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Show DEAF, BUT COULD TELEGRAPH. (Telegraph Age.) A curious and no less interesting case of recovery from a condition of absolute abso-lute deafness of a telegraph operator is noted at Portland, Me. Five or six years ago the hearing of Peter A. Foley Fo-ley began to fail, when suddenly a vear ago in left him utterly. His sense of feeling, however, had not deserted him, and adapting himself to changed conditions, condi-tions, practice gradually enabled him to read the messaee by the ser.se of feeling alone. Although not able to use the typewriter, his "copper plate" penmanship pen-manship stood him in good stead. Unable Un-able to hear a word of conversation or a click from the telegraph sounder. Mr. Foley successfully worked one of the busiest lines in the Western Union office, of-fice, the New York wire, reading the messages absolutely and entirely by the sense of touch. His left forefinger was placed lightly on the sounder, and by this medium he became able to write down the messages as accurately and as rapidly as any operator in the office. of-fice. The call for the-Portland office is tne tetter r, live dots, and Mr. Foley could tell by looking at his sounder when he was being called. So proficient had he become that he could read slow sending by simply watching the sounder, although he seldom sel-dom did this, for he found that his sense of touch restored to him the profession which it seemed almost inevitable that he must abandon a year ago. Although the regular operator at the end o the 4 .....i.,yi.iii. -- . ' W. New York wire knew of the Portland man's misfortune and doubtless favored fa-vored him sometimes when sending strange or unusual words, Mr. Foley really required no more consideration than any operator, for he read the fastest transmitting without the slightest slight-est difficulty, and his record of mistakes mis-takes in a year was probably as small as that of any other operator in the Western Union office. |