The telegraph originated the science-based electrical engineering industry

Evidence

Second, the telegraph was the first product—really the foundation—of the electrical goods industry and thus the first of the science- and engineering- based industries. … Much that is distinctive about the telegraph, from the organization of the industry to the rhetoric that rationalized it, derives from the particular nature of the engineering it brought into being. … More to the point, the telegraph was the first electrical engineering technology and therefore the first to focus on the central problem in modern engineering: the economy of a signal. — James W. Carey, Communication as Culture- Essays on…, 770

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to David Noble’s America by Design and debates about science-based vs. craft-based engineering traditions.
• corroborated: 2 independent passages support this claim — James W. Carey, Communication as Culture- Essays on…, 770