TRANSOCEANIC TELEPHONE SERVICE 269 



the obviously undesirable alternative is to give no service at all until 

 conditions have improved again. The present development effort is 

 largely directed toward improvements which will insure not only a 

 greater degree of reliability against interruptions but which also will 

 improve the grade of service as a whole. 



In the foregoing little has been said about the stations and plant 

 since a description of these and the operation of them are treated in two 

 companion papers by Messrs. Cowan and Oswald. It may be well, 

 however, to view the physical scene broadly as set forth on the accom- 

 panying map, Fig. 4. 



The geographical arrangement of the transmitting and receiving 

 stations was governed among other things by transmission considera- 

 tions. The two stations were placed about 50 miles apart because this 

 is approximately the distance for minimum signal and at a lesser or 

 greater distance the signals from the American transmitter might be 

 strong enough to offer some interference to receiving the English or 

 South American stations on adjacent channels. For the same reason 

 they were placed at considerable distances from the transmitters and 

 receivers of other communication agencies. The Netcong receiving 

 station lies to the north of the Lawrenceville transmitting station so as 

 not to be in paths of strong signals from the directive antennas which 

 face northeast toward England and southeast toward South America. 

 This configuration also places the transmitter outside the sensitive 

 angles of the directive receiving antennas. 



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