Teleseme

Last updated

A teleseme from Electric Telegraphy (1896)
The instructions read:
GRASP the crank PIN, and move it IN or OUT, from centre, and RIGHT or LEFT, until it REMAINS AT REST on what you want AFTER you remove your hand then PRESS the red "push" button once firmly, and don't touch the pointer after that. OBSERVE: The pin remains where you set it, until your want is known. Then it moves back to the "rib." Teleseme.png
A teleseme from Electric Telegraphy (1896)
The instructions read:
GRASP the crank PIN, and move it IN or OUT, from centre, and RIGHT or LEFT, until it REMAINS AT REST on what you want AFTER you remove your hand then PRESS the red "push" button once firmly, and don't touch the pointer after that. OBSERVE: The pin remains where you set it, until your want is known. Then it moves back to the "rib."

The teleseme, [lower-alpha 1] also known as the Herzog Teleseme, was an electric signaling device used in luxury hotels in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Guests desiring room service could use the dial mechanism of their room's teleseme to indicate a good or service from over 100 options. An attendant in a hotel office would then receive the request at a corresponding teleseme and have the order filled.

Contents

Telesemes were invented by F. Benedict Herzog in the 1880s, alongside Schuyler Wheeler. They were an "emblem of luxury" in hotels from the 1890s through to the 1910s but were eventually replaced with private branch exchange (PBX) telephone systems.

History

Felix Benedict Herzog, inventor of the teleseme Felix Benedict Herzog.jpg
Felix Benedict Herzog, inventor of the teleseme

American electrical engineer and inventor F. Benedict Herzog designed electrical devices such as automatic switchboards, elevator signals, and telephone accessories. He founded the Herzog Teleseme Company and worked with electrical engineer Schuyler Wheeler, whom the company employed in 1884 and 1885. Herzog and Wheeler were granted patents for an "Electric Signaling Apparatus". [2]

The teleseme, marketed as the Herzog Teleseme, was a signaling device for hotels. It came after simple electric signaling systems, but before hotels had telephone systems connecting rooms. The system was faster than buzzing the front desk and waiting for an employee to come to the room to take a request. [1] Telesemes were being manufactured by the Herzog Teleseme Company located in New York at 55 Broadway by 1890. The Herzog Teleseme was patented in 1895. [1]

The Herzog Teleseme Company marketed telesemes to luxury hotels as well as offices and stores. The company advertised the device as having many styles, sizes, and capacities. According to the company, the device "saves bell boys, increases bar receipts, gives better service" and could be "attached to any system of wiring". [3]

Operation

Telesemes were installed in individual hotel rooms, set in the wall and connected by wire to a hotel office. [4]

The teleseme had a dial roughly the size of a dinner plate, with written options arranged in concentric circles. [4] Teleseme models offered a varying number of options (137 choices in one model, 140 in another). To operate the teleseme, the hotel guest would move the hand of the pointer to the desired service. Once the guest had set the dial, they would push a button which closed the circuit and alerted a hotel employee through an electrolytic annunciator. [5]

An annunciator would alert a hotel attendant that a room had made a request through their teleseme. Electrolytic Annunciator - Herzog Teleseme Company.jpg
An annunciator would alert a hotel attendant that a room had made a request through their teleseme.

An attendant in the hotel office would monitor an electrolytic annunciator, a small glass display around 8 in × 12 in (200 mm × 300 mm) with up to 400 numbered compartments, each holding a platinum disc in a liquid suspension beneath the number. [6] A red spot would appear on the platinum disc, and the discoloration would indicate which room had requested service. The attendant would note the room number and squeeze a bulb that would force air into the liquid and clear the red spot. [4] The attendant would then use their own teleseme to mimic the setting from the one in the hotel room and determine the order. [6]

The teleseme enabled guests to call for various services, by specifying the need for a certain hotel employee, such as a waiter, chambermaid, manservant, hairdresser, or valet. [1] [7] [8] Beverages and food could also be ordered and room service items ranged from cognac [7] to lemon squash and seltzer [8] to oysters, buttered rolls, chicken salad, and soft-boiled eggs. [9]

Reception

By the early 1890s, the teleseme became an "emblem of luxury" for hotels in an era before telephones became common in guest rooms. Telesemes were installed in Paris's Élysée Palace hotel  [ fr ] [7] in the 1890s. [6] The Jefferson Hotel in Richmond, Virginia, opened in 1895 and had telesemes installed. [1] Telesemes were also included in Statler Hotels. [10]

Depiction of a teleseme from an 1891 article in Electricity: A Popular Electrical and Financial Journal Electricity in the Modern Hotel - The Teleseme.jpg
Depiction of a teleseme from an 1891 article in Electricity: A Popular Electrical and Financial Journal

An 1891 review in Electricity: A Popular Electrical and Financial Journal described the teleseme as coming into vogue in large establishments. According to the review, the list of services on each teleseme dial was "a formidable one and can hardly fail to evoke surprise that there are so many things involved in the modern idea of hotel luxury." The review describes "a full complement of breakfast beverages, and every imaginable solid concomitant". Also listed among the teleseme's options were police, a carriage, "my wash", a penny stamp, and the principal daily newspapers. According to the reviewer, "The completeness of the teleseme arrangement is shown by a special set of figures in the centre of the dial, under which is the injunction 'Call me at the above time, but do not disturb me till then'." [9]

It is rather suggestive that fully one-third of the dial is devoted to "drinkables", and of this space one-fifth is occupied with various brands of champagne. Such a list is a dangerous thing to have at one's elbow on a hot summer's day, for it comprises everything from appolinaris [ sic ] to a gin fizz, and includes the insidious sherry cobbler, the seductive cocktail and the patrician "Bass". [9]

Moses King, in his 1893 travel guidebook King's Handbook of New York City, described the teleseme at Holland House in New York City as the "most perfect of all signalling systems". [11] The novelist Edward Eggleston wrote a piece for The Century the same year that incorporated a teleseme. [12]

An 1894 article in The Electrician reported surprise that a New York hotel had replaced its new telephone service connecting rooms with a teleseme system. An inquiry to the establishment revealed that hotel operators were unable to keep up with the calls and that the phones had become "a huge nuisance on account of the facility they afforded for easy communication with the office, and particularly through the use made of them by the ladies for transmitting complaints". [4]

The teleseme had its drawbacks as it could not handle complicated requests and errors could result in ordering the wrong service. [6] One hotel guest, Mrs. Hamlin, recalls her mother attempting to order water mid-morning and being mistakenly sent a bottle of champagne. [13] Hotels eventually moved away from the teleseme in favor of private branch exchanges (PBX) with telephones in every room. A broker of PBX systems in 1914 wrote that hotels with telesemes were reluctant to switch systems. [6]

The teleseme technology was later adapted by Herzog for a police-signaling device in New York. [14]

See also

Notes

  1. Various spellings have been used for the device, including Tellesame. [1]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Nikola Tesla</span> Serbian-American inventor (1856–1943)

Nikola Tesla was a Serbian-American inventor, electrical engineer, mechanical engineer, and futurist. He is known for his contributions to the design of the modern alternating current (AC) electricity supply system.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Telephone switchboard</span> Device used to connect telephone circuits to establish calls between users

A telephone switchboard was a device used to connect circuits of telephones to establish telephone calls between users or other switchboards, throughout the 20th century. The switchboard was an essential component of a manual telephone exchange, and was operated by switchboard operators who used electrical cords or switches to establish the connections.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Telephone</span> Telecommunications device

A telephone is a telecommunications device that permits two or more users to conduct a conversation when they are too far apart to be easily heard directly. A telephone converts sound, typically and most efficiently the human voice, into electronic signals that are transmitted via cables and other communication channels to another telephone which reproduces the sound to the receiving user. The term is derived from Greek: τῆλε and φωνή, together meaning distant voice. A common short form of the term is phone, which came into use early in the telephone's history. Nowadays, phones are almost always in the form of smartphones or mobile phones, due to technological convergence.

In telephony, ringdown is a method of signaling an operator in which telephone ringing current is sent over the line to operate a lamp or cause the operation of a self-locking relay known as a drop.

A dial tone is a telephony signal sent by a telephone exchange or private branch exchange (PBX) to a terminating device, such as a telephone, when an off-hook condition is detected. It indicates that the exchange is working and is ready to initiate a telephone call. The tone stops when the first dialed digit is recognized. If no digits are forthcoming, the partial dial procedure is invoked, often eliciting a special information tone and an intercept message, followed by the off-hook tone, requiring the caller to hang up and redial.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Telephone call</span> Connection between two or more people over a telephone network

A telephone call or telephone conversation, also known as a phone call or voice call, is a connection over a telephone network between the called party and the calling party. Telephone calls started in the late 19th century. As technology has improved, a majority of telephone calls are made over a cellular network through mobile phones or over the internet with Voice over IP. Telephone calls are typically used for real-time conversation between two or more parties, especially when the parties cannot meet in person.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Elisha Gray</span> American electrical engineer

Elisha Gray was an American electrical engineer who co-founded the Western Electric Manufacturing Company. Gray is best known for his development of a telephone prototype in 1876 in Highland Park, Illinois. Some recent authors have argued that Gray should be considered the true inventor of the telephone because Alexander Graham Bell allegedly stole the idea of the liquid transmitter from him. Although Gray had been using liquid transmitters in his telephone experiments for more than two years previously, Bell's telephone patent was upheld in numerous court decisions.

A telephone numbering plan is a type of numbering scheme used in telecommunication to assign telephone numbers to subscriber telephones or other telephony endpoints. Telephone numbers are the addresses of participants in a telephone network, reachable by a system of destination code routing. Telephone numbering plans are defined in each of the administrative regions of the public switched telephone network (PSTN) and in private telephone networks.

In telephony, an automated attendant allows callers to be automatically transferred to an extension without the intervention of an operator/receptionist. Many AAs will also offer a simple menu system. An auto attendant may also allow a caller to reach a live operator by dialing a number, usually "0". Typically the auto attendant is included in a business's phone system such as a PBX, but some services allow businesses to use an AA without such a system. Modern AA services can route calls to mobile phones, VoIP virtual phones, other AAs/IVRs, or other locations using traditional land-line phones or voice message machines.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Business telephone system</span> Telephone system typically used in business environments

A business telephone system is a telephone system typically used in business environments, encompassing the range of technology from the key telephone system (KTS) to the private branch exchange (PBX).

Direct inward dialing (DID), also called direct dial-in (DDI) in Europe and Oceania, is a telecommunication service offered by telephone companies to subscribers who operate private branch exchange (PBX) systems. The feature provides service for multiple telephone numbers over one or more analog or digital physical circuits to the PBX, and transmits the dialed telephone number to the PBX so that a PBX extension is directly accessible for an outside caller, possibly by-passing an auto-attendant.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Hook flash</span> Telephone signal

On analog telephone lines with special services, a flash or register-recall signal is used to control functions on the public telephone exchange, PBX or VoIP ATA.

In residential telephony, an extension telephone is an additional telephone wired to the same telephone line as another. In middle 20th century telephone jargon, the first telephone on a line was a "Main Station" and subsequent ones "Extensions" or even called as intercom. Such extension phones allow making or receiving calls in different rooms, for example in a home, but any incoming call would ring all extensions and any one extension being in use would cause the line to be busy for all users. Some telephones intended for use as extensions have built in intercom features; a key telephone system for a small business may offer two to five lines, lamps indicating lines already in use, the ability to place calls on 'hold' and an intercom on each of the multiple extensions.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Schuyler Wheeler</span> American electrical engineer and manufacturer

Schuyler Skaats Wheeler was an American electrical engineer and manufacturer who invented the electric fan, an electric elevator design, and the electric fire engine. He is associated with the early development of the electric motor industry, especially to do with training the blind in this industry for gainful employment. He helped develop and implement a code of ethics for electrical engineers and was associated with the electrical field in one way or another for over thirty years.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Load balancing (electrical power)</span> Techniques by electrical power stations to store excess electrical power

Load balancing, load matching, or daily peak demand reserve refers to the use of various techniques by electrical power stations to store excess electrical power during low demand periods for release as demand rises. The aim is for the power supply system to have a load factor of 1.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Engine order telegraph</span> Communications device used on a ship

An engine order telegraph or E.O.T., also referred to as a Chadburn, is a communications device used on a ship for the pilot on the bridge to order engineers in the engine room to power the vessel at a certain desired speed.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Telephone exchange</span> Interconnects telephones for calls

A telephone exchange, also known as a telephone switch or central office, is a crucial component in the public switched telephone network (PSTN) or large enterprise telecommunications systems. It facilitates the interconnection of telephone subscriber lines or digital system virtual circuits, enabling telephone calls between subscribers.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Holland House (New York City)</span> Former hotel in Manhattan, New York

Holland House was a New York City hotel located at 274–276 Fifth Avenue at the southwest corner of 30th Street in NoMad, Manhattan, New York City, with a frontage of 250 feet (76 m) on Fifth Avenue. The architects and designers were George Edward Harding & Gooch. A mercantile building by the 1920s, in the present day, it is a loft building.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">F. Benedict Herzog</span> American photographer

Felix Benedict Herzog was an American electrical engineer, patent attorney, artist and photographer who discovered "America's First Supermodel" Audrey Munson. His Tale of Isolde established precedent in the US as the first pictorial photograph admitted by an art society on full equality with paintings.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Panel switch</span>

The Panel Machine Switching System is a type of automatic telephone exchange for urban service that was used in the Bell System in the United States for seven decades. The first semi-mechanical types of this design were installed in 1915 in Newark, New Jersey, and the last were retired in the same city in 1983.

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 Herbert, Paul N. (2017). The Jefferson Hotel: The History of a Richmond Landmark. Arcadia Publishing. ISBN   978-1-4396-6045-4. Archived from the original on March 15, 2024. Retrieved March 15, 2024.
  2. "Electrical Patent Record". Electricity: A Popular Electrical Journal. 11 (24). Electricity Newspaper Company: 380. December 1896. Archived from the original on March 15, 2024. Retrieved March 15, 2024.
  3. Johnston's Electrical and Street Railway Directory for 1897. W. J. Johnston Company. 1897. p. 408. Archived from the original on March 15, 2024. Retrieved March 15, 2024.
  4. 1 2 3 4 "American Notes: The Herzog "Teleseme" System". The Electrician. 34. James Gray: 224. December 21, 1894. Archived from the original on March 15, 2024. Retrieved March 15, 2024.
  5. Houston, Edwin James; Kennelly, Arthur Edwin (1896). Electric Telegraphy. McGraw Publishing Company. pp. 329–334. Archived from the original on March 15, 2024. Retrieved March 15, 2024.
  6. 1 2 3 4 5 Onion, Rebecca (March 17, 2014). "How Guests at Late 19th-Century Luxury Hotels Ordered Up Their Sherry and Manservants". Slate. Archived from the original on July 3, 2022. Retrieved March 15, 2024.
  7. 1 2 3 Bone, James (2016). The Curse of Beauty: The Scandalous & Tragic Life of Audrey Munson, America's First Supermodel. Simon and Schuster. p. 29. ISBN   978-1-942872-03-0. Archived from the original on March 15, 2024. Retrieved March 15, 2024.
  8. 1 2 Onion, Rebecca (March 9, 2014). "How grand hotels shaped modern life (and not just as a Wes Anderson set)". Boston Globe. Archived from the original on May 31, 2023. Retrieved March 15, 2024.
  9. 1 2 3 Guy, George H. (December 16, 1891). "Electricity in the Modern Hotel". Electricity: A Popular Electrical and Financial Journal. pp. 277–278. Archived from the original on March 15, 2024. Retrieved March 15, 2024.
  10. Fernandez-Solis, Jose Luciano (December 2006). Is Building Construction Approaching the Threshold of Becoming Unsustainable? (PhD thesis). Georgia Institute of Technology. p. 40.
  11. King, Moses (1893). King's Handbook of New York City. Boston, Mass. p. 224.
  12. Eggleston, Edward (1893). "The New Cashier". The Century: A Popular Quarterly. Century Company. Archived from the original on March 15, 2024. Retrieved March 15, 2024.
  13. Montgomery, Maureen E. (2016). Displaying Women: Spectacles of Leisure in Edith Wharton's New York. Routledge. pp. 94–95. ISBN   978-1-134-95286-1. Archived from the original on March 15, 2024. Retrieved March 15, 2024.
  14. "American Notes". The Electrician. James Gray. March 23, 1888. p. 551. Archived from the original on March 15, 2024. Retrieved March 15, 2024.

Further reading