Claude Chappe and the Napoleon Telegraph

It's interesting that Pratchett (who loved bringing historical things into his Discworld) used a matrix of black/white squares for signaling via his Clacks instead of the arms-with-angles used here.

I used to love watching the Signalmen on my ship practice both semaphore and Morse code using a signal lamp with neighboring ships. Even in today's modern era, with satellite communications encompassing the globe, ship-to-ship communication can still be made using these time and tested methods.

I think it's worth noting that semaphore communications occur at the speed of light.

This brings to mind how difficult it would be to do the remote learning via this network as opposed to the current system.

I find it fascinating that people were making telegraphs before Samuel Morse made his electric one in 1843.

In the 1970s as a Boy Scout I was trained in flag semaphore. I always thought that it was a very old, even ancient technology, so I am a bit surprised to find out it is not that old.

I first learned of these telegraphs (or semaphores) many decades ago, from reading some of the Hornblower books by C. S. Forester. I see it was Forester's usual historical accuracy trying to educate me.

Terry Pratchett had a visual telegraph system in his fictional "Diskworld" novels.

Birmingham Alabama has a large statue on top of a mountain that is " Vulcan, the God of Iron and Steal " . Vulcan holds in his hand, high above his head, a light that is visible from almost everywhere in Birmingham. The light is used to send a message to all of those who can see it. The light remains green if nobody has been killed in a vehicle accident in Birmingham, and if someone has been killed that day in a vehicle accident, the light turns red. I was always fascinated by this message that was being transmitted to so many people, in an attempt to make people more aware of the dangers of driving wrecklessly, or by becoming distracted. Even in this day of mass communication, The statue of Vulcan is sending a message 24 hours a day, every day of the year, reminding people to slow down and be careful, and try to keep the light green. Or if is red, to remember that traffic had already claimed at least one life on this day. Such a simple signal, designed to curve everyone's behavior and awareness of all those who can see it.

Every innovation starts somewhere. And remember, we landed men on the moon with slide rules for the most part. Thanks for the fascinating segment.

There is a building in Syracuse New York that has a tower on top that lights up with colors that indicate the coming weather and temperatures . It can be seen for miles around the countryside

Good show as always thank you

Another excellent episode, real history rocks!!!🙏👍📖😷

I'd imagine that Chappe would marvel at the modern internet, but not be at all that surprised.

09:27 what an amazing map/drawing. His or her use of shading gives the walls a 3D effect.

Very interesting

The crime of the Blanc brothers wasn’t so much wire fraud as misuse of government property. They weren’t attempting to defraud anyone, except perhaps the time of the people running the system. Rather, they used the system to transmit movements of the stock exchanges faster than that information could otherwise move, allowing them to take advantage of the arbitrage. In a sense, it was the ancient version of trading companies building their own faster internet links

I love that you mentioned the Count of Monte Cristo! That's the first thought that popped into my head when I saw what this episode was about.

Great subject!

I had just read a book on Mr chappe. Very interesting and so sad an ending to a bright man. Napoleon was wise to see the value in this method and used it well.