[NJARC] Speedwell Village

[John Dilks K2TQN]

To: morsecode at mailman.qth.net
From: w2pm at aol.com
Subject: [MorseCode] Speedwell Museum - birthplace of the magnetic telegraph

I attended the opening of the museum this morning.  The attendance 
was very poor from 10 - noon when I was there. There were 2:1 
staff/exhibitors v visitors and most of the visitors were senior 
citizens and a few stroller moms.

The county cleaned and restored the buildings and grounds nicely, and 
updated the circa 1970 displays in the Factor building which were on 
a par with public grammar school quality.  Now they replaced those 
with new ones, nicely done, and elevated the quality to high school 
junior history class displays.  They also removed most of the 
instruments which were there - which were never that impressive 
anyway save for a few nice pieces but nothing historic except for a 
small, experimental register which some then, and still think, was 
made in the 1860's.

There are several key and sounder display stations made nicely like 
wooden toddler toys. They are certainly functional enough but very 
VERY boring.  Not even the few toddlers I saw seemed compelled to 
depress them (and the levers were very tight - not sure a toddler 
could push them down anyway).  Some had LEDs attached, to demonstrate 
the advanced concept of SPST DC switching (likely will get complaints 
for playing to the gifted children crowd and too advanced for most 
others), and some had rudimentary toddler class sounders.  Attractive 
enough but very boring.

They DID have the original Vail register there - on loan from Cornell 
University. This is the same one featured in an article by our own 
learned gentlemen colleague - John Casale in a AWA publication of 
some years ago.  It was nice to see it and was very well displayed in 
a nice case truly world-class museum style.  I was told Cornell 
defined the display specs and the insurance company did not allow for 
any photos to be taken without prior written approval.  In the same 
room was, I am very proud to announce, the famed missing Vail 
Laboratory Notebook - Alfred's personal notes and drawings 
documenting the Washington to Baltimore demo was also on display in a 
similar museum grade case and open to one specific drawing page.  I 
say I am proud because I found that book hidden in an old file 
cabinet some years ago with pure junk.
When I showed it to the director at that time she was unimpressed and 
would have not noticed if I simply walked out with it - which I admit 
I was tempted to do.  However, I urged to take great care of it and 
explained it's significance. She smiled politely, thanked me for the 
info and placed it on top of a pile of files on her desk in the out 
basket.  I haven't seen it since this morning beautifully displayed 
with the right documentation.  I asked one of the staff if they knew 
anything about it and she said "it was found here 30 years ago by 
someone and taken good care of ever since".  I also politely smiled 
and thanked her for the explanation.  I did sneak a photo of it 
(prompting a security guard to come in and ask me to refrain from 
further photos. Even tho he was dressed as Civil War Union Signal 
Corp soldier, he looked like one of K2UV's relatives so I 
complied.  That room had some Morse and Vail letters, and some early 
texts on electricity featuring the telegraph. They also displayed a 
copy of a letter glued to the bottom of the Vail register written by 
Alfred bitterly denouncing Morse for not giving him enough credit for 
the telegraph and specifically saying Morse had no contribution to 
the design or construction of the register. And that register is very 
well done - clearly the model for all others most of us have seen in 
many versions.

The original water wheel and standpipe have been fully restored and 
are operating - very large and very impressive. The most impressive 
thing there.  Apparently old man Vail originally got into the iron 
forge business to construct that water wheel in order to provide for 
a large factor leased out to textil makers from nearby Paterson 
NJ.  He built it and thought they would come - but they didn't and 
the wheel was remanded to a use for cutting wood with the usual drive 
belt arrangements.  They did a fantastic job with this.  Of course 
later Vail would remain in the iron forging business making canon 
balls, large train parts - like wheels, brake shoes, etc.  He also 
did a lot of high end ornate iron artwork.  Vail (sr) was also a 
judge and the family always enjoyed an excellent reputation in the community.

Back to the telegraph, I was disappointed but really didn't expect 
much. But I think they missed a great opportunity to make this a more 
relavant experience and show the importance of the telegraph to 
society and it's role in the early evolutionary process of our 
telecommunications system.  Rather, this is quaint place which will 
very likely be greatly underutilized.

I did take a number of photos on the grounds, including the Civil War 
Union Signal Corp encampment, with several young men dressed in the 
period, but it was not very interesting either - but good enough I suppose.

Funny thing - there were three elderly people upstairs in the Factory 
also dressed in the period. They were demonstrating the telegraph 
using Triumph keys and Bunnell sounders in classic resonator housings 
across the room. Neither of the 3 knew the code. But they were 
somewhat knowledgeable of the telegraph and railroading.  In any case 
one of the three was a chubby woman, the other an elderly man who was 
her father in real life.  I asked them if they were Stephen Vail and 
the Mrs. and they said no, only period standins.  I told them they 
both remarkably resembled in profile to a striking degree but they 
didn't know that since they said they never saw photos of 
them.  However, in another adjacent building, the original Vail 
residence - which is also a museum and includes all the original 
furnishings and deco of the house, there are two portraits by Morse - 
one of S. Vail and the other Mrs. Vail.  I told the docent there 
about the couple in the factory building and she couldn't believe it 
so she went to take a look and was astounded at the 
resemblance.  They subsequently were named Mr and Mrs Vail and just 
in time to great the SFB Morse impersonator who was supposed to be 
there but by noon hadn't shown up yet. Hopefully he made it.

I will publish the photos by tomorrow and be back with web links of same.
Pete W2PM
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