The Internet Under the Sea

Summary

Throughline (NPR): "The Internet Under the Sea"

Date: October 23, 2025
Hosts: Rund Abdelfatah, Ramtin Arablouei
Summary by an Expert Podcast Summarizer

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Episode Overview

"The Internet Under the Sea" explores the hidden networks that make modern digital life possible: the undersea cables that carry virtually all of the world’s intercontinental Internet traffic. Hosts Rund Abdelfatah and Ramtin Arablouei connect recent disruptions—such as the Red Sea cable cuts caused by conflict—to the grand historical story of how the first transoceanic telegraph cables came to be. Through narrative storytelling and interviews with historians, engineers, and descendants, the episode highlights the technological audacity, setbacks, and human obsession behind creating the invisible global infrastructure tying continents together.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Fragility and Importance of Undersea Cables (00:19–06:20)

• The episode opens with a real-world scenario: a missile attack on the Rubymar cargo ship in the Red Sea (February 2024), which leads to catastrophic cuts in major Internet cables.
• Modern Relevance: Nearly all intercontinental Internet traffic runs through cables resting on the ocean floor—not satellites, as commonly assumed.
  • “If you took all the cables in the world and connected them, it could wrap around the earth 36 times…” — Ramtin Arablouei (04:32)
• Disruptions to these cables instantly impact millions, as seen when connections from Europe to Asia and Africa went down.
• Cables are extremely fragile—about the thickness of a human hair and easily severed by ship anchors, fishing, or sabotage.
• The episode highlights recent incidents: cable cuts near Taiwan, Finland-Germany, and Lithuania-Sweden, sometimes prompted by suspected sabotage (Russia’s "shadow fleet," geopolitical tensions).

Memorable Quote:
“These cables are an absolute essential technology that are also incredibly fragile. So fragile that in the beginning not many people thought it would actually ever work.”
— Ramtin Arablouei (06:20)

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2. Contextualizing History: The Race for Instant Communication (08:48–23:07)

The Industrial Age and the Problem of Distance

• The hosts and experts describe the mid-19th century, with rapid innovation—trains, steamboats, telegraphs—but transoceanic communication remained painstakingly slow (weeks for messages to cross the Atlantic by ship).
• It’s in this era that Cyrus W. Field emerges, inspired by technological ambition and relentless energy.

Cyrus W. Field: Relentless Visionary

• Field, a successful paper magnate, was lured out of retirement by Frederick Gisborne’s failed Newfoundland telegraph project.
  • “When he was successful, he went back to all of those creditors who had no claim on him…but he paid them in full with interest, and that really helped cement his reputation…” — Bill Burns (13:40)
• After listening to Gisborne’s story, Field is struck by the idea: Why not stretch the cable all the way across the Atlantic (16:12)?
• Field had no technical background, but recruited experts like Samuel Morse and wealthy friends ("The Cable Cabinet"). Both the US and UK were convinced—eventually—of the project’s strategic potential.

Notable Reflection:
“He really thought this would help prevent wars from breaking out.”
— Cyrus W. Field IV (17:12)

The Enormity of the Challenge

• The proposed cable: over 2,000 miles long, to be submerged 12,000 feet deep, with technology and science still in its infancy.
• The scale and complexity paralleled the Apollo missions for its era (23:17).

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3. Iteration, Failure, and Final Triumph (27:14–39:51)

First Attempts & Crushing Setbacks (27:14–39:10)

• The first cable-laying mission (1857) is thwarted by mechanical failure and ocean storms—hundreds of miles and a costly cable lost (30:15).
• Undaunted, Field raises more money and tries again; the second attempt is sunk by a violent storm, with ships battered and cables destroyed (34:00).
• The third attempt—finally—works! The 1858 cable briefly connects Queen Victoria and President Buchanan. Message transmission still takes 16 hours, but it's revolutionary (37:26).

Memorable Moment:
“They have a firework display that was so big and wonderful that it actually sets the dome of city hall on fire.”
— Rund Abdelfatah (37:47)

Collapse and Accusations

• Success is short-lived: the cable soon fails permanently, and Field is accused of fraud and public deception. The mood turns—from national hero to “humbug” (39:24).

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4. The Ultimate Connection: Perseverance Across a Decade (41:25–47:39)

• Field embarks on multi-year efforts to redeem himself and the vision.
• Aided by British investors and the colossal ship Great Eastern, new, sturdier cables are designed.
• After yet another failed attempt (1865), Field perseveres, and in 1866, the team succeeds: the Atlantic cable is laid, connecting continents reliably.
• An emotional victory:
  “When they landed the cable, he [Cyrus Field] wept.” — Bill Burns (47:37)
  “I went to my cabin. I locked the door. I could no longer restrain my tears.” — Cyrus Field (47:39)

The Impact on Civilization

• The first cables cost a fortune to use—hundreds of dollars per 20-word message.
• But the precedent is set: by 1900, cables span nearly every continent, and today, their descendants remain absolutely crucial for global connectivity.

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5. Reflection: Personality, Sacrifice, and the Legacy of the Cables (49:08–51:35)

• Field’s own fortunes decline after the cable, but his vision outlasts him.
• Modern undersea cables follow almost the exact routes of those first laid by Field and his contemporaries.
  • “If you look at a present day cable map of the world, and you look at the 1902 cable map… you will see those cables are on exactly the same routes…” — Bill Burns (50:20)
• The hosts and Field’s descendant discuss the personality traits—the mix of stubbornness, vision, and willingness to sacrifice—that drive radical change.

Thoughtful Quote:
“There’s certain personalities out there, and you can see them in the world today, and they, they can’t help themselves... I realize I’m not that kind of guy... but I’m not willing to sacrifice it all personally, for the greater good.”
— Cyrus W. Field IV (51:35)

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Notable Quotes & Timestamps

• “Almost all intercontinental Internet traffic…actually go[es] through cables that run along the ocean floor.” — Ramtin Arablouei (03:54)
• “Those fiber optic cables are actually extremely fragile... just slightly more than a human hair.” — Ben Roberts (04:49)
• “There's always the more information you have as a merchant… the better equipped you are to make better decisions faster. And the faster you are, the more likely you are to be able to make more money.” — Rund Abdelfatah (17:31)
• “The strain on the man was more than the strain on the cable, and we were in fear that both would break together.” — Narrator (32:05)
• “...the first cable was thenceforth to sleep forever silent in its ocean grave. Years of labor and millions of capital were swept away in an hour into the bosom of the pitiless sea.” — Narrator (38:50)
• “The Queen of England and President Andrew Johnson congratulated each other… may the cable under the sea tend to promote harmony between the Republic of the west and the governments of the Eastern hemisphere.” — Ramtin Arablouei (47:55)

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Key Segments & Timelines

• 00:19–06:20: Modern cable vulnerabilities and real-world disruptions
• 08:48–23:07: History of global communication, Cyrus Field’s origins
• 27:14–39:51: The Atlantic cable attempts, persistence in the face of failure
• 41:25–47:39: Final victory and the transformative 1866 cable
• 49:08–51:35: Reflecting on personality, legacy, and the continuing relevance of the cables

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Conclusion

This episode weaves a compelling narrative connecting past and present—the ambition and perseverance behind the first transatlantic cable continue to echo in today’s fraught, invisible Internet infrastructure. The undersea cables are both fragile and world-changing, critical to our global society, and a reminder that radical visions, persistence through repeated setbacks, and sometimes painful personal sacrifices remain at the heart of technological progress.

For anyone interested in the backbone of the Internet, audacious engineering, and the personalities that shape world-changing innovation, "The Internet Under the Sea" is essential listening.

Transcript

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[Ramtin Arablouei]

Y' all lost it. On the evening of February 18, 2024, two ballistic missiles were fired at the Rubymar, a massive cargo ship that's longer than the Washington Monument.

[Sponsor Announcer]

It was just the latest series of attacks by the Houthis, an Iranian backed rebel group operating in Yemen that's been firing on commercial ships in the Red Sea.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

The Houthis were trying to disrupt trade in the Red Sea, one of the busiest shipping routes in the world.

[Ben Roberts]

It's a passage between continents that reduces the time that it takes a ship to travel from Europe to Asia considerably. So for the Red Sea, a huge amount of freight is traveling that way.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Dozens of ships pass through these waters daily, along with billions of dollars worth of cargo. And the Ruby Mar was one of those ships.

[Ben Roberts]

And the crew abandoned ship, dropped anchor because they were abandoning ship. And then the ship drifted around on.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Its own, being pushed around aimlessly by sea currents and wind. Then less than a week later, at the bottom of the Red Sea, something broke.

[Ben Roberts]

Internet traffic that is going from Europe to Asia cut. And then also the other place that was impacted was Europe to Africa, to the east coast of Africa.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

This presentation, I dug into the numbers, and as you can see here.

[Bill Burns]

Joe.

[Cyrus W. Field IV]

It looks like you're frozen.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

In the span of minutes, millions of people from Kenya and Uganda all the way to Vietnam and Singapore had their Internet disrupted. Close to three quarters of the Internet data flow was interrupted between Europe and Asia.

[Ben Roberts]

It was unclear as to what had happened straight away.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

But after a few days, it did become clear.

[Ben Roberts]

Three physical cables, they were all cut around the same time. Very shortly afterwards, within minutes of each.

[Cyrus Field (historical quotes)]

Other.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

The undersea cables that carry all that Internet traffic had been cut.

[Ben Roberts]

It seems that the anchor that had been dropped must have cut the cables. You know, the weight of the ship would just cause that anchor to plow through the cable. It would drift along, find another cable, cut that, and then cut another one.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Okay, right now you might be thinking, wait a minute, I thought Internet connections happen over satellites. In fact, almost all intercontinental Internet traffic. The overseas connections let us do things like make payments, watch movies, or FaceTime. Our friends actually go through cables that run along the ocean floor.

[Ben Roberts]

The Internet relies upon these subsea cables ultimately for the whole thing to work as a global network, global system.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

If you were to look at a world map overlaid with these cables, it looks kind of like a messy connect the dots picture with cables crossing every major ocean. And if you took all the cables in the world and connected them, it could wrap around the earth 36 times. But these cables go largely unnoticed because we can't see most of them.

[Ben Roberts]

Those fiber optic cables are actually extremely fragile. My name is Ben Roberts.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Ben has been building cable networks in Africa for the past two decades.

[Ben Roberts]

That about the thickness? Just slightly more than a human hair. So they're very, very small. In the deep ocean it can be maybe the the diameter of a dime coin.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

You know, out of the 600 some cables that exist, two to four of them break every week and it doesn't take much to break them. It could be as simple as a fisherman's boat anchor accidentally severing one, or it could be an intentional sabotage. This either way, it's hard to tell, especially when these cuts happen in the depths of the ocean.

[Cyrus W. Field IV]

A cargo ship lingered off Taiwan's coast for days, ignoring repeated calls from the coast guard. Then a vital undersea cable went dark weeks ago.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Two data cables were also cut. One between Finland and Germany and another between Lithuania and Sweden. European Union says the suspected culprit vessel is part of Russia's so called ship Shadow fleet of oil executors charged the.

[Cyrus W. Field IV]

Ship'S captain, a Chinese national, with damaging critical infrastructure near Taiwan's southwestern coast.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

NATO's mission Baltic Sentry is a rapid response to an escalating new threat. Multiple cables cut in recent months.

[Rund Abdelfatah]

It's part of what I would just call the invisible infrastructure.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

These cables are an absolute essential technology that are also incredibly fragile. So fragile that in the beginning not many people thought it would actually ever work. I'm Ramtin Arablouei. Coming up, the story of a man who did think they could work and the lengths he went to to try to connect the.

[Rund Abdelfatah]

This is Giselle from Portland, Oregon and you're listening to Throughline on npr. I only recently discovered the show, but it has quickly become my favorite podcast in these difficult political times. I'm just so grateful for the show and the context that it gives to really complex contemporary issues. It's a good reminder that nothing exists in a vacuum. So thanks.

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[Ramtin Arablouei]

Part 1 the Cable Cabinet January 1854 New York City.

[Rund Abdelfatah]

The 1850s. You're really getting into sort of peak industrial age.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Trains and steamboats transformed how people traveled, did business and communicated.

[Rund Abdelfatah]

We start having, you know, telegraph. Your messages can get places further as long as they are already connected.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

This is Alison Marsh. She's a professor at the University of South Carolina and a historian of technology.

[Rund Abdelfatah]

So everything's changing right before your eyes. However, to get a message across the ocean it would still be by chip that would be the fastest. So that's not exactly speed mail in any way.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Let's say you wanted to send a letter across the Atlantic Ocean, say from London.

[Bill Burns]

So if you wanted to get a message to New York, you put it on the mail ship.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

This is Bill burns.

[Bill Burns]

I'm former BBC broadcast engineer and he's.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

The founder of the website atlantic-cable.com which is a deep dive, so to speak, on the first transatlantic cable.

[Bill Burns]

And usually about two weeks to New York and then two weeks back again.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

It's like if you texted a friend, hey, you want to get dinner? And then had to wait a whole month for their reply. One month just for one exchange. But that would all change because of one bored and wealthy man, Cyrus Field.

[Cyrus W. Field IV]

I gather he was about 5 9, which may have been on the slightly tall side, also estimated 140 pounds or so. My name is Cyrus W. Field IV.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Yes, Cyrus Field IV. He is the great, great grandson of the first Cyrus Field that we're talking about.

[Cyrus W. Field IV]

He was Described as wiry. And he apparently talked super fast as well. President Lincoln apparently couldn't understand him in person very well and told him, I don't understand you. Send me a telegram.

[Bill Burns]

Cyrus fool was born in 1819 in Stockbridge, Massachusetts. And he was the son of a clergyman, a minister, apparently.

[Cyrus W. Field IV]

Fire and brimstone, kind of no fun. Part of that puritanical work ethic. And that had a big influence on him.

[Rund Abdelfatah]

He's one of many, many children.

[Cyrus W. Field IV]

He was extremely squirmy and always running around, very high energy. He was bright, he was good at Math. At age 12, he started keeping the family books, running the finances for the family. And he was the only boy in that family that didn't go to college.

[Rund Abdelfatah]

And then trying to figure out what he wants to do with his life.

[Bill Burns]

So he left home at age 15 and I think he moved to New York with $8 in his pocket, which you could live on for a little bit in Manhattan at that time, but not an awful lot.

[Rund Abdelfatah]

And becomes an apprentice in a mercantile.

[Cyrus W. Field IV]

Shop and initially an errand boy, and worked his way up.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Cyrus would later move on to work.

[Bill Burns]

At a paper company and he became a partner in that company and unfortunately went bankrupt. And he ended up in charge of things. He negotiated on the debt to get it cancelled or paid off as far as possible. And then he started his own paper business business.

[Cyrus W. Field IV]

And the timing was great. Stationary had just become a big deal and people were mailing letters and envelopes, companies were issuing bonds and wanted to do it on fine paper. And his business just absolutely took off.

[Rund Abdelfatah]

He makes a fortune. He makes a quarter of a million dollars by the time he's 34. I still think a quarter of a million dollars is a lot of money today. Imagine what, you know, 150 years ago.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

It'S the equivalent of about $10 million today.

[Rund Abdelfatah]

He is loaded.

[Bill Burns]

And just give you an idea of his character, when he was successful, he went back to all of those creditors who had no claim on him personally.

[Cyrus W. Field IV]

And he paid them in full with interest, and that really helped cement his reputation and that helped him greatly going forward. And during this time he married, started a family, and apparently worked all the time, except on Sundays. But it took a toll on his health. And after something like 14 years, I guess, in the paper business, his doctor told him he needed to retire, which he did and was apparently kind of.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Bored until the day a stranger came knocking at his door.

[Narrator/Reader]

Mr. Gisborne left Halifax and came to.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

New York in January 1854, on a cold winter evening. Cyrus opens the door to find a man named Frederick Gisborne who came all the way from Canada looking for help. Gisborne was an engineer who was leading a project to build a telegraph cable line from the island of Newfoundland and the most eastern part of Canada to the North American mainland. The hope was that this cable would move messages more quickly than a ship making the same trip. But his investors abandoned him and he was left holding the bag, along with a debt that would have been about $2 million today.

[Bill Burns]

So Gisborne runs out of money, comes down to Newark looking for investors.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

And so it happens that Cyrus brother, who is also an engineer living in New York, bumps into Gisborne in a hotel lobby, hears his sad story and tells Gisborne to go see Cyrus.

[Bill Burns]

Finds Cyrus, goes to his house, talks to Cyrus, tells him his plan.

[Narrator/Reader]

Accordingly, he came and spent an evening describing the route of his proposed telegraph and the points it was to connect.

[Cyrus W. Field IV]

And the story goes that he wasn't terribly impressed with that idea.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

But there was something about it that got Cyrus wheels turning.

[Narrator/Reader]

After he left, Mr. Field took the globe which was standing in the library and began to turn it over.

[Bill Burns]

And he had a big floor globe which is now in the Smithsonian. And Cyrus says, well, you know, if we're going to have a connection to Newfoundland, why couldn't we just extend it across the Atlantic?

[Narrator/Reader]

It was while dust studying the globe that the idea first occurred to him that the telegraph might be carried further still and be made to span the Atlantic Ocean.

[Bill Burns]

And so Sy looks at his globe and says, why don't we do a cable?

[Cyrus W. Field IV]

Let's take it all the way.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Cyrus wasn't meant for the couch potato life. And this project could not have gotten him out of that retirement slump faster because this transatlantic cable idea was bigger than big, over 2,000 miles long. In fact, it had never been done before and nobody had ever even attempted to. But if this idea was possible, it would be weeks faster than having a mail ship cross the Atlantic. Also, the US could have closer ties to foreign governments. Business overseas could be conducted at a much greater speed. In Cyrus eyes, the possibilities were incredible.

[Cyrus W. Field IV]

He really thought this would help prevent wars from breaking out. You know, taking two weeks there to get a message back and forth from the old world to the new world and, and how that delay could cause misunderstandings, mistakes, that sort of thing.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

It also didn't hurt that it had money making potential.

[Rund Abdelfatah]

Depending on if you could get information faster about anything from a crop failure or a shipwreck, a loss of a market, you Know a famine somewhere or a drought elsewhere. There's always the more information you have as a merchant, as someone who's trading, the better equipped you are to make better decisions faster. And the faster you are, the more likely you are to be able to make more money.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

But Cyrus might have underestimated the scope of the project.

[Cyrus W. Field IV]

And I think that's one of the characteristics of someone that takes on a project like this. They're a little naive in terms of what's actually involved.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

And right from the start, the odds were stacked against Cyrus.

[Narrator/Reader]

Could a cable be stretched across the ocean? The first was a question of mechanical difficulties. The second problem was purely scientific, involving questions as to the laws of electricity not then fully understood, and on which the boldest might feel that he was venturing on uncertain ground.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

This is from a book account, the story of the Atlantic telegraph that was written by Cyrus younger brother, Henry Field.

[Rund Abdelfatah]

We don't really entirely know how all of electricity works yet. There are not yet colleges of electrical engineering. That's not going to exist for another couple of decades. And so we don't even have the terminology that we use, like there was calling something a volt or an amp. Those terms aren't even in use yet. So we don't have the formulas or the theorems to know what's happening. So there are different ideas, and they basically have to be tested.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

The idea was to have a cable line that would connect from the west coast of Ireland all the way to Newfoundland in Canada. From there, telegraph landlines would carry messages onto major cities like New York and London. There were a handful of undersea cable lines that existed at this time, but they were at a much smaller scale. None of them were crossing entire ocean spans. And of course, Cyrus, who has decided to embark on this impossible project, has zero experience with cables.

[Bill Burns]

Now, Cyrus is not technical. He's in the paper business, manufacturing and distribution and sales, but he's not technical at all. But he has friends who are, like Samuel Morse, for example.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

No big deal. Just the inventor of the revolutionary telegraph and the Morse code.

[Cyrus W. Field IV]

And he talked to Samuel Morse to find out, hey, do you think electric wire would work over 1700 miles? And he came back in the affirmative. And with that, with his energy and time and money, he went all in on this.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Cyrus would go on and stake a big part of his own fortune into the project, but he was still going to need a lot more money.

[Bill Burns]

So now Cyrus is having done quite well in New York. He'd met all the rich people, you know, industrialists in New York. So he rounds with his friends, said, who wants to come into this amazing new scheme? And Cyrus all got his buddies together, known as the Cable Cabinet.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

The Cable Cabinet. And Cyrus also made trips to England and got some investors there as well. So Cyrus is raising money, he's recruiting experts on his team, figuring out the cable tech side of things. And now he has to sell his plan to both the US and the British governments.

[Rund Abdelfatah]

He is talking about creating a direct line of communications between the two continents. I mean, think about it as like the red phone in the Oval Office today. Pick it up and talk to other world leaders. I mean, this is the same idea just 150 years earlier.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

The Brits were all in on this plan because let's not forget this was during the ascendance of the British Empire where they had colonies all over the world. So of course they would want to have faster lines of communication.

[Bill Burns]

And then they went to the American government and they said, well, you know, the British government is supporting us and that will mean they have priority on the cable when it's laid. And of course the American government somewhat reluctantly said, all right, well, I suppose we better pony up too.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Both governments gave Field some money for the plan, along with two massive warships, the Agamemnon from the British and and the Niagara from the US this would be a crucial part of the plan as no single ship could carry the weight of 2,000 miles worth of cables. Okay, so imagine spools of thread that are taller than you and wound not with string, but with 2,000 miles of cables that could fill entire rooms. It would take at least 30 men to coil cables onto a ship at any given moment.

[Bill Burns]

And it's a copper wire with seven strands that is surrounded by gutta percha, which is a tree resin. And then surrounding that is iron wire stranded around it for strength and protection.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

The whole thing was around 5, 8 of an inch in diameter. That's smaller than a dime. And the plan is to drop it all 12,000ft down to the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean.

[Bill Burns]

And that's it. That's how cables are laid. Exactly the same today.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

How much would this have cost?

[Bill Burns]

Oh, the equivalent of 100 million today, perhaps.

[Rund Abdelfatah]

Other historians have compared it to the Apollo missions of going to the moon. I mean, that's the same idea of doing something that is in some ways so far fetched, so unbelievable, which only.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Added to the hype. The grandest work which has ever been attempted by the genius and enterprise of man. The New York Herald, newspapers all around the country. And in England were covering the project and a lot of people were hopeful about it. If you wished to communicate some piece of intelligence straight away to your relatives across the wide world of waters, if you wish to tell those whom you know it would interest in their heart of hearts of a birthday or a marriage or alas, a death among you, the little cord which we have now hauled up to the shore will impact that tidings quicker than the flash of the lightning. It was hard to believe that this little cord was even possible. But Cyrus Field was going to try to stretch this cable and bring the world into a new reality. Cyrus and his cable cabinet make all the necessary preparations, crew members, machinery, food and water for the journey.

[Bill Burns]

So they make the cable, they've got the two ships and they're ready to lit.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

But with a project like this, at this scale, disaster can come as quickly as the wind changes direction.

[Narrator/Reader]

Such were the two elements of or forces of nature to be encountered, the ocean and the electric current. Could they be controlled by any power of man? Was it possible to combat the fierceness of the winds and waves and to stretch one long line from continent to continent? And then, after the work was achieved, would the lightning run along the ocean bed from shore to shore? Such were the questions which had puzzled many an anxious brain and which now troubled the one who was to undertake the work.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Coming up, all hands on. Hey, this is Nile Segundo. I messed up. Let's do it from the south. Hey, this is Nile Segundo from Philadelphia. You're listening to Throughline from npr and go birds.

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Part two. The strain on the cable. The strain on the man.

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On the.

[Engineer on Cable Ship]

Evening of the 7th instant paying out of the cable from the Niagara progressed satisfactorily.

[Bill Burns]

So here we are in the summer of 1857.

[Engineer on Cable Ship]

But in noon of the 8th we paid out 40 miles of cable.

[Rund Abdelfatah]

They say, okay, we're gonna start in Ireland and just go straight across.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

The plan was for the Niagara to lay its thousand miles then meet the Agamemnon in the middle of the ocean, splice the cables together and let the second ship finish laying the rest.

[Engineer on Cable Ship]

At noon on the 10th, we had paid out 255 miles of cable.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

This is an account from an engineer who worked on the project and was on board that first ship.

[Engineer on Cable Ship]

At this time we experienced an increasing swell followed later in the day by a strong breeze.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

And let's not forget they're not laying down a cable in some lake. We're talking about the Atlantic Ocean.

[Bill Burns]

It can be very rough water, so which is why you're late in the middle of the summer around July and August when you hope that it's temperate so you're not going to get hit by an iceberg and there aren't too many storms coming through. You could have a hurricane come through. Of course.

[Rund Abdelfatah]

Remember this is the 19th century. We don't have satellite weather telling us where the hurricane is going to go.

[Engineer on Cable Ship]

Shortly after this the speed of the cable gained considerably on the that of.

[Bill Burns]

The ship.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

As the cable was unspooling the wind was picking up and the sea was getting rougher which pulled at the cable causing it to unwind faster.

[Narrator/Reader]

The cable was running out freely at the rate of six miles an hour while the ship was advancing but about.

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4.

[Engineer on Cable Ship]

In proceeding from to the forward part of the ship I heard the machine stop. I immediately called out to relieve the brakes.

[Narrator/Reader]

The stern of the ship was down in the trough of the sea and as it rose upward on the swell the tension was too great.

[Engineer on Cable Ship]

When I reached the spot the cable.

[Narrator/Reader]

Was broken and the cable parted. One who was present, the unbidden tear started. To many a manly eye the interest taken in the enterprise by all everyone, officers and men, exceeded anything I ever saw. And there is no wonder that there should have been so much emotion at our failure.

[Bill Burns]

They ran into problems with their machinery. They got about 350 miles out from Ireland and they lost the end of the cable in much deeper water and they could not recover the cable. And the problem was then they really had very little slack on the cable, not enough to replace 350 miles that was lost. So they gave up for the Year.

[Rund Abdelfatah]

They have to turn around and go back and say, yeah, sorry, guys, we lost all your cable and all of your money and all of your investment. Let's do it again. So, you know, luckily Fields is a very, very persuasive person.

[Cyrus Field (historical quotes)]

Do not think that I feel discouraged or am in low spirits, for I am not. All the officers and men on board of the telegraph fleet seem to take the greatest interest in our enterprise and are very desirous to go out in the ships the next time.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Cyrus and his team basically go back to the drawing board, they say to.

[Bill Burns]

The cable company, can you make us another cable? And they said, sure thing. Have you got the cash?

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Cyrus does have the cash, but that's only because he and his team had to go back out and raise money again.

[Bill Burns]

And they made them another cable, a.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

New and improved cable. They also came up with a different game plan for laying it.

[Bill Burns]

This time they decided to start in the middle of the ocean with both ships. So they both sailed out from Ireland and met in the middle of the ocean and spliced the two ends of the cable together.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Then the two ships would both sail away from each other, one heading towards Newfoundland and the other to Ireland.

[Bill Burns]

And they could talk to each other over the cable by Morse code on the way.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

So a year after the first try, they make a second one and the pressure was on, especially for Cyrus.

[Narrator/Reader]

The strain on the man was more than the strain on the cable, and we were in fear that both would break together.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

The cable had to work.

[Narrator/Reader]

It was the 10th day of June that the expedition left England with fair skies and bright prospects.

[Rund Abdelfatah]

Beautiful weather looks great.

[Cyrus W. Field IV]

Yeah.

[Rund Abdelfatah]

Not too soon after that, on Sunday.

[Narrator/Reader]

It began to blow.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

A massive storm falls upon the two warships.

[Narrator/Reader]

Up to this time, the Niagara and the Agamemnon had managed to keep in sight of each other. And now, from the deck of the floor former, the latter was seen a mile and a half distant, rolling heavily in the sea.

[Engineer on Cable Ship]

Three or four gigantic waves were seen approaching the ship, coming slowly on through the mist, nearer and nearer. The Agamemnon rose heavily to the first and then went down quickly into the deep trough of the sea.

[Bill Burns]

Doesn't quite capsize, timbers are creaking, planks are opening up, the coals are shifting in the hole. The cable is uncoiling itself and getting tangled.

[Narrator/Reader]

But all things have an end. And this long gale at last blew itself out and the weary ocean rocked itself to rest.

[Bill Burns]

Everybody survives miraculously, and they actually try.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

To pick up where they left off, but they can't do it. The cables have suffered too much damage.

[Rund Abdelfatah]

There's no one who's going to be communicating on this. And so they finally give up, turn around and head home, and they have to regroup again.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

And no one probably had a heavier heart than Cyrus.

[Cyrus Field (historical quotes)]

When I thought of all that we had passed through, of the hopes thus far, disappointed, of the friends saddened by our reverses, of the few that remained to sustain us, I felt a load at my heart almost too heavy to bear.

[Bill Burns]

He kept a bold face on board because he sailed the expeditions, but people that knew him well said he was really upset about it, but he just would not give up.

[Rund Abdelfatah]

I mean, I think we've all met those people who have those egos and those ideas, and they're like, yeah, nothing is going to stop me. You have to have that absolute, utter belief in yourself and in the technology that. That this is going to succeed.

[Bill Burns]

There are literally hundreds of newspaper stories about it in Britain and all over the usa.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

And so the great cable on which the hopes of two worlds rested has broken for the second time. We trust the next attempt will achieve the grand object.

[Bill Burns]

And they're generally enthusiastic. They understand it's a new project of unknown complexity, and they're prepared to cut the cable company quite a lot of slack.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Meanwhile, Cyrus appeals to his investors to give him one more chance. They still had the ships, they still had enough cable. And things had been going smoothly until that storm rolled through and it was.

[Narrator/Reader]

Voted to make one more trial before the project was finally abandoned. Even though the chances were 100 to 1 against them, that one might bring them success.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

And just a month later, Cyrus and the two warships were back at sea.

[Bill Burns]

And they start again in the middle, and they sail out to both ends.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

They both reach the starting point and start laying down the cables. A day passes, then two.

[Rund Abdelfatah]

The line unreeled neatly, without incident. Incident at least, not major incident.

[Bill Burns]

They both land at about the same time. The Agamemnon in Valentia in Ireland and the Niagara in Babel Arm off Trinity Bay in Newfoundland. And they land the cables and they start sending signals.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

They had done it.

[Rund Abdelfatah]

The final attempt, the third attempt. Yes, it succeeded. They got it. You know, third time. The charm. The official inauguration happens between Queen Victoria and President Buchanan. And so that's like the official first message. The Queen desires to congratulate the President upon the successful completion of this great.

[Sponsor Announcer 2]

International work in which the Queen has.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Taken it's 102 words and it takes.

[Rund Abdelfatah]

Almost 16 hours to send.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

But 16 hours is way better than two weeks. And when Cyrus gets back to NYC, he gets a hero's welcome.

[Bill Burns]

They have a big celebration in Manhattan with fireworks and parades and everything.

[Rund Abdelfatah]

The church bells are ringing. They have a firework display that was so big and wonderful that it actually sets the dome of city hall on fire. Same type of reactions are happening over in England.

[Cyrus W. Field IV]

He was awarded all sorts of medals and prizes.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

And the cables starts to deliver on its promise. Hundreds of messages go back and forth.

[Cyrus W. Field IV]

But during that month of the celebration, there were problems with the cable and it wasn't working that great. And in the height of the celebrations.

[Rund Abdelfatah]

After only a few weeks, the cable just stops working altogether.

[Bill Burns]

And they try and send out repair ships from Ireland and they can't find the location of the problem.

[Narrator/Reader]

That first cable was thenceforth to sleep forever silent in its ocean grave. Years of labor and millions of of capital were swept away in an hour into the bosom of the pitiless sea.

[Cyrus W. Field IV]

And the public and everyone turned against the project. They claimed it was all a stock fraud, that he had just done this to make money and that it was all a house of cards.

[Bill Burns]

And now the angry letters to the New York Times start appearing. Was the Atlantic cable a humbug? It was the term at the time, a humbug, you know, fake news. And they saying, well, did the cable ever work?

[Rund Abdelfatah]

And lots of people just began to think that this is a big hoax.

[Bill Burns]

And Cyrus Field is roundly condemned.

[Cyrus W. Field IV]

At that point, the public attitude as well as the government turned against him.

[Bill Burns]

So now we're in an unfortunate position where they've spent all the money. Investors are not particularly interested at this point.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

But Cyrus isn't finished yet. That's coming up.

[Rund Abdelfatah]

This is Kendra from Cleveland. You're listening to Throughline from npr.

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[Bill Burns]

Part 3 the 8th Wonder of the World Come listen all unto my song.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

It is no silly fable Tis all about the mighty chord they call the Atlantic Cable. Bold Cyrus Field, he said, says he, I have a pretty notion that I can run a telegraph across the Atlantic Ocean. It had been several years since the first transatlantic Cable failed in 1858, and Cyrus Field wouldn't let it go.

[Cyrus Field (historical quotes)]

I can hardly keep the business of the Atlantic Telegraph Company out of my mind for a single moment.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

In the early 1860s, an investigation concluded that that it was possible to lay a new cable. And this new cable was going to be stronger and more durable than the last one. Meanwhile, other cables were being laid around the world, but none of them crossed the Atlantic. It was just too big of a challenge. But when Cyrus went looking for investors to redeem himself, he had trouble finding them in the US because of the Civil War.

[Cyrus Field (historical quotes)]

The whole country is in such a state of excitement in regard to the war that it is almost impossible to get anyone to talk for a single moment about telegraph matters.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

So Cyrus turned to the British who were interested in how the cable could help them power their colonies. He found a sympathetic ear from British businessmen and by 1865, Cyrus had again found his investors. He had the technology and they also have the ship, the Great Eastern.

[Cyrus W. Field IV]

And it was apparently five times bigger than any other ship that floated at that time.

[Bill Burns]

That was the largest ship ever built and it was intended to be a major passenger ship launched on the Thames in London. They had to launch it sideways. It was so big it would have run into the bank on the other side if they'd launched it in the traditional way. All sorts of problems. Building it was a commercial failure. It had been mothballed. It was sold at auction for £25,000 when it had cost £100,000 to build.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

But Cyrus Field saw the Great Eastern and said, that's my boat. 114 sheep, 20 pigs, 29 geese, 14 turkeys, a milk cow and 500 other fowl. This is what the 500 man crew brought on board the ship for food In July of 1865, when Cyrus Field launched another expedition to lay a new cable. Cyrus, remember, wasn't an engineer. He didn't know much about sailing, but he was nothing if not persistent. And Once again, he put everything he had into this.

[Bill Burns]

Great Easton, then sails out of the Thames, round the south coast of England, round the south coast of Ireland.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

As the sun set, a broad stream of golden light was thrown across the smooth billows towards their boughs. As if to indicate and illumine the path marked out by the hand of heaven. They let one reporter aboard the ship, William Howard Russell of the Times of.

[Bill Burns]

London, they sail up to Valencia, up the. Up the west coast of Ireland. Now we're ready to lay the cable again.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

The men laid cable westward across the Atlantic, testing the signal every half hour to make sure it was working. When they found problems, they spent hours pulling up the cable and fixing it. And again the cable snapped.

[Bill Burns]

And they lose the end of the cable. At that point, in 12,000ft of water.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Cyrus's lip quivered and. And his cheek blanched.

[Cyrus Field (historical quotes)]

The cable has parted and gone overboard.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

There around us lay the placid Atlantic, smiling in the sun and not a dimple to show where lay so many hopes buried. They spend more than a week trying to pull up the cable. And they get close.

[Bill Burns]

They get almost to the surface, but.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

The rope they're using to reel it up breaks.

[Bill Burns]

They have nothing else they can do at this point, in the middle of the deepest part of the ocean, they have no other way of recovering it. So they mark the position on their chart and they put a buoy there in case it's there when they come.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Back, because, of course, they were coming back. By now, you know that Cyrus Field wasn't the kind of guy who gave up.

[Cyrus Field (historical quotes)]

We have learned a great deal, and next summer we shall lay the cable. Without doubt.

[Cyrus W. Field IV]

Apparently, when he traveled internationally, the first word he learned was faster in every foreign language, and that was kind of his mantra.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

So in 1866, the next year, in July, Cyrus and his crew set out again.

[Bill Burns]

No problems. Nothing happens on the way. They arrive in Newfoundland, they land the cable in Trinity Bay at heart's content, and they send a message back.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

And on July 27, 1866, the Great Eastern had successfully reached Newfoundland with the cable intact. And for Cyrus Field, they said when.

[Bill Burns]

They landed the cable, he wept.

[Cyrus Field (historical quotes)]

I went to my cabin. I locked the door. I could no longer restrain my tears.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

The Queen of England and President Andrew Johnson congratulated each other in dispatches published in newspapers, along with a note from Johnson to Cyrus saying, may the cable under the sea tend to promote harmony between the Republic of the west and the governments of the Eastern hemisphere. Under the cable agreement, the British and American Governments had dibs on using them. And with this new transatlantic cable being 80 times faster than the first one, messages and money soon started flying.

[Bill Burns]

So for a hundred dollars in Gold in 1866, you could send a 20 word message across the cable, bring that into modern money. It's hundreds and hundreds of dollars, you know, for a single message, which is.

[Cyrus W. Field IV]

Phenomenally expensive, but it beats, you know, boating across the ocean ever.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

As for Cyrus Field, the project he spent over a decade on, invested his own fortune in, that he believed in, with his whole being, was finally finished. He could finally give his mind and body some rest.

[Cyrus W. Field IV]

Apparently he crossed the Atlantic over 50 times dealing with this, and he got seasick every time and apparently didn't sleep much.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

He considered laying a cable across the Pacific ocean, but never ended up doing it. Eventually, he got into New York rail cars, but made some bad investments.

[Bill Burns]

Unfortunately, he got suckered in by the robber barons in New York, and they played him.

[Cyrus W. Field IV]

He was embarrassed. His reputation had been. Had really taken a hit at that time.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

And it wasn't just that he lost.

[Cyrus W. Field IV]

Money, just a string of misfortune. His wife died, a child died.

[Rund Abdelfatah]

It's sort of the sad tale of what happens to Cyrus.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Cyrus field died in 1892 at the age of 72, and he did live to see a cable boom. By 1900, cables connected almost every continent.

[Bill Burns]

If you look at a present day cable map of the world, and you look at the 1902 cable map of the world, you will see those cables are on exactly the same routes, okay, worldwide, with the exception of the Pacific, which is much more heavily cabled now.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

In the 1950s, the first telephone cables were laid in the ocean, and fiber optic cables followed starting in the 1980s. Today, hundreds of undersea cables keep billions of people connected.

[Rund Abdelfatah]

The way this technology moved forward was through the persistence of a group of men who really, really, really wanted this big project to happen. Sometimes you just really need to have really big, outrageous, crazy thinkers and be like, yes, let's do that.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Cyrus Fields wasn't an engineer, he wasn't a sailor. But he was someone who had a vision. One of those people who feel that it's their duty to change the way we live, whether the rest of us believe in their vision or not. It's something his great, great grandson thinks about a lot.

[Cyrus W. Field IV]

There's certain personalities out there, and you can see them in the world today, and they, they can't help themselves. I just picture his family. He was just not there. He was not present. I realize I'm not that kind of guy. I mean, I want to make the world a better place and I volunteer at the food bank and I'm on the parks board and stuff like that. But I'm not willing to sacrifice at all personal, personally, for the greater good.

[Rund Abdelfatah]

And that's it for this week's show. I'm Rund Abdelfatah.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

I'm Ramtin Arablouei and you've been listening to Throughline from npr.

[Rund Abdelfatah]

This episode was produced by me and.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Me and Lawrence Wu, Julie Kane, Anya.

[Rund Abdelfatah]

Steinberg, Casey Miner, Christina Kim, Devin Kadayama, Irene Noguchi.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Fact checking for this episode was done by Kevin Voelkel. The episode was mixed by Gilly Moon. Thanks to Jason divingracia, Louis Fisher, Christian Benford, Esteban Lopez Lopez and Andy Su for their voiceover work. Thanks also to Doug Madhuri, Julian Rall, Alan Malden, Jane Munga, Diana Gravely and Al Jazeera. Thank you also to Johannes Durgi, Laura Schwartz, Tommy Evans and Beth Donovan.

[Rund Abdelfatah]

Music for this episode was composed by Ramtin and his band Drop Electric, which.

[Ramtin Arablouei]

Includes Naveed Marvi, Sho Fujiwara, Anya Mizani and Throughline listeners. We love hearing from you. You've already shared a lot of your own love and respect for NPR's Gaza reporter Anas Bhabha, who was recently featured in our episode from the Front Lines. The episode looks at how war reporters work and Anas talked to Run from Gaza City about his work there. And here are some examples. Casey Wendt wrote, thank you for this episode. I think about Anas a lot and worry about him. So it was nice to hear his reporting. And Aaron McNeil wrote. Anas Baba, thank you. Thank you. Thank you. So please take a minute and leave us a review and a rating on Spotify or Apple. It actually really does help more people find out about the show and it lets us know how we're doing. And if you do it, you might just hear your review right here on the show.

[Rund Abdelfatah]

Thanks for listening.

[Sponsor Announcer]

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