 expensive it meant that very few systems were installed. It took a few more years for a system to be developed that would gain widespread acceptance. The inventor was an American artist named Samuel Morse. He had always taken an interest in the new and developing science associated with electricity and while returning by ship from Europe shortly after the discovery of the electromagnet he developed some ideas for an electrical signalling system. On his return to the USA his work commitments took priority and development was particularly slow. Eventually he enlisted assistance from others and the development started to move forwards. After many setbacks he even- tually convinced the American Congress to provide funding for a trial line and on 24 May 1844 Morse sent his first message along the line between Baltimore and Washington which read 'What hath God wrought!'. The system quickly gained acceptance because it only used one wire and was easy and reliable to use. Not only did its use spread very rapidly in the USA, but it was used worldwide, linking countries and continents, enabling messages to be sent across the world in a few minutes or hours where they would have taken weeks before. An introduction to radio 5 The Morse system only enabled text messages to be sent. The next major development entailed the sending of sounds over wires. The invention of the telephone is often credited to a Scot named Alexander Graham Bell. He had followed his father in working to enable deaf people to speak and in 1870 the Bell family moved to Canada. Bell was very successful and soon found himself appointed as Professor of Vocal Physiology at Boston University in the USA. His researches involved looking at sound vibrations, and this led him to wonder whether these vibrations could be transmitted along wires in the form of electrical variations. His initial attempts at realizing his idea gave sounds that were unintelligible. Then in 1876 he set up a new system, and the first message that was successfully transmitted over wires 