Mirror Signal Towers

[DesertFox]

I was watching a show on the Old West and the hunting of Geronimo. There was suppose to be signal tower using mirrors were used. I have seen a few writers use such things as thins in stories but curious when were such signal towers used historically?

[aglooka]

I was watching a show on the Old West and the hunting of Geronimo. There was suppose to be signal tower using mirrors were used. I have seen a few writers use such things as thins in stories but curious when were such signal towers used historically?

 

 

The french Séré De Rivieres fortresses of the 1870'ies were interconnected by such a system.

 

Aglooka

[DesertFox]

Well, I heard that the British used fires during the time of the Spanish armada. Could the idea of mirrors have been used extremely early, is there any technical challenges for say, teh Romans to have used them

[Old Tanker]

Well, I heard that the British used fires during the time of the Spanish armada. Could the idea of mirrors have been used extremely early, is there any technical challenges for say, teh Romans to have used them

 

Miror signaling goes back to ancient times.

 

The Brit Army formalized in India about 1810 or so using a specicic heliograph tripod instrument for communications.

 

The U.S. around 1880 used them across Az. and NM to track Apaches and various other groups raising hell in the area.

 

Ft. Huachuca , Ft. Grant and Ft. Apache were among posts employing specialized heliograph equip as they could communicate among the three. Also the devices were quite portable mainly using 8" mirrors on a tripod.

 

It seems that some Commonwealth nations kept heliograph communications devises into the 1950s.

[APF]

Could the idea of mirrors have been used extremely early, is there any technical challenges for say, teh Romans to have used them

 

Yes, and yes.

 

Yes, mirrors were available in old greece; made from polished bronze. So, technically, no problem.

 

Yet, if *you* had to choose between a fire - more or less readily lit at *any* time, and a mirror which needs the sun to operate (hint, hint: night did happen to our forefathers as well) - which means of communication would you have choosen?

 

Greetings

[DesertFox]

With mirrors and a primitive version of Morse code, you could send complex messages over a long distance

[Old Tanker]

Yes, and yes.

 

Yes, mirrors were available in old greece; made from polished bronze. So, technically, no problem.

 

Yet, if *you* had to choose between a fire - more or less readily lit at *any* time, and a mirror which needs the sun to operate (hint, hint: night did happen to our forefathers as well) - which means of communication would you have choosen?

 

Greetings

You could combine fire and mirror at night time using a shutter on the mirror to tap out code.

[DesertFox]

You could combine fire and mirror at night time using a shutter on the mirror to tap out code.

 

True, I just wondering if this idea was used in antiquity

[Tim the Tank Nut]

History Channel runs a program from time to time about the Alexandia Lighthouse in ancient Egypt that presupposes a fire and mirror combo.

[Unreal John]

Rudyard Kipling considered the matter in 1886:

 

 

"A Code of Morals"

 

 

 

Lest you should think this story true

I merely mention I

Evolved it lately. 'Tis a most

Unmitigated misstatement.

 

Now Jones had left his new-wed bride to keep his house in order,

And hied away to the Hurrum Hills above the Afghan border,

To sit on a rock with a heliograph; but ere he left he taught

His wife the working of the Code that sets the miles at naught.

 

And Love had made him very sage, as Nature made her fair;

So Cupid and Apollo linked , per heliograph, the pair.

At dawn, across the Hurrum Hills, he flashed her counsel wise -

At e'en, the dying sunset bore her husband's homilies.

 

He warned her 'gainst seductive youths in scarlet clad and gold,

As much as 'gainst the blandishments paternal of the old;

But kept his gravest warnings for (hereby the ditty hangs)

That snowy-haired Lothario, Lieutenant-General Bangs.

 

'T'was General Bangs, with Aide and Staff, who tittupped on the way,

When they beheld a heliograph tempestuously at play.

They thought of Border risings, and of stations sacked and burnt -

So stopped to take the message down - and this is what they learnt -

 

"Dash dot dot, dot, dot dash, dot dash dot" twice. The General swore.

"Was ever General Officer addressed as 'dear' before?

"'My Love,' i' faith! 'My Duck,' Gadzooks! 'My darling popsy-wop!'

"Spirit of great Lord Wolseley, who is on that mountain top?"

 

The artless Aide-de-camp was mute, the gilded Staff were still,

As, dumb with pent-up mirth, they booked that message from the hill;

For clear as summer lightning-flare, the husband's warning ran: -

"Don't dance or ride with General Bangs -- a most immoral man."

 

[At dawn, across the Hurrum Hills, he flashed her counsel wise -

But, howsoever Love be blind, the world at large hath eyes.]

With damnatory dot and dash he heliographed his wife

Some interesting details of the General's private life.

 

The artless Aide-de-camp was mute, the shining Staff were still,

And red and ever redder grew the General's shaven gill.

And this is what he said at last (his feelings matter not): -

"I think we've tapped a private line. Hi! Threes about there! Trot!"

 

All honour unto Bangs, for ne'er did Jones thereafter know

By word or act official who read off that helio.

But the tale is on the Frontier, and from Michni to Mooltan

They know the worthy General as "that most immoral man."

[rmgill]

Here's a site showing a bit on heliographs.

[APF]

You could combine fire and mirror at night time using a shutter on the mirror to tap out code.

 

Yes, but why use a mirror in that case - the fire + shutter will do without.

 

However, the main idea is to serialize the information stream just like morse did. Once you had the idea to replace the multitude of letters (a,b,c,d,e,f,g etc.) by a stream of information which is longer, but easier to communicate, you're done.

 

Greetings

[Yama]

True, I just wondering if this idea was used in antiquity

 

Apparently it was, to some degree.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heliograph

The first recorded use of the heliograph was in 405 BC, when the Ancient Greeks used polished shields to signal in battle. In about 35 AD, the Roman emperor Tiberius, by then very unpopular, ruled his vast empire from a villa on the Isle of Capri. It is thought that he sent coded orders daily by heliograph to the mainland, eight miles away.

 

The German professor Carl Friedrich Gauss, of Georg-August University of Göttingen, outlined a first design for a formal heliograph in 1810. His device directed a controlled beam of sunlight to a distant station. It was meant to be used for geodetic survey work.

 

The record distance was established by a detachment of U.S. signal sergeants by the inter-operation of stations on Mount Ellen, Utah, and Mount Uncompahgre, Colorado, 183 miles (295 km) apart on Sept 17, 1894, with Signal Corps heliographs carrying mirrors only 8 inches square.

 

Wow, nearly 300 kilometres

 

Visual telegraphy of course did not necessarily need fire or sun. Semaphore system was fairly widely used in Europe 19th century, especially in France:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Semaphore_line