UPDATE: These posts were written in 2010. Since then, this site has undergone several server migrations, theme changes, and WordPress updates. The posts linked in this page are temporarily offline to correct formatting and other errors introduced over the past decade.

This page aggregates links to posts in this blog related to the Western Union Telegraph Company’s first generation microwave network built out shortly after the end of World War II. The posts are derived from articles published in various newsletters and journals based on research done between 2002 and 2008 in Maryland, Delaware, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, New York, and the District of Columbia.

Western Union Telegraph Company microwave network map.

Google Maps with relay sites:

View Western Union Microwave Network in a larger map

Western Union built four terminals and 21 relay sites for its system. I summarized all of the sites in an appendix to a Historic American Engineering Record (HAER) report I prepared for the National Park Service that provides an intensive investigation into one of the western Pennsylvania relay sites.The blog posts linked below are derived mainly from that appendix. The first post in this series documents the landmark terminal building Western Union built in Washington, D.C.’s, Tenleytown neighborhood.

Western Union Microwave Terminals

• New York (Western Union headquarters)
• Washington, D.C. (Tenley)
• Philadelphia
• Pittsburgh