|
|
By 1877 it had grown to 9762 miles of wire with 192 telegraph offices. He was an outstanding man with a thorough knowledge of the operating and technical sides of telegraphy and an able administrator. He was justifiably proud of his Department and for 25 years he resisted its amalgamation with the post-office, on the grounds that it would adversely affect the interests of the telegraph.
On the other hand, by the end of 1883 he seems to have been a strong supporter of the telephone by erecting the large numbers of lines needed. On Saturday, January 12 1878 he along with Mr. G.A.Kopsch who was the 'Chief Mechanician' of the telegraph department conducted experiments between La Perouse (Botany Bay) and Sydney approximately 10 miles distance. The instruments used were made by Kopsch to Bell's principles (These instruments still exist today and a detailed description can be found by clicking here). On an official visit to West Maitland one week later and using the same equipment, transmitted songs and a bugle blast to Sydney, 100 miles distant.
The secretary of the Sydney Stock Exchange visited Melbourne and impressed with what he saw sought to develop a trial telephone between the 'Sydney Royal Exchange' and 'the General Post-office', he encountered the sharp resistance of Cracknell who, in spite of or because of his own experiments, believed that all the shouting and singing through a telephone instrument across telegraph wires did not offer a sufficiently clear system of vocal communication and he declared that the 'Yankee toy' needed considerable improvement before its introduction in New South Wales. But Cracknell was overruled.
In 1880 the first of the Edison-Bell telephones were seen in Sydney. One was installed in Cracknell's office. This was connected to another in the Royal Exchange where the postmaster-general of the day, Alexander Campbell MLC. happened to be a director. According to the 'Sydney Morning Herald' the installation worked admirably, the tone was clear, the means of communication simple, and the whole apparatus little liable to get out of order (SMH 7 August 1880). A switchboard was fitted up at the Royal Exchange, and within a few weeks every wharf and wool shed at Darling Harbour was connected to the system. Users erected their own lines at their own expense and paid an annual maintenance fee to the postal department.
Cracknell was opposed to the monopolisation of new techniques by private interests and Sydney council on his advice, had rejected the opportunity of becoming the first Australian city with streets lit by the incandescent method. He had cautiously advised the council not to use 'the present unsatisfactory appliances', but to retain its gas lighting.
Cracknell was a man of bold ideas and in 1883 developed a continuous cable bearer disguised as an ornamental shop veranah front which ran along the western side of George Street from the GPO to Railway Square.
In Sydney, for some years, the route to the telephone switchboard was barred to women by the crusty figure of Edward Cracknell. He wrote, early and inaccurately in December 1878, 'has been tried...in other parts of the world and has proved an utter failure'. Women, he sensed, were incompetent at fixing mechanical problems. Instead young boys were employed at the Sydney exchange until Cracknell disappeared in 1893.
