FIFTY YEARS AGO

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22349, 21 February 1936, Page 8

FIFTY YEARS AGO

MECHANICAL ADVANCES - SPREAD OF ELECTRICITY The following paragraphs from the issue of the New Zealand Hehald of February 20, 1886, show that the world apparently was more advanced, technically, half a century ago than most people imagine:— "In China the powerful Viceroy Li Hung has for some time been urging the need of railroads and telegraphs. His influence, aided by the support of other able statesmen, has already given to China over 3000 miles of telegraphs, manned by Chinese operators." "Heretofore ships have been permitted to pass through the Suez Canal only in daylight, but now warships and steamers with powerful electric lights may go through at night." "A company has been incorporated to build an underground railway in New York from the Battery, up Broadway, to Harlem River, with various branches, making about 13 miles in all." "Upward of 3000 miles out of 15,000 miles of telegraph and electric wires in Chicago have been put underground within the past year, and poles are gradually disappearing from the streets." "Mr. Alexander Graham Bell, the famous electrician, says that the problem of seeing by electricity is so nearly solved as to give much encouragement to those at work in that wonderful world of physics."