ELI5: Explain Like I'm 5

First transcontinental telegraph

Ok kiddo, do you know what a telegram is? It's a special message that people used to send before we had the internet and phones like we do now.

Well, a long time ago, people in America wanted to be able to send telegrams all the way from one side of the country to the other, which is a really long way! So, they figured out a way to build a special kind of wire that would go all the way from the east coast to the west coast.

They dug holes and put up poles to hold the wire, and it took a really long time to finish. But finally, on October 24th, 1861, they were able to send the very first telegraph message all the way across the country!

It was a really big deal because before this, it could take weeks or even months for letters to be delivered from one side of the country to the other. But with the telegraph, people could send messages almost instantly! And this was just the beginning of how we communicate over long distances today.