This page contains some interesting historical snippets about Morse and other Telegraphic Codes.

One of the attractions of Morse Code for the Amateur is the endless possibilities for effective communications using the simplest of equipment. This is epitomized by QRP, for by what other means could you communicate using a transceiver having perhaps only two or three transistors and a dozen other components.

But did you know....

.....Samual F.B. Morse originally intended that his Code would be received by a mechanical reader which would provide ink representations of the code on a paper tape! It wasn't until later that operators realised that they could copy the code by ear using the clicks of the mechanical reader, and directly transcribe the character onto paper in real time.

Samual Morse chose his characters based upon their frequency of reoccurrence in the English language. The letter "E" being the most frequently used character has the shortest number of elements, "I" the second most frequently used character has two elements, and so on and so forth. Incidentally the layout of the QWERTY keyboard used the same premise, those most frequently used characters lie under the natural resting location of a trained typist's fingers. But do you realise that there are different keyboard layouts for different countries - French keyboards are significantly different from those used in the UK.

Think of the confusion that could have resulted if every nation had developed a Telegraphic Code based upon the frequency of reoccurrence of the characters in their own languages! In fact that is what initially happened, the American Morse code had a number of differences than the European or "Continental Code".

The correct Internationally recognised designation for Morse is “ International Telegraph Code #1”. In 1865, the first International Telegraph Conference—which later gave rise to the International Telecommunications Union (ITU) adopted Morse's famous code for international telegraphy - based upon the European Continental Code.

However the International Telegraph Code #1 should not be confused with the code known as CCITT No: 1 which is in fact the Baudot Teleprinter code. Morse Code is still defined by the ITU within their ITU-T series of Recommendations (formerly those of the Consultative Committee for International Telephone and Telegraph (CCITT)) as "ITU-T Recommendation F.1 (1998), Division B, I, Morse Code".

The Baudot Code dates back to 1874, but was actually devised by two of Emile Baudot’s associates, Johann Gauss and Wilhelm Weber as part of the overall system, though apparently the code was used for cryptography by Sir Francis Bacon as early as 1605.

Emile Baudot in fact devised a "printing telegraph" system which used this code, although apparantly no commercial teleprinter (of the type recognised today) was ever made using Baudot's code.

Radio Teletype (RTTY) as used on the Amateur Bands which is often called "Baudot Code" uses neither the Baudot Code, known as CCITT #1 or the later Murray Code, CCITT #2, devised in 1901. Modern RTTY uses ITA2 (International Telegraph Alphabet #2) which had replaced both CCITT#1 and CCITT #2 by the early 1930's.

Maritime Radio

In the days before the advent of Inmarsat and GMDSS (Global Marine Distress Signaling System) when all ocean going ships had to have a Radio Officer or "Sparks" as a member of the crew, Morse or CW was defacto means for communications with the shore stations whilst the vessel was out of VHF range.

In those days, in the UK, the Morse qualifications for a RO were:

PMG1

The CW requirements were 25 wpm (words per minute) P/L (plain language) and 20 wpm code groups to be taken as part of a 2 year college course, and at the time the UK PMG1 was regarded as being one of the toughest courses in the RO world.

After passing the exams, the newly qualified RO would be required to spend six months at sea as a Junior RO before being set loose on the world.

PMG2

For this qualification, the CW requirements were 20 wpm P/L and 16 wpm code groups but only required a short (6 month?) college course.

There was also a "Special" PMG for ROs on trawlers which required only a 6 month college course.

The PMG1 and PMG2 qualifications were replaced in 1970 by the Maritime Radio Communications General Certificate (MRGC) which had the same CW requirement as the PMG2 i.e. 20 wpm p/l and 16 wpm code groups.

However, to get employment on a "Quality" shipping line, a Radar Certificate was essential. This was normally taken by the newly qualified RO as a short extension course before going to sea.

Land Line Morse Telegraphy

In the days when Western Union was a Telegraphic Message Service, the operators used bug keys of the Vibroplex type which had their adjustments set for 27wpm, with the adjusting screws welded in place to stop operators from changing the settings.

So why did Western Union set the keys to 27wpm? Well, Western Union were not alone as it appears that other Telegraph operating companies also used 27wpm as their "standard" transmission speed.

Apparantly it was all to do with obtaining the highest through-put of traffic.

At first this may sound a little strange - as surely a trained and experienced operator can send well in excess of 27wpm.

Well, yes he can, but the Telepgraph companies found that 27wpm is the speed that results in the lowest transmission and reception errors which in turn yielded the highest traffic throughput. And remember, the operators had to send and receive exactly what was on the message form - 100% correct - no errors - and therefore no second guessing.

Also 27wpm is the maximum speed that most people can write legibly in longhand! Important before the days of the typewriter!

Learning the Code

Much has been written about learning morse code, and there are an abundance of commercial products, many offering "Quick", "Rapid", "Revolutionary" or "7 Day" learning methods. Personally I don't think that there's any magical short cuts to learning CW. It simply takes a little time and effort - the amount of time and effort required will be very dependant upon the individual and the level of attainment and proficiency required.

The key to learning the code is just simply practice, a little and often. And for anyone able to devote what is only a few minutes per day of spare time to such regular practice, the code can usually be learnt within a fairly short time.

My tips are:

Firstly, don't go rushing out to buy a Morse Key and buzzer - ideally you shouldn't even attempt to send CW until you know the code and can copy most characters by ear with a reasonable degree of proficiency.

Secondly, get yourself a good PC based CW tutor program - forget cassettes, CDs, records, etc., - after the first couple of plays, you will memorize them! What you need is something to provide true random characters, and a PC is ideal. Second best is a Morse Tutor such those offered by MFJ, Datong etc. but these come a long way behind the PC, and assuming you have the PC already, they are more expensive, and most only offer limited features.

Try to select a PC program which as a minimum can send random letter and figure groups of 5 characters in Farnsworth Mode - i.e. the characters are sent at a high speed with long gaps between. Other nice features for the PC program would be to send mixed letter, number and procedural character groups; standard plain language words; plain texts, and simulated QSOs. The ability to change the pitch (frequency) of the tone is also useful, as trying to receive a different pitched tone can often "throw" someone who has become accustomed to learning with only one tone pitch. Don't be tempted to buy any "Miracle Morse Learning Systems" - frequently these can ultimately slow down your progress. In any event, no miracles are required to learn Morse - it really can be equated to learning a favourite tune - or more correctly about 42 tunes of which you will only hear the very first opening bars!

Another aspect of learning the code which will also often "throw" the student is when the time comes to make the transition from using 5 character groups to receiving words of other lengths. Don't worry - it's just part of the learning process.

Start learning letter and number groups with the character speed set to about 18 wpm (yes 18wpm!) and with a long gap to reduce the overall speed to, say, 5 wpm. This is commonly known as the Farnsworth Mode, and the 18 wpm character speed makes you learn the rhythm of the code from the outset and prevents you from trying to decode the individual dots and dashes within the character. If the Morse characters are sent below 10wpm, there is a tendency to read the individual dots and dashes, and this is the big mistake which most beginners initially make and then find it very difficult to overcome when trying to progress to higher speeds. Having the character speed set well above 10wpm will avoid you getting stuck on what is frequently termed "the 10 wpm plateau". That's why, until recently, most countries set their Morse Test Speed at about 12 to 13 wpm, for at these speeds it is only possible to receive the code by recognising the rhythm of the characters. Recognising the rhythm of the code is the key to the secret of learning and becoming proficient in Morse Code.

Try and practice twice daily - ideally morning and evening but for only about 15 to 20 minutes per session. Regular and frequent practice is the key to mastering the code. When you learn CW, you will be absorbing the code during the practice session, and only afterwards does your brain subconsciously process that information. As this is a subconscious process, the brain can only absorb and retain a certain amount of data per session, and normally 15 to 20 minutes is the limit for most people. Even a session of only 10 minutes once a day is OK if time is at a premium, but there really is nothing to gain by attempting protracted sessions longer than 20 minutes as anything over this time will not be absorbed and will simply be "lost". Make sure that you won't get disturbed - any distraction is likely to "throw" you and impede your progress. You may find that using headphones can be beneficial as these will help to isolate you from distracting noises. You need isolate yourself from anything but the code which you will be receiving. Also, from the outset, try to write down the received code using lower case letters - it's faster and less tiring than writing capitals.

Above all, try to practice every day, but don't become overly concerned if you have to miss a few days now and again. Providing the break is not too long, you will get back to where you were before when you broke off within a day or so.

As most countries have now adopted the 5wpm Morse Code test, the above procedures will prepare you for your test. Most individuals should be able to pass the test after a few weeks of practice.

For a CW operator with a little experience, 5wpm is painfully slow and very few amateur QSOs take place at 5wpm. For those wishing to improve their code proficiency beyond this 5wpm minimum, further practice will be required, and the computer is probably still the best way to get up to a more usable 10 to 12 wpm. The Farnsworth mode with the characters sent at 18 wpm is still applicable, and the next learning phase will be aimed at reducing the gaps between the characters.

As you progress with your learning, as soon as you get to about 80 to 90% correct copy at a given speed, then increase the speed (i.e. shorten the gap) - always push yourself. If you are not pushing yourself you are not learning. Don't worry about not getting 100% correct copy - when you listen to CW off the air invariably you will never get 100% perfect copy due to QRM, QRN, QSB etc. The odd letter missed can be almost always be guessed later.

As soon as you known the letters, numbers and a few of the procedural characters, as part of your practice, start listening to CW off the air - it's very different than when listening to perfect computer generated CW and will give good experience of copying plain text interspersed with amateur "shorthand" and codes. You will also have a good measure of QRM QSB QRN etc. Also if you have up until this time only been learning using the letter and number groups, you will find random length words will initially "throw" you.

You will also appreciate how bad some Amateur CW is, and what mistakes to try and avoid. You will also learn to recognise good, well sent morse and after a short while you will begin to appreciate how much easier it is to copy morse with well formed characters when compared to morse being poorly sent. Probably the most common mistake is poor inter-character spacing which results in running characters together.

I'm sorry if the above appears to be overwhelming - it isn't - and a few minutes of dedicated practice a couple of times a day is really all that's needed - perhaps for a couple of weeks - perhaps for a couple of months.

For those wishing to go beyond 12 wpm, the following tips may be useful.

I previously made reference to the 10 wpm plateau. There are two other plateaus which needed to be breached to copy high speed Morse.

One will be found in the 20+ wpm region. Up to 20 wpm, it is possible to manually write down the Morse characters as they are heard in "real time". However, as the speed increases, it is essential to develop an ability to audibly receive characters ahead of those being written down, i.e. to develop a first-in, first-out (FIFO) buffer memory. As the Morse Characters are of different lengths, the character rate will effectively vary according to the nature of the text. Thus words containing predominantly the characters e, i, s, t, n, a, require the receiver to write faster than when copying words comprising mostly the characters o, c, y, l, j q, z, p, etc. Thus developing a FIFO buffer memory will help to smooth out the variations in the off-air receiving and the manual transcribing.

Developing a buffer memory will enable code of up to about 27 to 30 wpm to be manually transcribed, which is the limit for most people to manually write down text, which in itself is another plateau. It is of course possible to receive Morse faster than this, either by simply following the text in one's head, perhaps with just jotting down relevant words, but to transcribe text of over 30 wpm requires the use of a typewriter, or nowadays, a word processor, together with the ability to touch type!

I have extracted the following useful tips from other acknowledged sources.

Morse Learning Software

(Extracted and adapted for Morsum Magnificat from Gary Bold's 'The Morseman' column in 'Break-In', journal of NZART).

From time to time, I'm asked to give opinions on various Morse learning software packages. I can't comment on specific programs, but I do have some strongly-held "don't do this" opinions, applicable to all programs:

**Don't even look at a written table of the Morse code before starting to learn, and certainly never attempt to memorize one visually. You have to learn Morse by sound.

**Don't have anything to do with software that shows you the Morse characters on the screen.

**Don't have anything to do with training schemes that ask you to initially listen to successions of dots and dashes, or parts of characters, or to "count the dots and dashes" in characters. You have to recognise whole characters, and doing this will retard your progress. Listen only to complete, correctly sent, characters.

**Don't ever listen to Morse at a character speed of less than 12 wpm. Use 14 wpm or faster, if possible.

**Don't learn by memorising opposites, such as "K" and "R". This actually causes some people to confuse them forever!

**Don't spend lots of time copying random code groups. Reading plain language is very different (refers to ZL Morse test. Ed). Random code groups are popular because simple computer programs to send them are easy to write. They have a place, for identifying and practising "hangup" characters, but that's all....

METHODS NOT RECOMMENDED

by Wm.G. Pierpont, N0HFF (From Morsum Magnificat Nr. 43, Christmas 1995)

(Reprinted and specially edited for Morsum Magnificat from Bill Pierpont's book "The Art and Skill of Radio-Telegraphy").

In almost every subject we may study there are efficient and inefficient ways to go about learning it. It seems foolish to go about learning in a hard way, if we know of a better one.

Many, many people have managed to master the Morse code by methods which we cannot recommend today, but they have done so at a heavy cost in time and effort, and often have experienced great discouragement along the way.

They have managed by persistence to overcome the stumbling blocks and achieve success in spite of them. But countless others have got stuck and have given up at some slow speed, generally less than 10 - 12 wpm.

Through the years all sorts of schemes have been devised for "memorizing" the code, some of them quite ingenious. Most of them involve some kind of visualization: a pictorial or systematic arrangement based on structure, or a "chain" of relationships of some sort, adding to or exchanging components of one character to obtain another.

No Translating!

A few have devised words or phrases presumed to have a sort of "sound-alikeness" to the code character. Such methods probably would help a person who might sometime need to signal for help in a dire emergency, but they have no value for telegraphic communication. There is never any reason to see the code in written form. Never translate "dit plus dah means A" and then write it, or as another has said: "If you find yourself hearing 'dahdidahdit' and saying to yourself 'Aha, that's a 'C', and then writing it down, you're in trouble -- that's translating."

Most of these well-intentioned aids to learning have overlooked the fact that the code letters are an alphabet of sound. These "aids" have interposed something else between the letter sound and the letter. Most of these methods present their schemes to the eye, not the ear.

Sound-Alikes

Even those which purport to use sound (such as "sound- alikes") fail to provide the necessary unity of sound pattern (partly because they are too slow, but also because the "sound-alikes" are extraneous and distracting).

Both kinds require an extra step - a translation step - to get there. Those which require some sort of analysis (such as how many dits and dahs) of each character in order to identify it, or to run through a series of some sort, also have introduced needless steps which inevitably slow the learner down, and usually severely limit his achieving speeds over about 5-10 wpm.

Very many of those who originally learned the code from a printed chart of dots and dashes began the bad habit of counting the number of dots and of dashes from a mental chart. Then they must decipher the longer characters by counting: for example, to separate B from 6 and 1 from J.

Some Managed It!

Some of these hams were able by much practice, and perhaps realizing the nature of the problem, to overcome their speed plateau. (I knew one experienced ham-ex-navy-commercial operator who could go right along at 20 wpm this way, but that was his ultimate limit. He loved the code, but could never advance a step further. That was as fast as he could analyze: pretty fast at that!).

Those who have learned by the "sound-alike" methods, (e.g, they hear "didah", and it sounds like "alike", which they have been taught means "A") rarely reach even a ten wpm plateau.

One method extensively advertised for many years "taught" the beginner by the scheme "Eat Another Raw Lemon," which was supposed to remind him how each of the four letters E A R L was formed, each one adding one element to the previous one.

This was illustrated by large printed dots and dashes. There must have been a good many who started out this way, and in spite of it, at least some of them finally managed to become proficient. I knew of one such amateur who got to around 20 wpm that way.

Impeding Progress

The expert teachers tell us that any kind of printed dots and dashes or any other such pictorial impressions will only impede the student's progress when he is beginning to learn the code. All such methods violate good pedagogy, because they do not teach the code as actual sound patterns, as it will be heard and used.

They also require the student to learn something (which he must later forget in order to advance) in addition to the sound of the code itself. While these methods may seem to make it easier at first, they actually make it much harder, or even impossible, to advance. The wise teacher and student will avoid these approaches.

Last update 27/1/04