Alfred Vail

Alfred Vail (September 25, 1807 - January 18, 1859) was a machinist and inventor. He was a partner of Samuel F. B. Morse in the development of the telegraph. Following Morse' public demonstration of the marking telegraph on 2 September 1837, Vail partnered with him to perfect the instruments, especially the relay.

Vail is best known as the developer of Morse code. It is unlikely that he actually developed the code since Vail in his 1845 pamphlet The American Electro Magnetic Telegraph wrote that the alphabet of dots, lines and spaces was created on board the packet Sully, by Prof. Morse.

Vail's claim to the code was pushed following his death by his daughter Amanda Vail.