A few weeks ago, I mentioned how much I love watching Antiques Roadshow. In the episode I saw this week, a man brought an 1880s era stock ticker to be appraised and it really piqued my interest. So I decided to do some research and found:
Edward A. Calahan invented the stock ticker in 1867 to convey stock prices over a long distance. A special typewriter was used to send the stock quotes over telegraph wire that then displayed them on the stock ticker at the other end of the connection. A bit different from the way we can view a stock’s movements second by second on Yahoo! or Google Finance today.
Thomas Edison made improvements on the device and his Universal Stock Ticker was said to have a printing speed of one character per second in the late 1860s.
In the 1870s, stock tickers were available on a contract basis for about $6 per week. And by 1883, 1,000 were in use around New York City.
The stock ticker I saw on Antiques Roadshow was made between 1880-1885 by the Star Electric Company. The appraiser said it was worth about $8,000 to $10,000—not bad for a piece of obsolete (if still very cool) technology.
As a collector, I was excited to see this stock ticker, but my heart sank after realizing it was fake.
http://www.edisonticker.com/star-electric/
I found this write-up fascinating and really enjoyed learning more about these old stock tickers. It’s interesting to see what they miss on the Roadshow! Thank for you so much for sharing.