Our history
Cable & Wireless very proudly celebrated their centenary on St. Helena on 26 November 1999.

One hundred years is a long time for any company to be anywhere. To maintain a presence and provide a range of services to customers in such an isolated and remote location is, we think, rather special. Cable & Wireless have been around for a long time in many parts of the world and it may be of interest to readers to know something of the history of the Company, both locally in St. Helena and globally.

Cable & Wireless traces its origins to 1872 but it was not until 1899 that the Eastern Telegraph Company (ETC), later to become Cable & Wireless, laid the first telegraph cable into Ruperts Bay, St. Helena. This was a small but vital part of the chain between South Africa and Europe and it would later become an important link in the world's most extensive network of cables.

In those early days the present day site at The Briars was built. The fact that most of it is still standing is testimony to the thoroughness of ETC building. Photographs from 1906 show that the operation at that time was very labour intensive. Over fifty operators and technicians were employed and housed, some in the buildings that still stand, and others in houses at the rear of the site, long since demolished.

The ETC was spreading its wings in many directions. Cable stations grew up in St. Helena, Ascension Island, the Cape Verde Islands and in numerous locations throughout South America and Africa. In the meantime the Western Telegraph Company and many other companies, which would later be amalgamated to form Cable & Wireless, were extending their presence into the Far East, India and Europe. The early decades of this century saw very rapid expansion of the submarine cable network and by 1934, when all the associated companies merged to form Cable & Wireless, the new company owned more than 164,000 nautical miles of cable.

Cable & Wireless was really an overseas arm of the UK government telecommunications monopoly until it became a Public Limited Company and was listed on the London Stock Exchange in 1981. As such it served the Empire, almost in a charitable way and without much regard for making a profit, the duty of company employees was summarised as follows in an address from the Chairman in 1950:-

'We want you to be self reliant and resourceful in difficulty. We want to be able to rely on you confidently to keep open the lines of communication as far as lies in your power, whatever the difficulties may be'

Well, the lines are still open and never more so than now. The company employs more than 50,000 people all over the world and has a presence in over 70 countries. The operation in Hong Kong alone once employed 13,000 people whilst at the other end of the scale there are just over one hundred employees in the South Atlantic, 37 of whom are in St. Helena. Cable & Wireless is the world's third largest carrier of international traffic, this includes normal voice traffic and data as used in the internet. Traffic is carried by means of submarine fibre optic cables with massive capacities and, as in the case of St. Helena, by satellite communications, using the Intelsat satellites.

A lot has been done here in the last ten years alone. Gone are the days when international telephone calls had to be booked days ahead and calls for Christmas Day 3 months in advance and limited to 15 minutes per call! There were only 3 manual international high frequency telephone lines and 1 manual telex line available serving both Ascension Island and the rest of the world. In the later part of 1989 the Government domestic telephone network was absorbed into Cable & Wireless and a brand new Satellite Earth Station was built enabling international direct dialling, fax and data transmissions possible world wide. The TV system was brought into service in 1995 and programmes such as CNN, Discovery, BBC World, various entertainment and all major sporting events are shown. A fully functional internet service was commissioned as recently as September 1999 bringing the Island closer and more up to date with the outside world.

Apart from the sophistication of the modern services now on offer the company has given considerable thought to the management and development of the staff. We at Cable & Wireless are very proud of our record of service to St. Helena and we hope that our customers are happy with the level of service they receive.

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