On July 30, 1872, he was issued for "Improvement in Telegraphing". This one-page patent makes a vague claim about using atmospheric electricity to eliminate the overhead wire used by the existing telegraph systems, but it contains no schematic diagram of how to build it, and no theory of how it might function. Loomis envisioned towers "on the tops of high mountains, and thus penetrate or establish electrical connection with the atmospheric stratum ... to form the electrical circuit." Loomis's patent is actually similar to , issued to William Henry Ward three months earlier. Ward, who apparently was acquainted with Loomis and his ideas, applied for his patent, "Improvement in Collecting Electricity for Telegraphing, &c.", on June 29, 1871, and it was granted on April 30, 1872. Ward's description envisioned intercontinental signalling, but does not include a detailed schematic diagram. Instead, it illustrates and describes towers that can be rotated into the wind in order "to drive an aerial current of electricity into the insulated middle portion of the tower, which current passes upwardly through the upper portion of the tower and out through the ventilator or the top... whereby the tower is receiving continually fresh and new supplies of electricity". The two patents in some places use almost identical language:  Despite the existence of the earlier Ward patent, most historical reviews still credit Loomis as being the first individual to receive a patent for wireless electronic communication. Loomis now held a patent, and the Loomis Aerial Telegraph Company had a federal charter, but there appears to have been liitle corporate activity beyond an organizational meeting. Ernest Newton Boog placed much of the blame on the inactivity on the Panic of 1873, which occurred in September of that year, and "ruined most of the very capitalists who had agreed to back him". However, in late 1877 it was reported that Loomis was now conducting successful experiments in West Virginia, and also had the financing needed to test a bold plan to connect the western United States with Switzerland. According to this report, carried in numerous papers: "Information has reached here recently that Professor Loomis, who has been in the mountainous regions of West Virginia for some months conducting a series of experiments with his proposed aerial telegraphy, has demonstrated finally that telegraphing without wires is practical." Furthermore, "Professor Loomis has a scheme now on foot for a series of experiments from a point on one of the highest peaks on the Alps, in Switzerland, to a similarly situated place in the Rocky Mountains, on this side of the world.