It’s the end of an era
For some reason this really saddens me. I’ve been considering for a long time sending my mom a “telegram” via Western Union. Had I known this was going to end I would have gone ahead and done it. 
The end of telegrams has been coming for some time. Still, I’m sorry you missed out, Blalron.
The Train don’t come here, no more, Either…
Also I can’t use my horse and buggie anymore as I broke my horse and buggie whip and the horse and buggie whip business went south too
And thus the “If you want a message, call Western Union” line variously attributed to movie producers Louis B. Mayer, Harry Cohn, and Samuel Goldwyn joins the list of expressions which will have to be footnoted for the benefit of generations just born and those yet to come.
many federal postal systems in europe have done the same thing recently …
it seems to be a “domino effect” kind of thing
Being a geezer and having used telegrams many times years ago, it sort of saddens me too.
Some random thoughts: During WWII, notifications of the death of anybody in the service came by telegram. This gave people horrors when a Western Union messenger rode his bike up their sidewalks.
Most people had a fear of them anyway, as they were perceived to bring only bad news, although that certainly was not the case. Millions used them for quick messages as snail mail was really slow back then.
You got ten words for the basic price, and then paid for each additional word.
That resulted in the joke about a guy who went into the office, wrote out a message to his girlfriend, which read, “I love you. I love you. I love you.” The attendant told him he could have one more word for the same price, so he added, “Regards.”
the inland telegram service here ceased in 1982, by which time scarcely anyone used them anymore, except for congratulatory wedding telegrams
Why did telegrams say “STOP”, instead of having a period between sentences?
dont have the cite, but I read yesterday that the word STOP was free (or part of a 10-word payment. But punctuation marks cost more.
Looks weird, but then at least they never sent stuff like: “how R U W8 4 me”
My grandparents met when my grandfather came into the Western Union office where my grandmother was working to send a telegram. He used to send her telegrams at work while they were dating and he was travelling for work. This was in the late 20’s/early 30’s. I think my mom still had a couple of them that my grandmother saved.
Does anyone know what the last telegram was?
Help. Help. I’m being held hostage…
The original telegrams were transmitted in Morse code, which had no punctuation marks and no lower case.
I wonder if you’ll still be able to wire money. That saved our asses only a few years ago during a vacation in Europe when our credit card was canceled. We had applied for a new credit limit and it took effect at exactly the wrong time. We went to the Western Union office in Paris (which was located right in the shadow of Notre Dame), and had our bank wire us some bucks. Thanks, Western Union.
According to the article in the OP “Western Union has not failed. It long ago refocused its main business to make money transfers for consumers and businesses. Revenues are now $3 billion annually. It’s now called Western Union Financial Services, Inc. and is a subsidiary of First Data Corp.”
Does anyone else provide telegram services?
I could see a niche or novelty market here, with the telegrams carried over the net.
No lower case, true. But Morse has had punctuation marks since 1848. (The first WikiPedia chart does not include puncs, but others on the same page do. My guess is the “1922” chart was not intended to be comprehensive, just a graphic reproduction of a brief code list.)
RE: Use of STOP
Certainly there was a period code (...), which is also given as the STOP code, which is not surprising. Although I am familiar with International Morse as used in the 20th Century as a Ham, I have never been a telegraph operator. Still it seems questionable that a fee would be charged to transmit a period (...) but not to transmit a STOP code (..._), and if the letters S T O P were actually transmitted, that would make even less sense. So I still can’t understand why STOP was used in telegrams.
RE: Wiring money
Why would you need to wire money in this day of ATMs and credit cards worldwide?
How about personally-delivered singing or dancing telegrams? 
Susie runs away from home, calls for help from Memphis has no internet account and the guy she went with stold him cards and cash.