable manufacture and laying, The Cable is perhaps the best view so far of this "audacious endeavour".