The post office and its story : $b an interesting account of the activities of a great government departmentBennett, Edward
History
The post office and its story : $b an interesting account of the activities of a great government department
Bennett, Edward
Postal service -- Great Britain -- History
The area of each floor is so great that it is essential that the various
circulation tables at particular points thereon should be directly
connected by tube, thus allowing of the rapid transit of the traffic and
preventing the confusion which would attend carriage by hand from point
to point. In all sixty-eight house pneumatic tubes are worked throughout
the day. In addition, continuous aerial cord carriers worked by electric
motors are used for the conveyance of telegrams.
For the purposes of circulation, and for staffing and effective
supervision, the three floors or galleries are divided into sections or
divisions. For instance, the provincial galleries are composed of seven
divisions, named respectively A to G, and the various circuits are
grouped as geographically as possible in these divisions. The A Division
embraces such south-easterly and south-westerly towns as Dover,
Folkestone, Brighton, Bournemouth, Basingstoke, and Ventnor, and so on.
In addition to these divisions there are the News Division, the Special
Section, and the Intelligence Section. The former contains the news
circuits over which press work is disseminated throughout the Kingdom.
The apparatus in use for this class of traffic is the Wheatstone
Automatic, which in the course of years has been so improved that
whereas in 1870 it was only capable of transmitting some 80 or 100 words
per minute, it is now possible, given good wire conditions, to attain a
speed of 400 words per minute, although for working purposes it is not
usual to exceed an average speed of from 200 to 250. This system is
specially adapted for the transmission of general news, one batch of
which, on specially prepared slips, is often forwarded to many different
towns. A large proportion of this particular traffic is classified,
being news of general interest, and is handed to the Department by the
different news agencies, such as the Press Association, the Central
News, the Exchange Telegraph Company, &c., for dissemination to the
various subscribers in different towns.
Air pressure is largely employed in perforating with the requisite Morse
characters the slips by which the Wheatstone transmitters are fed, and
by this means a number of duplicate slips can be prepared at one
operation. Stick punching is also employed, but more recently other
systems have been introduced, such as the Creed and the Gell. These have
keyboards similar to that of a typewriter with increased signs, &c.; but
whereas, in using the ordinary hand perforator, each dot and dash of the
Morse characters require to be separately made by the operator, the
improved systems provide the required perforated Morse signals complete
for every letter of the alphabet on the slip or ribbon, as each letter
of the keyboard is depressed. The power employed is obtained by means of
electric motors.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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