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Morse’s first telegraph printed the message by printing a seismograph-like line on a thin strip of paper..<ref>{{cite web |url=http://web.mit.edu/invent/iow/morse.html |title=Samuel F. B. Morse as MIT's Inventor of the Week |accessdate=2009-12-10 |work= }}</ref> The dips in the line had to be decoded using a dictionary written by Morse, but decoding was hard if the line was not clear. By the following year, he had made a telegraph that used an improved dot-and-dash system of [[Morse Code]] that impressed dots and dashes on paper. Different combinations of dots and dashes represented letters and numbers. The paper was decoded later by an operator. This system was better because it was easier to decode, and eventually trained operators could decode it in their heads. In 1838, Morse exhibited his telegraph to the public in New York.  

Morse’s first telegraph printed the message by printing a seismograph-like line on a thin strip of paper..<ref>{{cite web |url=http://web.mit.edu/invent/iow/morse.html |title=Samuel F. B. Morse as MIT's Inventor of the Week |accessdate=2009-12-10 |work= }}</ref> The dips in the line had to be decoded using a dictionary written by Morse, but decoding was hard if the line was not clear. By the following year, he had made a telegraph that used an improved dot-and-dash system of [[Morse Code]] that impressed dots and dashes on paper. Different combinations of dots and dashes represented letters and numbers. The paper was decoded later by an operator. This system was better because it was easier to decode, and eventually trained operators could decode it in their heads. In 1838, Morse exhibited his telegraph to the public in New York.  

In 1842, Morse got a grant from [[Congress]] for $30,000 to build and experimental [[telegraph]] between Baltimore and Washington, D. C., a distance of 40 miles. The real first message was sent on this telegraph system when the news of the [[Whig Party]]'s nomination of [[Henry Clay]] for U.S. President was telegraphed from the party's convention in Baltimore to the Capitol Building in Washington. This was the first news ever dispatched by electric telegraph. Morse’s first public message, sent on May 24, 1844, was from [[Numbers]] 23:23, “What hath God wrought!” The verse had been picked out by the daughter of one of his friends who had publicized Morse’s invention and secured funding for it.  

In 1842, Morse got a grant from [[Congress]] for $30,000 to build and experimental [[telegraph]] between Baltimore and Washington, D. C., a distance of 40 miles. The real first message was sent on this telegraph system when the news of the [[Whig Party]]'s nomination of [[Henry Clay]] for U.S. President was telegraphed from the party's convention in Baltimore to the Capitol Building in Washington. This was the first news ever dispatched by electric telegraph. Morse’s first public message, sent on May 24, 1844, was from [[Numbers]] 23:23, “What hath God wrought!” ([[Numbers 23:23]]) The verse had been picked out by the daughter of one of his friends who had publicized Morse’s invention and secured funding for it.  

Morse had difficulty being recognized as ''the'' inventor of the telegraph, as similar devices had been invented by people such as William Cooke and Charles Wheatstone. Cooke and Wheatstone’s device used multiple wires, however, and would be surpassed by Morse’s more superior method. Morse had been the first to combine the battery, electromagnetism, the electromagnet, and the correct battery configuration into a working telegraph. The United States government used Morse’s invention without being officially recognized for it, so Morse was awarded the sum of $80,000 dollars in 1858, in recognition of his invention, by the governments of France, Austria, Belgium, the Netherlands, Russia, Sweden, Tuscany, and Turkey, all of whom used his telegraph. Morse was recognized in 1871 in the United States when a bronze statue of him was unveiled in [[Central Park]] in [[New York City]].  

Morse had difficulty being recognized as ''the'' inventor of the telegraph, as similar devices had been invented by people such as William Cooke and Charles Wheatstone. Cooke and Wheatstone’s device used multiple wires, however, and would be surpassed by Morse’s more superior method. Morse had been the first to combine the battery, electromagnetism, the electromagnet, and the correct battery configuration into a working telegraph. The United States government used Morse’s invention without being officially recognized for it, so Morse was awarded the sum of $80,000 dollars in 1858, in recognition of his invention, by the governments of France, Austria, Belgium, the Netherlands, Russia, Sweden, Tuscany, and Turkey, all of whom used his telegraph. Morse was recognized in 1871 in the United States when a bronze statue of him was unveiled in [[Central Park]] in [[New York City]].