The invention of the telegraph was a cumulative effort by several inventors, but the person most credited with inventing the practical electric telegraph and popularizing its use is Samuel F.B. Morse. Morse, originally a painter, began working on his version of the electric telegraph in 1832. He developed Morse Code, a system of dots and dashes representing letters and numbers, in 1835. By 1838, he had presented his concept to the U.S. Congress and later received funding to build a telegraph line between Washington, D.C., and Baltimore, where he sent the first official message in 1844: "What hath God wrought?"

However, Morse was not the first to conceive or build an electric telegraph. Early ideas date back to the 1700s, and by 1798, a rough telegraph system was used in France. The first working telegraph was built by English inventor Francis Ronalds in 1816, using static electricity. Other inventors, such as Baron Schilling von Canstatt in 1832, and the British inventors Sir William Fothergill Cooke and Sir Charles Wheatstone, who patented a telegraph system in 1837, also contributed significantly to telegraphy development

. Morse's key innovation was creating a simpler, single-wire telegraph system combined with Morse Code, which made telegraphy more practical and commercially viable. His system eventually became the primary telegraph technology worldwide

. In summary, while many contributed to the invention and development of the telegraph, Samuel Morse is credited with inventing the first practical electric telegraph system and Morse Code, which brought telegraphy into widespread use.