Submarine Telegraphy and the Hunt for Gutta Percha

Helen Godfrey, Ph.D. (2011), University of New England, is an independent researcher who has published related material as journal articles. Experiences living in Australasia, Africa, Britain and the Caribbean have widened her research perspectives.

• List of IllustrationsAbbreviationsCurrency Values, Weights and MeasurementsGlossaryIntroduction Part 1: Submarine Telegraphy: The Forces of Science and Commerce1 The Significance of Gutta Percha and the Rise of Submarine TelegraphyGutta Percha and its SignificanceThe Development and Significance of Submarine Telegraphy2 Gutta Percha and the Challenge of Submarine Telegraphy Gutta Percha and Submarine Telegraphy – The Early Years Growth Years of Submarine Telegraphy and its Dependence upon Gutta Percha 3 The Rise and Challenges of the Gutta Percha Trade The Lands of Plenty: Southeast Asia and Regional Trade The European Hunt for Gutta Percha 4 Factory to Forest: Opportunity at the Periphery Singapore and the Development of the Gutta Percha Trade The Trade Comes to Sarawak via Singapore Part 2: Power, Profit and the Periphery5 The Gutta Percha Trade of Sarawak Sarawak, its People and the Brooke Administrations Significance and Growth of the Gutta Percha Trade in Sarawak 6 Operation of the Gutta Percha Trade in Sarawak The Trade Network Overland Trade Paths Trade Venues: Bazaars and Outports Credit and Barter 7 Impact of the Gutta Percha Trade – Opportunity Interaction with the External Market The Changing Nature of Sarawak Imports Prestige Goods or Pusaka 8 Impact of the Gutta Percha Trade – Change and Challenge Monetization Changing Social Relations and the Gutta Percha ‘Wars’ 9 Conclusions Appendix 1 Gutta Percha Appendix 2 Statistical Material ReferencesIndex

'[The book] is packed with informative graphs correlating the booms and busts in cable laying between 1850 and 1900 with trends in the trade in gutta percha and associated goods. Drawing on both anthropological literature and economists’ analyses of global commodity chains, [Godfrey] illuminates the very different meanings gutta percha acquired as it moved from the forests of Borneo to the cable factories of London before finally being laid to rest at the bottom of the sea.Godfrey devotes her opening chapters to sketching the history of the cable industry and the workings of the gutta percha markets in Singapore,but her real focus is on the forests and peoples of Sarawak. [...] That the global cable network of the Victorian era owed its existence in part toIban headhunters’ pursuit of Chinese jars, is just one of the surprising insights to be gleaned from Godfrey’s fascinating book.'Bruce J. Hunt (University of Texas), in: Technology and Culture, Volume 61, Number 4, October 2020, pp. 1247-1248.'In important ways, this book helps to further our understanding of Sarawak's economic development, building on seminal works by Daniel Chew and Ooi Keat Jin. But this thorough and perceptive study also encourages its readers to consider Sarawak's contribution to globalization through telegraphy and, therefore, to the contributions Sarawak and its people made to technological innovation and advancement. The care with Godfrey seeks to delineate both the material and the cultural of imagined factors involved in the gutta trade, and their intersection, provides a rare and welcome example of the cultural content and context of economic development being recognized. Intelligently illustrated, with informative diagrams and charts, Submarine Telegraphy and the Hunt for Gutta Percha makes a original and important contribution to our understanding of Sarawak history and, indeed, to Sarawak's contribution to World history.J.H. Walker (Honorary Visiting Fellow, School of Social Sciences, University of Western Australia), in: Borneo Research Bulletin, Volume 49, pp 313-316.