Richmond Dispatch, April 27, 1902, page 13:
CABLES WILL BE GOOD ONLY AS COPPER.
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This is the Opinion of Professor Fessenden, After Successful Wireless Telegraphy Tests on Roanoke Island.
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WEIR'S POINT, ROANOKE ISLAND, N. C., April 26.--(Special)--One of the most important tests of wireless telegraphy ever made was conducted on this little island yesterday by Professor R. A. Fessenden before a board of Navy Department experts.
The tests were in every respect successful, demonstrating conclusively that a system has been secured at last which does away with the defects of the system now in use. These experiments are being conducted by Professor Fessenden, who for years was Thomas A. Edison's chief assistant. Associated with him is Professor Willis J. Moore, of the United States Weather Bureau, at Washington.
GREAT RAPIDITY.
In the presence of these experts Professor Fessenden received wireless messages from his Cape Hatteras station, a distance of fifty miles, at the extraordinary rate of twenty-five words per minute. The receiving end of his instruments were so delicately adjusted that the dots and dashes of the wireless instrument were as plainly audible as though coming from a copper wire.
Professor Fessenden, who has lived on Roanoke Island for the past two years, stated that he had selected the place because of its isolation, and because from there he could keep his experiments a profound secret.
END OF ALL CABLES.
"The age of the cable is over," declared Professor Fessenden last night after his tests. "Wireless telegraphy is certain to supersede it, and within five years cables will be of no value except for copper."
Professor Fessenden believes that ocean cables will be the first to feel the introduction of commercial wireless telegraphy.