FEATURE
THE FIRST GLOBAL NETWORK
BY STEWART ASH
T
he first global submarine cable network was built by Scotsman, Sir John Pender GCMG (1815-96) who, in 1864, founded the Telegraph Construction and Maintenance Co (Telcon). It was this company that was pivotal to the success of the 1865 and 1866 Atlantic Telegraph. Telcon went on to dominate the submarine cable supply industry for over 100 years and is now part of ASN. In 1868, Pender stepped down as Chairman of Telcon and, over the next 28 years, built the world’s first world-
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SUBMARINE TELECOMS MAGAZINE
‘John Pender was a key figure in one of the 19th century’s most important technological enterprises: the interconnection of the British Empire through undersea telegraph cables, a network that Tom Standage has called the Victorian Internet.