This book gives a fascinating glimpse of the many documented attempts throughout history to develop effective means for long-distance communications. The oldest attempts date back to millennia before Christ, and include ingenious uses of homing pigeons, mirrors, flags, torches, and beacons.

The book then shows how Claude Chappe, a French clergyman, started the information revolution in 1794, with the design and construction of the first true telegraph network in France. Another chapter contains the first English translation of a remarkable document on the design of optical telegraphs networks, originally written in 1796 by the Swedish nobleman Abraham Niclas Edelcrantz.