Railroads in 1908 -- Telephone

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Bluefield Daily Telegraph
July 8, 1908

TELEPHONES COMING INTO PRACTICAL USE
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Many Prominent Railroad Men Predict That it Will Eventually be Used for Dispatching Purposes
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    Telephones are gradually coming into use on railroads for dispatching purposes and many prominent railroaders of the country are not the least backward in predicting that in time, and probably before a very long time, the telephone will be used almost if not exclusively for this work, which now requires a vast army of telegraphers.  It is claimed that the telephone can be used so much cheaper, and this is the main point in the argument for its introduction.
    Already almost every railroad in the country is using it almost exclusively in yards and on short lines where telegraph instruments are not absolutely needed, and one railroad in the west is using it alone on a big line.  Statistics complied by the Railway Age Gazette show that 3,000 miles of track in the country is being operated by the means of telephones for dispatching purposes.  At any rate railroad officials are giving the matter attention and every effort will be made to so perfect the telephone that it can be used with all safety on railroads.
    Telegraph superintendents of various railroads are almost a unit in the belief that the days of the telegraph instrument for use on railroads are numbered and that the telephone is bound to be the successor.
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Gordon Hamilton
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