As the Covid-19 pandemic wears on, more and more of life has moved online — school, playdates, conferences, civic events, court proceedings, and even weddings. According to Wired, more than 450,000 couples were married between March and May 2020, at the height of coronavirus lockdowns. A whole industry has sprung up around Zoom weddings, with services like Wedfuly offering professionally produced events complete with virtual photographers, DJs, and the bandwidth to handle up to 1,000 guests.

随着Covid-19大流行病的蔓延，越来越多的生活已转移到网上-学校，活动日期，会议，公民活动，法院诉讼程序甚至婚礼。 根据《连线》杂志的报道，在2020年3月至2020年5月之间，正值冠状病毒封锁的高峰时期，有超过450,000对夫妇结婚。 Zoom婚礼席卷整个行业， Wedfuly等服务提供专业制作的活动，包括虚拟摄影师，DJ和可容纳多达1000位客人的带宽。

Most people assume that online weddings are a new thing. But they’re not. The first online wedding occurred almost 150 years ago, in 1876.

大多数人认为为o n第婚礼是一个新事物。 但事实并非如此。 第一次在线婚礼发生在将近150年前的1876年。

As Tom Standage describes in his book The Victorian Internet, the telegraph was the hot, new technology of the time. Every bit as revolutionary and world-changing as today’s internet, the telegraph allowed people to communicate via electronic networks across vast distances almost instantaneously. Messages that would previously take up to a year to send could suddenly be sent in minutes. Even the term “online” originated with the telegraph industry — the “line” part referred to a physical telegraph line.

正如汤姆·斯坦迪奇(Tom Standage)在他的《维多利亚时代的互联网》中所描述的那样，电报是当时最热门的新技术。 电报与当今的互联网一样具有革命性和世界变化性，它使人们几乎可以立即通过远距离的电子网络进行通信。 以前可能需要一年时间才能发送的邮件可能会在几分钟内突然发送出去。 甚至“在线”一词源于电报行业—“线路”部分指的是物理电报线路。

Faced with the possibility of calling off his wedding, Storey had an idea.

面对取消婚礼的可能性，斯托里有个主意。

As Standage writes, people used the telegraph for nearly everything — conducting business, sending news, transferring money, and committing crimes. It was only a matter of time before someone used the brilliant new technology to conduct a remote wedding. One of the first documented couples to do so were William Storey and Clara Choate, who were married over a telegraph line in 1876. This story of their marriage is recounted in Standage’s book, as well as in the 1891 edition of the telegraph journal Western Electrician.

正如Standage所写，人们几乎使用电报机进行一切事情，包括开展业务，发送新闻，汇款和犯罪。 某人使用出色的新技术进行远程婚礼只是时间问题。 最早记录在案的夫妇之一是威廉·斯托里(William Storey)和克拉拉·乔特(Clara Choate)，他们于1876年通过电报线结婚。斯坦达奇的书以及1891年的电报期刊《西方电工》( Western Electrician)都讲述了他们的婚姻故事。 。

At the time, Storey was serving as the telegraph operator at Camp Grant in Arizona. He applied for military leave to travel, by wagon, to San Diego to marry his fiancee, Clara Choate, who was living there with her family. His request was denied, and there was no minister to perform the ceremony at Camp Grant, or within 100 miles of the remote army base. Faced with the possibility of calling off his wedding, Storey had an idea. As a telegrapher, he knew that contracts executed over telegraph lines were binding. “Why,” he wondered, “can we not be married by telegraph?”

当时，Storey在亚利桑那州的格randint营地担任电报运营商。 他申请马车休假，乘货车旅行到圣地亚哥，与未婚妻克拉拉·乔阿特(Clara Choate)结婚，后者与家人住在一起。 他的要求被拒绝，也没有部长在格randint营地或偏远军队基地100英里内举行仪式。 面对取消婚礼的可能性，斯托里有个主意。 作为一名电报员，他知道通过电报线路执行的合同具有约束力。 他想知道：“为什么，我们不能通过电报结婚吗？”

It turns out that the couple could. Storey hatched a plot to bring Choate to him at Camp Grant, and then telegraph a minister in San Diego, who would perform the ceremony remotely. Storey invited Choate to travel to Camp Grant, and she made the 650-mile wagon journey to join him in person. The couple’s plan caught the attention of Lieutenant Philip Reade, who was in charge of government telegraph lines between San Diego and Camp Grant. He apparently loved the idea of a remote wedding, and issued an order to all the operators along the line:

事实证明，夫妻俩可以。 斯托里策划了一个阴谋，将格randint(Choate)带到格randint营(Camp Grant)，然后给圣地亚哥的一名电报员打电话，他将远程执行仪式。 斯托里邀请乔阿特前往格randint营，她进行了650英里的旅行旅程，亲自与他一起。 这对夫妇的计划引起了菲利普·里德中尉的注意，他负责圣地亚哥和格randint营地之间的政府电报线路。 他显然喜欢远程婚礼的想法，并向沿线的所有操作员发出了命令：

You are hereby informed that the wires of this division after 8 pm, April 24th will be used for the purpose of conducting a marriage ceremony by telegraph between San Diego and Camp Grant, and you and your friends are specially invited to be present on the occasion, to assist if necessary and to see that good order is maintained.

特此通知您，4月24日晚上8点之后，该部门的电线将用于在圣地亚哥和格randint营地之间进行电传婚礼，并特别邀请您和您的朋友出席该场合，以在必要时提供帮助并确保维持良好的秩序。

At 8:30 on the 24th, Storey and Choate stood together in front of the telegraph key at Camp Grant. Over 600 miles away, the Reverend Jonathan L Mann of Methodist Episcopal church stood with Choate’s father and other guests in San Diego. Choate’s father wired the message, “Greetings to our friends at Camp Grant. We are ready to proceed with the ceremony,” and the reply came back, “We are ready.”

在24日的8：30，Storey和Choate一起站在格randint营地的电报钥匙前。 在600英里之外，循道卫理公会教堂的牧师乔纳森·曼恩牧师在圣地亚哥与Choate的父亲和其他客人站在一起。 Choate的父亲传达了一条信息，“向格randint营地的朋友们致以问候。 我们已经准备好进行仪式了，”答复又回来了，“我们已经准备好了。”

Mann read the complete wedding ceremony, which was tapped out word-for-word by an expert operator in San Diego, and read aloud by another operator at Camp Grant. Telegraphers at the time could send up to 40 words per minute according to Standage, so the reverend needed to speak slowly, but otherwise the ceremony took place almost in real time. When it was time to say “I Do,” both Storey and Choate tapped on the telegraph key, and then signed their transmissions with their names.

曼恩(Mann)阅读了完整的婚礼，由圣地亚哥的一位专业操作员逐字逐句地朗诵，并由格randint营地的另一位操作员大声朗读。 根据Standage，当时的电报员每分钟最多可以发送40个单词，因此牧师需要讲得慢一些，否则仪式几乎是实时进行的。 是时候说“我愿意”了，斯托里和乔特都点击了电报键，然后用他们的名字签名了。

Over the wire, the reverend transmitted “As a token of your sincerity will you please join your right hands?” and the couple sent back “It is done.” Mann finished the service, and Storey and Choate were officially married. Congratulations flooded in from operators at stations all along the line, who had tuned in to assist and to witness the unique event. A band played in San Diego, and the operator at that station wired to Camp Grant that the band “is…giving you and your bride a serenade.”

通过电话线，牧师传达“作为您的诚意，您是否愿意加入您的右手？” 然后这对夫妇发回邮件说：“完成了。” 曼恩完成了服务，斯托里和乔阿特正式结婚。 沿线各站的操作员纷纷向他们表示祝贺，他们接听并协助并见证了这一独特的事件。 一支乐队在圣地亚哥举行演出，那个电台的接线员接到格randint营地的电话，认为该乐队“正在……给你和你的新娘一个小夜曲。”

Storey and Choate went on to reportedly lead a happy life and had five children together. Storey made a fortune in the 1886 real estate boom in California. For the rest of his life, Western Electrician reports, Storey would often go to send a telegram, meet the operator, and hear “Storey! Let me see, wasn’t you married by telegraph? Well, well, I was a guest at your wedding. I heard the whole ceremony at the telegraph office in ________, Arizona”.

据说Storey和Choate过着幸福的生活，并育有五个孩子。 在1886年的加利福尼亚房地产热潮中，斯托里发了大财。 西方电工报告说，在他的余生中，斯托里经常去发送电报，与接线员会面，并听到“斯托里！ 让我看看，您不是通过电报结婚了吗？ 好吧，好吧，我是你婚礼上的客人。 我在亚利桑那州________的电报局听到了整个仪式。”

Today’s Zoom weddings are a good deal more sophisticated than Storey and Choate’s online wedding 144 years ago. If the couple’s wedding was held today, they could have heard the band that played their serenade. And while Zoom can be laggy, it can certainly transmit more than 40 words per minute.

今天的Zoom婚礼比144年前Storey和Choate的在线婚礼要复杂得多。 如果这对夫妇的婚礼今天举行，他们可能已经听见了演奏小夜曲的乐队。 尽管Zoom可能比较落后，但它肯定可以每分钟传输40个以上的单词。

But the basic concept is the same as it was nearly a century and a half ago. Love endures even the craziest of circumstance. And it doesn’t wait. With a little ingenuity — and a big dose of the latest tech — couples will keep tying the knot, no matter the circumstances of the world they find themselves living in.

但是基本概念与近一个半世纪以前一样。 爱情甚至可以忍受最疯狂的情况。 而且它不会等待。 情侣们只要有一点点创意和大量的最新技术，无论他们生活在哪个世界的情况下，他们都将继续保持联系。