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Posted by Ed Kiser on April 27, 2007 at 18:17:06 from 205.188.116.198 user Kisered.

In CC CH17, Mr. Farland was in a desperate hurry
to contact his office, to have some papers
prepared for him to take with him on the train.
There was quite a conversation with the operator,
called Exchange, in trying to get connected to the
proper number with the first attempt getting a
wrong number. There seemed to be quite a bit of
frustration in trying to get the proper
connection.

In PP CH33, having just received the "FIRE HELP
QUICK" message from the pigeon, Captain Flint is
frantically trying to call Col. Jolys to get his
firefighters out to combat the blaze. Again, the
operator seemed not to understand what the correct
number was. Considering it had TWO digits in it,
Exchange still did not properly hear the desired
number.

Oh, how easy it was, back in the olden days...
One did not even have to dial their own number
they wanted, as all they had to do was to TELL the
operator what number you wanted to talk to, and
she did all the connecting.

It was interesting to read in making a call, one
picked up the phone and waited for "the telephone
to answer" - that is, the operator.

There was also the custom that to contact the
operator, one would jiggle the hook, causing a
light to flash on the operator's board and thus
get their attention. This process of jiggling the
hook is an old habit, learned from those old days
of talking to the operator, that still persists in
perhaps the more elderly of ranks, that if a phone
connection is lost, intentionally or otherwise,
there seems to be that reflex action to
frantically jiggle the switch at the bottom of the
phone cradle, as if that would do any good in
today's world.

We became reminded that, back in those days,
although phones were in use, they were not all
that common in homes, as apparently the one in
Beckfoot was the only one on that side of the
lake.

Ransome wrote of a time when the younger set took
with them a set of pigeons so they could still get
word back to the adults at home. Today, they
would simply take their cell phone with them.
Somehow, that takes out a good part of the
adventure.

I have always felt that the Walkers missed out on
a good opportunity to get word to Mother back at
Holly Howe when they were across the lake at
Swallowdale, when they were on the top of the
lookout rock and saw far in the distance the Holly
Howe farm, and even specks moving that were
probably people on the lawn, when it could have
been arranged to SIGNAL in both directions at a
particular pre-agreed time in the darkness of the
evening. John spoke of the possibility of
signaling to Holly Howe, but never persued the
topic further. Now that would have been an
interesting distance to try Morse. I do have to
wonder just how effective a pocket torch, even
with a fresh battery, would have been over such a
distance. They could have at least tried.
Perhaps the camp lantern would have served better,
as it did the D's at the North Pole communicating
with Beckfoot, which was a considerable distance.

Perhaps such attempts to communicate more closely
with the natives would have detracted from their
own sense of "on their own" without too close a
native hand taking part in their daily decision
making.

In this modern world of sending instant EMAILS to
people half-way around the world without a thought
as to just how far away that person is, perhaps it
is good to have Ransome here to remind us of that
other time, quite within the lifetime of some of
us, when the technology of communications was at
the mercy of a few hemp seeds pecked from a finger
by a pigeon. Times have changed.

What is coming in the years ahead in the
technology of communictions? Are we to be using
some microchip implanted beneath the skin? And
will such devices be used for enhanced
communications, or for thought control by Big
Brother?

With ideas like that, Morse Code and pigeons are
looking a lot nicer, as are a lot of things back
in those Ransome Days.

Let us just be grateful that George Owdon and the
Hullabaloos did not have cell phones.

Ed Kiser, Kentucky



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