These days, we're so used to miraculous discoveries coming at breakneck speed that we tend to forget what heroic undertakings they once involved. Reading about the "Vicorian Internet," note especially the lengths they went to in Australia to be involved:
By 1870, a submarine cable was heading towards Australia. It seemed likely that it would come ashore at the northern port of Darwin from where it might connect around the coast to Queensland and New South Wales.
South Australia realised it would miss out, and Charles Todd was determined that this should not happen and put in a courageous bid to run an overland telegraph line right across the heart of the Australian continent, a distance of 2,700 miles, through territory which had hardly even been explored.
It was an undertaking more ambitious than spanning an ocean. Flocks of sheep had to be driven with the 400 workers to provide food.
A little bit more daunting than two guys in a garage, yes?
