When the company started in 1887, it was known as The New York and Mississippi Valley Printing Telegraph Company. The name was derived from the company’s operating boundaries. In 1856, the company’s name was changed to Western Union Telegraph Company. The name became a household in the US that Western Union almost became synonymous with telegram as would Kodak be for still photos.
During the Civil War, Western Union was instrumental in transmitting communications from and was the first to complete transcontinental telegraph messaging. The company’s Morse operator in the 1860s was Thomas Edison who was an icon in the US. In 1866, Western Union was the first to introduce a stock ticker in the New York Stock Exchange and changed the way stocks are brokered until this day.
In was in 1871 when Western Union introduced the idea of wiring money. The company continued sending messages making communications between family and friends in far places an irreplaceable component of life in the US.
In 1914, Western Union introduced the first charge card. Then in 1923, the company’s teletypewriters allowed communication between parent and subsidiary companies in the US. This innovation was responsible for what is later known in modern communication as facsimile machine. True enough, Western Union became the first to offer public fax service, connecting New York City and Buffalo, New York.
In 1964, after the World War II, Western Union started using its transcontinental microwave radio beam system rendering poles and wires as obsolete transmission facilities. In 1974, the company launched its first communications satellite that would make domestic communications possible. The satellite was named Westar 1.
Western Union went through difficult financial situations in early 1990s that it was forced to declare bankruptcy in 1994. The company reorganized into a financial services business. Its primary product is the wiring of money which they started more than 100 years earlier.
In August 1994, Western Union was acquired by First Data Corporation for $660 million. Under First Data, agent locations were opened in almost every corner of major cities in the world, including supermarkets, pawnshops and banks. In 1986, more than 8 million money-transfer transactions were processed by Western Union.
At present, Western Union is serving more than 185 countries with its 175,000 agent locations scattered all around the world.