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It was compiled in 1879 by Walter P. Phillips, who explained that he was in large part putting down the collective experience of generations of telegraph operators. In the introduction to the 1907 edition of his book, "The Phillips Code: A Thoroughly Tested Method of Shorthand Arranged for Telegraphic Purposes. And Contemplating the Rapid Transmission of Press Reports; Also Intended to be Used as an Easily Acquired Method for General Newspaper and Court Reporting," Phillips wrote, "Research suggests that at one time, commercial telegraphs and railroads had numerical codes that contained at least 100 groupings. Few survived beyond the turn of the century. The compilation in this book represents the consensus of many whose duties brought them into close contact with this subject."[1]
His code defined hundreds of abbreviations and initialisms for commonly used words that news authors and copy desk staff would commonly use. There were subcodes for commodities and stocks called the Market Code, a Baseball Supplement, and single-letter codes for Option Months. The last official edition was published in 1925, but there was also a Market supplement last published in 1909 that was separate.
The code consists of a dictionary of common words or phrases and their associated abbreviations. Extremely common terms are represented by a single letter (C: See; Y: Year); those less frequently used gain successively longer abbreviations (Ab: About; Abb: Abbreviate; Abty: Ability; Acmpd: Accompanied).
Later, The Evans Basic English Code[2] expanded the 1,760 abbreviations in the Phillips Code to 3,848 abbreviations.
Examples of use
Using the Phillips Code, this ten-word telegraphic transmission:
ABBG LG WORDS CAN SAVE XB AMTS MON AVOG FAPIB
expands to this:
Abbreviating long words can save exorbitant amounts of money, avoiding filing a petition in bankruptcy.
In 1910, an article explaining the basic structure and purpose of the Phillips Code appeared in various US newspapers and magazines.[3] One example given is:
T tri o HKT ft mu o SW on Ms roof garden, nw in pg, etc.
which the article translates as:
The trial of Harry K. Thaw for the murder of Stanford White on Madison Square Roof Garden, now in progress, etc.
Notable codes
The terms POTUS and SCOTUS originated in telegraph code, and are included in the Phillips code.[4][5][6] SCOTUS appeared in the very first edition of 1879[7] and POTUS was in use by 1895,[4] and was officially included in the 1923 edition. These abbreviations entered common parlance when news gathering services, in particular, the Associated Press, adopted the terminology.
Telegraph operators would often interleave Phillips Code with numeric wire signals that had been developed during the American Civil War era, such as the 92 Code. These codes were used by railroad telegraphers to indicate logistics instructions and they proved to be useful when describing an article's priority or confirming its transmission and receipt. This meta-data would occasionally appear in print when typesetters included the codes in newspapers,[8][failed verification] especially the code for "No more—the end", abbreviated as "- 30 -" on a typewriter.
Excerpts of the codes
Example abbreviations of the Phillips Code
Code
Expansion
Hag
Haggle
Hz
Hazard
Igo
In consequence of
Kf
Confer
Kft
Conflict
Kpt
Compete
Oac
On account of
Ot
Owing to
Pcu
Preclude
Pkg
Packing
Pkj
Package
Pmnt
Prominent
Px
Price
Pxl
Political
Rept
Repeat
Rlav
Relative
Rpv
Representative
Sac
Senate Committee
Scf
Sacrifice
Sovy
Sovereignty
Spn
Suspicion
Thu
The house
Wam
Ways and means
_ _ _ _
Paragraph mark
Co
County
Dr
Doctor
Dx
Dash
Ea
Each
Ed
Editor
Eu
Europe
Fm
From
Gb
Great Britain
Gj
Grand Jury
Hc
Habeas corpus
Hf
Half
Hi
High
Kg
King
Ld
London
Lp
Liverpool
Lx
Pounds sterling
Mm
Mid-meridian (midnight)
Mo
Month
Mr
Mister
Oc
O'clock
Qm
Quartermaster
Ry
Railway
Sa
Senate
Ss
Steamship
Td
Treasury Department
Xm
Extreme
Za
Sea
Xg
Legislate
Xb
Exorbitant
ITC
In this connection
IQO
In consequence of
IAB
Introduced a bill
IAR
Introduced a resolution
HVNB
Have not been
Hur
House of Representatives
GX
Great excitement
GOH
Guest of honor
IWR
It was reported
IXJ
It is alleged
KAH
Knots an hour
CIC
Commander In Chief
UMPS
Umpires
Editions
1879: The Phillips Telegraphic Code for the Rapid Transmission by Telegraph, published by Gibson Brothers Printers[7]
1909 Market Supplement
1918 edition (implied by an article in the September 1923 edition of the Commercial Telegraphers' Journal, Volume 21[9])
April 1, 1923, edited by E. E. Bruckner and published by Telegraph & Telephone Age.[10]
^"IXX 5 POTUS WI: How News Comes in to 'The Sun' ". Indianapolis Sun. June 28, 1910. p. 2.
In the Sun's version of the article, the text tri is given as trio and Ms as Msq—evidently typographical errors.
^Safire, William (October 12, 1997). "On Language; POTUS and FLOTUS". The New York Times Magazine. Section 6, p. 28. Retrieved 2009-01-25. N.B.: Mistakenly claims POTUS first appeared in the later 1925 edition.{{cite news}}: CS1 maint: postscript (link)
