With over 160 years of history under its belt, Morse code is by far the oldest digital signaling system known to man. Originally developed for telegraph systems, [Samuel Morse’s] code has been sent ...

The Titanic famously (or infamously) used Morse code to call out in distress at the end of its final voyage. Ships at sea and the land-based stations that supported them used Morse code for decades, ...

The first message sent by Morse code's dots and dashes across a long distance traveled from Washington, D.C., to Baltimore on Friday, May 24, 1844-175 years ago. It signaled the first time in human ...

Navy ships typically communicate with each other via radio or satellites, but every ship has a few backups just in case. One of the most common backups is the signal lamp, where sailors can send Morse ...

In case you’re not a former sailor or ham radio operator, the above is not a typesetting snafu. Those are the dashes and dots (or “dits” and “dahs,” as telegraph operators often vocalize them) that ...

Posts from this author will be added to your daily email digest and your homepage feed. is a former senior reviewer who worked at The Verge from 2011 until May 2025. His coverage areas included audio, ...

It doesn’t always work out this way, but sometimes older is faster. Two Morse code men recently bested a fast-fingered teen “texting” a message via cell phone in a high-profile digital duel that aired ...