The 1878 Patent for Long-Distance Kissing
A satirical inventor in Snohomish introduces a bizarre 'kisograph' machine to keep lovers connected across thousands of miles.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
Local housekeepers and clerks have been amusing themselves lately by referring to a state of invention they are pleased to call a 'kisograph.' They claim it is destined to revolutionize living. We furnish our readers with a description of it as near as possible. First, you procure two immense tin cans just large enough to conveniently get your head into, and then procure two large corks; cook the corks on the floor sound of the cans; then nail the corks to the wall, after which cut a hole through the wall and can as near the center as possible. You must be very careful that the can rests securely on the corks and does not touch the wall. After this has been done, take four strings and connect with the other instrument in the same manner. It is then ready for use. It is said a man can kiss his wife at a distance of over 4,000 miles through this machine, sending and receiving the smacks at an interval of three seconds. Should he attempt to kiss some other man’s wife, the machine turns on the alarms which rings all the fire alarms and blows all the steam whistles in the city, or place where the kiss is received.
“It is said a man can kiss his wife at a distance of over 4,000 miles through this machine, sending and receiving the smacks at an interval of three seconds.”
Long before Zoom or FaceTime, local humorists were already wrestling with the absurdity of 'tele-intimacy.' While our modern devices are more elegant than tin cans on strings, the 1878 anxiety about 'connecting' across vast distances remains a permanent feature of Washington's technological culture.
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