BIS Review 1/2004  3  Another major technological advance in the mid-1800s was the telegraph. Besides aiding the expansion of railroads by improving the coordination of rail traffic, the telegraph sharply reduced the costs of communicating in many other industries.
And judging from the rapid growth in its use - the number of messages handled rose from about 9 million in 1870 to nearly 56 million in 1890 - the telegraph undoubtedly contributed to better decisionmaking and higher productivity throughout the economy.12 Agriculture also was increasingly mechanized in the decades immediately after the Civil War, though the change was not as impressive as in the industrial sector.