The Sun soon afterward expressed annoyance at a report that it was itself a part of a monopoly which was to control the telegraph, and that it had bought a telegraph-line from New York to Springfield, Massachusetts. It insisted that there should be no monopoly, and that the use of the telegraph must be open to all. There was no suggestion that Morse intended to control his invention improperly, but the Sun was not quite satisfied with the government’s lassitude. Morse had offered his rights to the government for one hundred thousand dollars, and Congress had sneered.
It was not until 1846 that the telegraph was extended to New York, and in the meantime the New York papers used such other means as they could for the collection of news. Besides trains, ships, horses, and the fleet foot of the reporter, there were pigeons. Beach went in for pigeons extensively. When the Sun moved from 156 Nassau Street, in the summer of 1842, it took a six-story building at the southwest corner of Nassau and Fulton Streets, securing about three times as much room as it had in the two-story building at Spruce Street. On the top of the new building Beach built a pigeon-house, which stood for half a century.
The strange, boxlike cote attracted not only the attention of Mr. Bennett, whose Herald was quartered just across the street, but of all the folk who came and went in that busy region. So many were the queries from friends and the quips from enemies concerning the pigeon-house that the Sun (December 14, 1843), vouchsafed to explain:
Why, we have had a school of carrier-pigeons in the upper apartments of the Sun office since we have occupied the building. Did our contemporaries believe that we ever could be at fault in furnishing the earliest news to our readers? Or did they indulge the hope that in newspaper enterprise they could ever catch us napping?
Carrier-pigeons have long been remarked for their sagacity and admired for their usefulness. They are, of all birds, the most invaluable, and as auxiliary to a newspaper cannot be too highly prized. Part of the flock in our possession were employed by the London Morning Chronicle in bringing intelligence from Dublin to London, and from Paris to London, crossing both channels; therefore they are not novices in the newspaper express.
If there was delay in the arrival of the Boston steamer, and the weather clear, we despatched our choice pigeon, Sam Patch, down the Sound, and he invariably came back with a slip of delicate tissue-paper tied under his wing, containing the news. We thus are apprised of the arrival of the steamer some two hours before any one else hears of her. Our men are at their cases; the steam is up in our pressroom, and our extras are always out first.
We sometimes let one of our carriers fly to the Narrows, and in twenty minutes or so we know what is coming in, thirty miles from Sandy Hook Light. We despatch them as far as Albany, on any important mission; frequently to New Jersey, and in the summer-time they sometimes look in at Rockaway and let us know what is going on at the pavilion. We have a small sliding door in our observatory, on the top of the Sun office, through which the little aerials pass. By sending off one every little while, we ascertain the details of whatever is important or interesting at any given point.
They often fly at the rate of sixty miles an hour, easy! For example, a half-dozen will leave Washington at daylight this morning and arrive here about noon, beating the mail generally ten hours or so. They can come through from Albany in about two hours and a half, solar time. They fly exceedingly high, and keep so until they make the spires of the city, and then descend. We have not lost one by any accident, and believe ours is the only flock of value or importance in the country.
We give this brief detail of “them pigeons” because our prying friends and neighbors in the newspaper way have such a meager, guesswork account of them; and because we dislike any mystery or artifice in our business operations.
Speed and more speed was the newspaper demand of the hour, particularly among the penny papers. The Sun and the Herald had been battling for years, with competitors springing up about them, usually to die within the twelvemonth. Now the Tribune had come to remain in the fray, even if it had not as much money to spend on news-gathering as the Sun and the Herald.