So, too, with Samuel F. B. Morse, and Alexander Graham Bell, the one the father of the electric telegraph, the other the inventor of the telephone. If anybody had told Samuel Morse in 1811, when as a youth of twenty he sailed from New York to Liverpool to study painting under Benjamin West, that he would be known to posterity as an inventor rather than as an artist, he would have laughed the prophecy to scorn. But, as has happened to other gifted men, circumstances conspired to turn and fix the thoughts of this brilliant son of New England on problems unconnected with the routine of his daily life, yet appealing to him with such force as to change the whole course of his career. [Illustration: THE FIRST BOBBIN WINDER] TELEGRAPH AND TELEPHONE [Illustration: BIRTHPLACE OF S. F. B. MORSE _The inventor of the telegraph was born at the foot of Breed’s Hill, Charlestown, Massachusetts._] [Illustration: THE NEW YORK HOME OF S. F. B. MORSE _This house was located on West Twenty-second Street near Fifth Avenue._] [Illustration: SAMUEL F. B. MORSE] [Illustration: THE FIRST TELEPHONE] [Illustration: THE FIRST TELEGRAPH INSTRUMENT] With Morse the turning point was reached in 1827 when, some years after his return from England, he attended a course of lectures in New York on the subject of electromagnetism. What he then heard fired his imagination, and led him, during a second visit abroad, to study more closely the nature of electricity. He specially became interested in the possibility of utilizing this great natural force as a medium for long-distance communication, and when homeward bound, in the autumn of 1832, applied himself to this one problem to such good purpose that before landing in New York he was able to show to his fellow passengers plans of the instrument that was to immortalize his name. [Illustration: “LONG DISTANCE” _Alexander Graham Bell opening the New York-Chicago long distance telephone line, October 18, 1892._] It was not until five years afterward, however, that Morse made the first working demonstration of his invention, which by most people was regarded as a scientific toy rather than a creation of the highest practical utility. And a scientific toy it remained until, after a heartbreaking struggle to secure the necessary financial aid, Morse persuaded Congress in 1843 to appropriate $30,000 for the construction of a telegraph line between Washington and Baltimore. The first message to be flashed over this line, May 1, 1844, was the news of the nomination of Henry Clay for the presidency; and with the sending of that message one of the greatest inventions in the history of mankind definitely gained recognition as an accomplished fact.