I was visiting the California State Railroad Museum in old Sacramento and saw the message sent via telegraph when the transcontinental railroad was finished “Done” or in Morse code on May 10th, 1869.
-.. — -. . means Done in Morse code
The link to this wav file will let you hear the code. You can also play it on the site linked to below.
I just had to create this blog post related to the Definition of Done. The story is interesting because on May 10th, 1869, the telegraph operator originally connected the golden spike to one end of the telegraph and the other end to the rail maul (hammer), so that when the executive hit the spike with the maul the sound would be heard across the telegraph everywhere. The problem is the two executives missed so he sent the message “Done” and everyone celebrated. I’m assuming Morse code was used at the time. I guess the rigging up of the maul and spike could be considered gold platting.
Try this website for the museum http://www.parks.ca.gov/?page_id=668. This site is the one I used for the Morse code http://morsecode.scphillips.com/translator.html
I recommend taking the guided tour of the museum if at all possible. The tour guide we had was pretty good and I learned much, that I don’t think I would have picked up on by just walking through the museum on our own. Like the original date was supposed to be May 8th but the one railroad was high jacked by the workers because they did not get paid.
This is how we should be celebrating the end of a Sprint or Delivery of Customer Useable Product.
The telling of the story as to why the celebration was late was also interesting as it was supposed to be on the 8th and not the 10th.
Another interesting thing is that the two competing companies met awhile prior to this date, but they kept on building in the hopes that the government would award them more government land for the extra miles of track. So as it turns out the two teams finished much earlier. There are lots of good stories from this trip that I hope to share over time.
Cheers,
Greg
