March 13, 2007

PHONOGRAPH RECORDS RADIO PROGRAM (Dec, 1930)

Filed under: Radio — @ 9:30 am
Source: Popular Science ( More articles from this issue )
Issue: Dec, 1930
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For some reason You Cylinder never caught on.

PHONOGRAPH RECORDS RADIO PROGRAM

You can make a phonographic record of your own voice or record your favorite radio program through an attachment on a new combination radio and phonograph. The attachment does not interfere with the ordinary use of the instrument for playing a record or program.

For record making, a microphone picks up voices and transmits them to a blank record through an electric “pick-up” similar to the reproducing arm of a standard electrified phonograph.

March 8, 2007

WIRE REPLACES WAX IN NEW DICTATING MACHINE (Feb, 1932)

WIRE REPLACES WAX IN NEW DICTATING MACHINE

Unusually clear reproduction is claimed for a new type of dictating machine invented in Germany. In this device the fluctuations of a speaker’s voice, conveyed electrically to electromagnets, leave a moving steel wire traveling through them more or less strongly magnetized according to the intensity of the voice at each instant. To play back the record, the wire is passed through a similar machine where the reverse process takes place and the voice is heard in a pair of headphones. The wire may then be run through a demagnetizer and used again. Wax records are dispensed with, since the wire takes their place. The wire is made of an alloy the nature of which the inventor is keeping secret, but upon which, he says, the success of his device depends. The machine is shown above.

March 7, 2007

HEADSET STAND FOR RADIO (Oct, 1923)

The guy who invented this would have been rich if it hadn’t been for those pesky speaker pushers.

HEADSET STAND FOR RADIO
An ornamental wooden headset stand, for use as a distribution center when a number of receivers are used simultaneously, and as a rack for holding the headphones when these are idle, has been introduced. This appliance eliminates any crowding near the equipment. The’ stand may be moved around a room at will, and when the concert is finished, it may be conveniently placed in a corner or closet, out of the way. The outfit has a switch to disconnect any receivers not in use.

March 2, 2007

Coast-to-Coast Mail in 15 Seconds (Oct, 1960)

Coast-to-Coast Mail in 15 Seconds

A TV-like facsimile system will transmit mail between Chicago and Washington this fall—with a nation-wide fax mail operation in the offing

By S. DAVID PURSGLOVE

REVOLUTION takes place this fall in the way Uncle Sam handles the mail. Letters mailed in Washington, D. C, will be delivered in Chicago, Ill., the same day —thanks to electronic transmission.

The Post Office Department will put into regular use in October a television-like facsimile system between these two cities and their suburbs. Within seconds after reaching one post office, a letter will arrive in another, hundreds of miles away.
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The Stay-Putnik (Mar, 1963)

After Telstar, what?

The Stay-Putnik

It’s our new Syncom, a satellite that promises a better bounce for world-wide TV and telephone

THE newest U.S. communications satellite—scheduled for launch this month or sooner, in an attempt to top Telstar— can’t be expected to streak across the sky at regular intervals. To the operators of a tracking station, it won’t even seem to be in orbit. Instead, the unnatural instrument package will hang around over the Atlantic, tracing a lazy north-south figure-8 every 24 hours.
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Household Tools to Speed Home Work (Feb, 1932)

I think that the telephone on the second page is one of the earliest I’ve seen that has a modern handset.

Household Tools to Speed Home Work

VERSATILE TONGS. Useful in the kitchen are these tongs which serve many purposes from grasping hot potatoes to lifting eggs out of boiling water. Also at one end there is a handy bottle opener

DRIES HAIR QUICKLY. This new hair drier can be used with an ordinary gas plate. When the curved housing of sheet metal is set upon the burner, it directs outward a stream of hot air which, striking the hair, quickly dries it

THEY SAVE YOUR HANDS. Especially designed to aid in washing clothes are the tongs shown below. Their grip will not harm fragile fabrics, it is said
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February 28, 2007

EAR TUBES FOR PHONE MAKE WORDS DISTINCT (Jul, 1933)

I’m not sure it would be possible to design a worse set of earphones…

EAR TUBES FOR PHONE MAKE WORDS DISTINCT
Persons hard of hearing, who have difficulty in carrying on a telephone conversation, are said to be aided by the new set illustrated above. When answering a call, the user places a receiver of conventional design (at right of photo) upon the base of an instrument resembling a physicians’s stethoscope. Tubes lead to a pair of earpieces that help to make every word audible. In speaking, the special transmitter, seen in background, is used.

February 23, 2007

Weird Radio Pictorial (Oct, 1924)

Filed under: Radio — @ 10:20 am
Source: Popular Mechanics ( More articles from this issue )
Issue: Oct, 1924
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The old issues of Popular Mechanics are organized rather badly. In this case there was a section called “Radio News” with two or three pages of articles and then this pictorial with no preface or explaination. The pictures are pretty great though so I hope you enjoy them.

Top, Girls in a High School Have Set Out to Prove That Building Radio Sets Is Not an Art for Boys Alone, and They Show Surprising Aptitude at the Job; Center, a Prisoner on Governor’s Island, New York, Building a Radio Set in the Shops Where Earnest Endeavor Is Made to Turn Wayward Energies into Useful Channels; Below, Even the Smallest and Most Remote Country School Can Now Have Its Own Drill Orchestra

A New Type of Loud Speaker Entertains New York Fans Gathered on the Street Below. The Inventor Is Paul De Kilduchevsky

A Candidate in the French Elections “Stumps” His District by Radio Auto
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February 22, 2007

Phonograph Carried as Vanity Case Plays Standard-Size Records (Oct, 1924)

Phonograph Carried as Vanity Case Plays Standard-Size Records

Carried like a vanity case and about the same size, a collapsible phonograph that plays standard records has been invented.
The motor is wound by a detachable crank and the horn opens and closes like a telescope so that it can be folded into small space. The entire instrument weighs but little and is said to reproduce tones as satisfactorily as many larger and more expensive machines.

INFORMATION: TO SEND AND USE IT (Jan, 1958)

This is a chapter about information from a really cool text book called The World of Science, published by Golden Books in 1954.
Also check out another chapter I posted called “COMPUTERS THE ELECTRONIC BRAINS”

INFORMATION: TO SEND AND USE IT

CUTTING A DISK

In the sound studio a singer is performing a popular number. The microphone suspended from overhead wires picks up the sound. If a whole group of musicians were being used, more microphones would be spaced about. In the control room at the back stands the sound engineer listening through earphones and turning dials on the crowded panels before him.

Soon, as a result of this recording session, tens or hundreds of thousands of people will be able to flick on a phonograph and, wherever they are, hear this same singer with her guitar performing this same popular tune, as often as the hearer chooses to repeat it.
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February 21, 2007

Bell Labs: A MODERN SYLLOGISM (Mar, 1945)

Translation: At Bell Labs even our marketing drones are total geeks.

A MODERN SYLLOGISM

MAJOR PREMISE:
Bell Telephone System serves the American Public.

MINOR PREMISE:
Bell Telephone Laboratories develop the facilities of the Bell System.

CONCLUSION:
Therefore, Bell Laboratories serve the American Public.
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February 20, 2007

SPORTS RADIO is Combination Cane and Seat (Mar, 1940)

Filed under: DIY,Radio — @ 11:41 am
Source: Popular Science ( More articles from this issue )
Issue: Mar, 1940
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SPORTS RADIO is Combination Cane and Seat

By FRANK TOBIN

CONSISTING of a compact yet powerful battery receiver mounted on a conventional cane-seat which can be purchased for a dollar or two, the radio illustrated forms a handy set for hikers, sports spectators, and campers. The circuit, designed around three of the new American-made midget tubes, consists of a pentode regenerative detector, resistance coupled to a pentode amplifier which in turn is resistance coupled to a second audio-amplifier stage. Regeneration is controlled by a 25,000-ohm potentiometer. Since the commercial type of antenna coil shown in the diagram has no tickler winding it will be necessary to provide one by winding approximately thirty-five turns of No. 38 double-silk-covered wire around the lower end of the long, flat grid coil.
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