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this post was submitted on 15 Mar 2024
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Asklemmy
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Check it out:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Optical_telegraph
Optical telegraphs, also called semaphores, were invented in 1684, and first experimented in 1767. The most popular system was invented in 1792. There are a lot of hills around the US and Europe named “Telegraph Hill” because they used to be where an optical telegraph station was set up.
You’re thinking of the electric telegraph, which was indeed invented in 1837, and very quickly supplanted optical telegraphs. We now use the term telegraph almost exclusively to describe the electric telegraph, but someone from the 1700s wouldn’t know that.