# Uses of metal wire prior to the electric age? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [November 27, 2013, 3:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/uses-of-metal-wire-prior-to-the-electric-age/674886 "2013-11-27T03:24:38Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2013, 3:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/uses-of-metal-wire-prior-to-the-electric-age/674886/21 "2013-11-27T15:40:44Z")
This site claims that drawn wire prior to 1850 was brittle and not suitable for fencing: [http://www.ehow.com/facts\_5561006\_origin-wire-fencing.html](http://www.ehow.com/facts_5561006_origin-wire-fencing.html) ---
**Author:** ![Daylate](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/9dc877/32.png) [@Daylate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Daylate)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2013, 4:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/uses-of-metal-wire-prior-to-the-electric-age/674886/22 "2013-11-27T16:52:09Z")
The Brooklyn Bridge, opened in 1883, used over 14,000 miles of wire to spin it’s four main suspension cables. ---
**Author:** ![yabob](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/yabob/32/2821_2.png) [@yabob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yabob)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2013, 5:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/uses-of-metal-wire-prior-to-the-electric-age/674886/23 "2013-11-27T17:46:30Z")
> [@dtilque](#): > > I’m not sure when they first baled hay (as opposed to just loading it loose in the wagon), but I’d be surprised if it were earlier than the late 19th century and more likely some time in the 20th. So it’s not what the OP is looking for. Agreed, but I just wanted to clear up that baling with wire wasn’t a modern development. Before twine bales became prevalent, livestock owners had to be very careful that they didn’t leave a piece of baling wire in the hay when they fed it to their animals. … BTW, what about wire brushes, which are a useful tool for a number of tasks. Wiki claims that the Romans had them. ---
**Author:** ![njtt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ecd19e/32.png) [@njtt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/njtt)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2013, 9:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/uses-of-metal-wire-prior-to-the-electric-age/674886/24 "2013-11-27T21:23:29Z")
**SirRay** , I think you may be overestimating the relevance that wire would have had to the work of early electrical experimenters. Until the invention of the [Voltaic pile](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voltaic_pile) in 1800, all electrical research, including that with the Leyden Jar and Franklin’s famous kite experiment, was concerned with what we would now call static electricity. This could involve quite high voltages, but relatively little flow of current, and the phenomenon of electrical conduction was not even recognized until the work of [Stephen Gray](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Gray_%28scientist%29) in the early 18th century, but whose importance was not much recognized before the 1730s. Even then, the phenomena of interest were essentially “static electrical” ones. Gray was able to show how “electrical virtue”, the capacity of a charged object to attract fluff, or perhaps cause a spark or a mild shock, could be conducted through, for instance, a thread or a child’s body, to act at some distance from the originally statically charged object. I do not think he or his successors thought in terms of currents, still less of circuits, and AFAIK Gray did not rely on metal wires, or even particularly on metallic conductors of any sort, in his experiments. He used such things as hemp threads and human bodies as his conductors (which is fine when you are dealing with highish voltages but low current). Experiments with Leyden jars, I think, tended to rely on metal rods rather than wires to conduct the electricity, but we are still talking about static electric effects rather than currents or circuits. Even after current electricity became “a thing”, in the 19th century, after the invention of the Voltaic pile, one could, of course, rely on rigid metal rods rather than wires to construct circuits. Flexible wire is more of a convenience than a necessity for electrical experiments. (Which is not to say that wire was not available to, or used by, the early current-electricity researchers.) ---
**Author:** ![JBDivmstr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/b4bc9f/32.png) [@JBDivmstr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JBDivmstr)\ **Post date:** [November 30, 2013, 11:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/uses-of-metal-wire-prior-to-the-electric-age/674886/25 "2013-11-30T23:15:13Z")
> [@yabob](#): > > No, before. I remember baler twine from when I was a kid, too, but the older guys had plenty to say about the wire bales they used to have to deal with. > > [Baling wire - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baling_wire) > > A little before then, I think. None of the dairy farmers I lived around in the late 60s were still using wire bales. > > ETA: > > Don’t confuse this with modern day round bales. The smaller size bales that one picked up by hand used to be wire bound before twine balers came in. I stand corrected. :smack: Thanks, **yabob** for educating me. 🆒 ---
**Author:** ![bob\_2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bob_2/32/3341_2.png) [@bob\_2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bob_2)\ **Post date:** [November 30, 2013, 11:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/uses-of-metal-wire-prior-to-the-electric-age/674886/26 "2013-11-30T23:26:43Z")
All the farmers around where I lived in the 50s and 60s use twine. Wire was too expensive. ---
**Author:** ![Starving\_Artist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/aeb1de/32.png) [@Starving\_Artist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Starving_Artist)\ **Post date:** [December 1, 2013, 12:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/uses-of-metal-wire-prior-to-the-electric-age/674886/27 "2013-12-01T00:29:39Z")
> [@CalMeacham](#): > > Nope. > > Barbed wire is a much more recent invention than you’d think. It was invented in the second half of the 19th century. I doubt if anyone was using wire for fencing much before that. Lotsa sources, but Wikipedia is, as always, the most accessible: > > [Barbed wire - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barbed_wire) I stand corrected as well. Thanks for the info. ---
**Author:** ![aceplace57](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aceplace57/32/3500_2.png) [@aceplace57](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aceplace57)\ **Post date:** [December 2, 2013, 3:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/uses-of-metal-wire-prior-to-the-electric-age/674886/28 "2013-12-02T03:04:30Z")
Nails are made from wire. I think starting in the late 1800’s. Before that they were handmade by blacksmiths. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/uses-of-metal-wire-prior-to-the-electric-age/674886.md?page=1)