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Samuel Morse was born in 1791 the same year our Bill of Rights was ratified and the year Mozart died. He was raised in Massachusetts and later went to Yale College where he majored in chemistry and natural philosophy. His dad, Jedidiah Morse, (b.1761 d. 1826) was an American Congregational pastor and wrote a series of widely used geography textbooks. Samuel Morse also edited and wrote geography textbooks. In 1811 he went to England to study painting and gained considerable reputation as a portrait painter. After he came back to America, he established the National Academy of Design and was it’s first president. With his brother, R.C. Morse, he founded the New York Observer in 1823. He perfected the bathometer in 1866, which is a device to determine the depth of lakes and oceans. In 1832 he came up with the idea for employing electromagnetism in telegraphy. It took five years to perfect his machine. In 1843 a $30,000 congressional grant enabled him to build a telegraph line between Washington D.C. and Baltimore. On May 24, 1844 Samuel Morse sent the first electronic message, "What hath God wrought," or in other words, "Look what God has enabled us to build, and benefit by." And the rest is history...
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