In a satellite data transmission test performed on October
25, 1962 by IBM, a message was transmitted from an IBM 1401
data processing system in Endicott, N.Y., to an identical computer
at the IBM World Trade Corporation laboratory at La Gaude, France.
The message was converted by an IBM 1009 Data Transmission Unit
from binary coded decimal form into a special transmission code.
From this special code serial bits were converted in audio signals
in an American Telephone and Telegraph Company digital subset.
Those audio signals were then transmitted to the AT&T earth
station in Andover, Maine. From there the message was carried
by microwave via the Telstar satellite to the earth station
in France, and by telephone line to the receiving terminal,
where a digital subset reconverted the message into a special
code for another IBM 1009, which checked for error and converted
to standard binary coded decimal characters for the receiving
computer.