February 18, 2008

Rubber Bands Drive This Baby Auto Three Miles (Feb, 1933)

Filed under: DIY, Toys and Games — @ 12:17 am
Source: Modern Mechanix ( More articles from this issue )
Issue: Feb, 1933
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Rubber Bands Drive This Baby Auto Three Miles

by DICK COLE

Here’s something distinctly new in the way of midget autos. Powered by a battery of rubber bands from old inner tubes, it will cover a distance of three miles at a surprising clip—and on one winding. Seated at the wheel you’ll be the envy of all the youngsters in town.

Be there the boy with soul so dead, Who to himself has never said: “Gee, I wish I had a baby auto.”

THIS article will make those wishes come true. Here is a nifty looking baby with clutch, two forward speeds and reverse, and Free Wheeling. The design is simple; the materials are cheap; which brings the building of this miniature car within the scope or the average mechanically minded boy’s pocket book.

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February 17, 2008

Odd Figures You Can Form with Your Hands (May, 1933)

Filed under: Toys and Games — @ 2:42 am
Source: Popular Science ( More articles from this issue )
Issue: May, 1933
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Odd Figures You Can Form with Your Hands

AMUSING figures, grotesquely resembling human beings, may be made with the fingers and a few simple accessories such as a tuft of cotton, eyes from a discarded doll, and a streak or two of paint. The six poses illustrated here were created by Otto Croy, German artist. With a little ingenuity, almost unlimited variations may easily be devised.

February 16, 2008

Electricity Runs New Player Pipe Organ for Home (Oct, 1931)

Filed under: Music — @ 12:06 am
Source: Popular Science ( More articles from this issue )
Issue: Oct, 1931
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“Compact” is not the first word that comes to mind when I look at this picture, but I guess compared to most other pipe organs…

Electricity Runs New Player Pipe Organ for Home

Designed on the principle of the player piano, a compact new pipe organ for home and school plays music automatically from a flexible roll. Because of its unique feature, the “reproducing organ” will bring into the home an entire symphony, which, if played by hand, would require the services of a whole group of artists. All of their movements may be recorded upon a single roll. The organ is expected to be of especial value in schools. Pupils of music appreciation classes are enabled to hear the compositions of masters played by famous musicians and recorded for the purpose. Electric mechanism works the instrument.

February 15, 2008

The Talking Newspaper (Aug, 1930)

Filed under: Movies — @ 12:33 am
Source: Popular Science ( More articles from this issue )
Issue: Aug, 1930
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The Talking Newspaper

By MICHEL MOK

This vivid account of how sound and action reels are made lays bare for you the secrets of a new industry. Big trucks or planes rush camera to scene of news.

SIX o’clock of a stormy spring evening. Fire breaks out in the Ohio State Penitentiary at Columbus. Five thousand men fight for their lives behind melting prison bars. Three hundred and seventeen are killed in their cells by flames and suffocation.

Three o’clock the next afternoon. Carefree crowds fill the moving picture houses along Broadway, New York City. There, 600 miles from the scene of the holocaust, only twenty-one hours after the first alarm, Pathe News pictures of the disaster are thrown on the screens.

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February 14, 2008

Bugle Call into Megaphone Gets ‘em Up in the Morning (Mar, 1941)

Filed under: Just Weird, Music — @ 12:02 am
Source: Popular Mechanics ( More articles from this issue )
Issue: Mar, 1941
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Bugle Call into Megaphone Gets ‘em Up in the Morning

Reveille sounds painfully loud these days to the boys in camp at Fort Jackson, S. C. When the bugler sounds “I can’t get ‘em up in the morning” he steps to a huge megaphone that blasts his notes throughout the camp. Mess call, he finds, does not require so much artificial amplification.

February 13, 2008

Midget Television Set for Home (Oct, 1932)

Filed under: Television — @ 2:01 am
Source: Modern Mechanix ( More articles from this issue )
Issue: Oct, 1932
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Midget Television Set for Home

MIDGET television receivers, corresponding to the midget receivers now in widespread use, are now available for home entertainment. As pictured at the right, the receiver is housed in a small cabinet and is operated with eight tubes, which deliver current to a crater neon tube. The scanning disc has sixty holes and is operated by a synchronous motor.

February 11, 2008

Television - a Season Pass to Baseball! (Apr, 1947)

Filed under: Advertisements, Television — @ 2:02 am
Source: Popular Science ( More articles from this issue )
Issue: Apr, 1947
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Remember, it would be inappropriate to watch television wearing anything less than your Sunday best.

Television - a Season Pass to Baseball!

Every home game —day or night — played by the New York Giants, Yankees and Brooklyn Dodgers will be seen over television this season!

Owning a television receiver in the New York area will be like having a season pass for all three ball clubs. And in other cities, preparations for the future telecasting of baseball are being made.

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February 8, 2008

Tiny Electric Car Runs 12 m.p.h. on Track (Feb, 1934)

Filed under: DIY, Toys and Games — @ 12:39 am
Source: Modern Mechanix ( More articles from this issue )
Issue: Feb, 1934
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Tiny Electric Car Runs 12 m.p.h. on Track

THIS tiny electric car constructed by Woodrow McCrate of Black, Texas, spins merrily around on its 65 foot concrete race track at speeds of up to twelve miles per hour. It has made a decided hit with the little tots of this Texas town.

Power from the regular house lighting circuit is used to run the car. An ordinary 1/4- h.p., 110 volt a.c. motor is mounted in the rear of the toy automobile, and connected to the rear axle through speed-reducing gears.

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February 7, 2008

Learn to Fly—Right on Ground (Apr, 1934)

Filed under: Aviation, Toys and Games — @ 12:03 am
Source: Modern Mechanix ( More articles from this issue )
Issue: Apr, 1934
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Learn to Fly—Right on Ground

A RECENTLY developed machine gives actual flying instruction to beginning aviators when a coin is placed in the slot.

A small plane is fixed within a glass cage, which is also a miniature wind tunnel. The plane is controlled by regulation joystick, rudder pedals and throttle handled by the embryo pilot seated just in front of the apparatus.

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February 6, 2008

Pigeon Fancier Equips His Birds for Sound (Jul, 1940)

Filed under: Music — @ 2:04 am
Source: Popular Science ( More articles from this issue )
Issue: Jul, 1940
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Pigeon Fancier Equips His Birds for Sound
Birds that play music while they fly are the pride and joy of George Spiegel, Elizabeth, N. J., pigeon fancier. Spiegel attaches special lightweight reed pipes, obtained from China, to the tail feathers of his pigeons. When they fly, a musical whistling flows from their feathers.

Mystery Cell Aids Television (Aug, 1930)

Filed under: Television — @ 2:03 am
Source: Popular Science ( More articles from this issue )
Issue: Aug, 1930
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Mystery Cell Aids Television

Remarkable demonstration in theater shows big improvement in seeing and hearing by radio. New process used to aid planes blinded by fog.

By ROBERT E. MARTIN

TWO remarkable developments recently revived public interest in television, and brought the dream of practical transmission and reception of “images on the air” a step nearer realization.

In a dramatic demonstration at Schenectady, N. Y., a few weeks ago, Dr. E. F. W. Alexanderson, consulting engineer of the General Electric Company, projected six-foot images bright enough to be seen by a large gathering. Before that, the best television image had been only a few inches square and had been produced by the feeble flickering of a neon tube.

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February 5, 2008

VIOLIN HOOKED TO RADIO SET (Aug, 1933)

Filed under: Music — @ 2:04 am
Source: Popular Science ( More articles from this issue )
Issue: Aug, 1933
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VIOLIN HOOKED TO RADIO SET

Stringed instruments without sounding boards, including violins, cellos, guitars, and ukuleles, have been devised by an eastern violin maker. Vibrations of the strings pass through the bridge to a magnetic pickup, resembling a microphone, that converts them into electric currents. These are amplified to operate a loudspeaker. At home the instruments may be plugged directly into the family radio. One of the new violins is illustrated above.

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