Any telegraph collectors here?

I’ve decided that I need (obviously) an antique railroad telegraph. I’ve been YouTubing to get to know what to look for, but could use some guidance. Anyone here knowledgeable on these?

My aim is for an 1800s to early 1900s model that includes both the telegraph key and the sounder, like shown below. A piece that was part of a Ontario, Canada, railroad network would be what I hold out for.

From eBay, I see that these don’t cost a lot of money. But I really only want one, and I want to buy it right - a nice original working version with no missing parts. I understand that some telegraph operators were contractors who owned their own sets. I imagine that railroads marked their owned telegraph sets, as they branded everything else from spittoons to spoons. A railroad branded set would be cool.

I Don’t know if I’d ever bother to try to use it with other hobbyists, but who knows, maybe we’ll have another pandemic and I can amuse myself endlessly with one 👍

apparently you can connect a telegraph to your computer to spend the day telegraphing with friends. Could be interesting. Fun fact, early railways (maybe later too) used a different code than radio telegraphs

I learned Morse on one back when I was 10 years old for a Ham ticket.
Just been recently looking at Morse key prices which seem to be going up up up, few years ago no one wanted them.

Interesting that you’re seeing price increases. When I Google “how to collect telegraphs”, the search comes back with “Did you mean, How to get a life?” 😁

Keeping this in line with a watch forum, has anyone ever seen one of these? I really want one!!!

LOL, it can’t be worse than trying to figure out why my wifi printer won’t print today

Fascinating! They didn't catch on? Can't understand why. Can't wait to see the German silver headband, do you wear the key in front of your nose or tha back of your head?

It’s hard to imagine how that worked 😀

Spotted at a local museum

That's got to be the first analog to digital to pictograph converter ever made ( presuming there is Morse code somewhere in the process) unless of course it went via teleprinter.

So, this happened today 😀 PM me your fax number if you want some more pictures 👍