Telefon Hírmondó: Listen to news and music electronically, in 1893

Summary

The Telefon Hírmondó (also Telefonhírmondó, generally translated as "Telephone Herald")[1][2] was a "telephone newspaper" located in Budapest, Hungary, which, beginning in 1893, provided news and entertainment to subscribers over telephone lines. It was both the first and the longest surviving telephone newspaper system,[3] although from 1 December 1925 until its termination in 1944 it was primarily used to retransmit programmes broadcast by Magyar Rádió.[4] Three decades before the development of radio broadcasting, the Telefon Hírmondó was the first service to electronically deliver a wide range of spoken and musical programming to a diverse audience. Although its inventor envisioned that the technology could be eventually expanded to serve a national or international audience, the technical limitations of the time ultimately limited its service area to just the city of Budapest. The Telefon Hírmondó was founded by Tivadar Puskás (a few reviews translated his name as "Theodore Buschgasch"),[5] an engineer and inventor who had worked with Thomas Edison.[6][7] In view of the ever-increasing pace of living, especially in major cities, Puskás recognized that daily newspapers, even with multiple editions, could no longer effectively keep up with developing events. He decided that this problem could be rectified through the introduction of a regularly updated audio news source.[8] Initially, the Telefon Hírmondó editorial office was located near Astoria, at 6 Magyar Street.[9] The system began operating on 15 February 1893 with around 60 subscribers, and was inaugurated with a message from Puskás, which, translated into English, stated: We greet the inhabitants of Budapest. We greet them in an unusual way from which telephone broadcasting all over the world will start its victorious journey.[9][10] For the initial transmissions, individuals who had telephones called into a central office to listen to Telefon Hírmondó reports that were updated hourly. Emile von Szveties ...