#Exhibit of the Month

One of the great technical achievements that revolutionized the idea of time and space, opening a new era in the history of communication, is telegraphy. It is based on the transmission of electrical signals through a cable over long distances, allowing people to communicate instantly. The telegraph spread very quickly and a network of wires stretched around the world.

In 1837, the American painter and physicist Samuel Morse invented the first electromagnetic device for telegraphy, patented in 1840. To send messages by wire, Morse developed in 1838 a simple code of dots and dashes, which represented the letters of the alphabet, known as "Morse code ".

Both Morse code and the telegraph machine were improved over time, with the telegraph becoming the most widespread system of communication and information transmission for more than a century, until the advent of the Internet. The telegraph system consisted of a series of stations repeaters along the transmission line route. Each station had an operator who received and transmitted messages by telegraph. The Morse machine transmitted about 25 words per minute, which were recorded in code on a paper tape. The operator in charge of transmitting the message would decode it and write it on paper using a special typewriter.

In Bessarabia, the telegraph entered in 1860: on April 8, the Bender telegraph station began its activity, and on April 24, the one in Chisinau, following the construction of the first Odesa-Chisinau-Leova telegraph line. Currently, telegraph services have been discontinued. The only ones who still use coded communication are radio amateurs.

The Morse telegraph machine shown comes from the Osinoostrovsky electrotechnical plant, Soviet Union, and dates back to 1934. The exhibit was restored by Mihail Culașco.

Virtual Tour

Exhibitions

„The Moldpress State News Agency – eye witness of the Republic of Moldova for 33 years”

June 20 – July 4, 2023

The Moldpres State News Agency is a self-managed news agency, founded under the decision by the Supreme Soviet of the Moldovan Soviet Socialist Republic (MSSR) No 122-XII from 20 June 1990, following the liquidation of the ATEM Moldovan Telegraphic News Agency.

The history of the present Moldpres State News Agency started back in the 1940 year, when the Moldtag Moldovan Telegraphic Agency was set up, based on a decision by the Council of People's Commissars of MSSR.

In 1990, when the process of national revival started, the Supreme Soviet of MSSR (presently the Parliament of Moldova) on 20 June issued the decision No 122-XII, thereby ruling to liquidate the Moldovan Telegraphic News Agency. The decision was signed by the then president of the Supreme Soviet of MSSR of that time, Mircea Snegur.

Following the liquidation of ATEM, the authorities in the same year founded the Moldova-pres National News Agency, subordinated to the parliament. Immediately after the creation, the Moldova-pres National News Agency established the first collaboration relations with the Rompres National News Agency (Romania), presently Agerpres.

In 1994, the Agency switched under the government's subordination and became the editor of the Official Journal (Monitorul Oficial) of Moldova. Subsequently, structural changes came about, aimed at optimizing the managerial activity and its renaming into Moldpres - a modern mass media structure with three main directions of work: spread of information of wide interest to the public, editing of the Official Journal and the photo-report.

In 1996, the Moldpres Agency became state enterprise, carrying out its activity in self-financing regime and afterwards in 2018 it was reorganized through its transformation into Public Institution.

The opening of the exhibition will take place on June 20, at 17:00, in the upstairs hall of the National Museum of History of Moldova, 31 August 1989 street, 121A.