working on a commissioned portrait of the famed French general Marquis de Lafayette when he got an urgent message from his father saying, “Your dear wife is convalescent.” Leaving the painting of Lafayette unfinished, the painter rushed home to New Haven, Connecticut, to find that his beloved wife was not only dead but had already been buried. In 1825, an aspiring painter was in Washington, D.C. Prior to the invention of the telegraph, long distance communication was as slow as the horse which carried it the Pony Express could deliver a message across America in roughly 10 days. In the U.S., Stone says that people still send telegrams for a simple reason, echoing the famous quote about why humans climb Mount Everest-“because they can.”

Everything from legal notices to social correspondence for births, funerals and weddings are being routinely sent by telegrams. “People use them for canceling contracts and sending legal notifications because a copy of the message is retained in our files for 7 years and can be legally verified,” explains Stone. Overall, he says that about 20 million telegrams are still delivered every year.Īnd this isn’t just a gimmick text messages and e-mails might work for saying hi but when it comes to urgent hand-delivered messages, the telegram is still the gold standard. They are well aware of their own anachronism: “Most people are pretty surprised to learn that telegrams still exist, and in fact are still pretty widely used in some parts of the world,” says Colin Stone, Director of Operations. Principal amongst them is the International Telegram Company who inherited and still operate Western Union’s former telex and cablegram network.

But a handful of companies are carrying on the tradition.

Whats telegram used for