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Mechanical Tricks make Fowl Actors Perform

TWELVE chickens, sitting austerely in a miniature jury box, nodded silently in agreement when asked whether the accused rooster was guilty.

An ostrich opened its mouth as though carrying on a conversation with a white trader.

A myna bird shouted, “Hello, how are you?” to a fisherman.

A rooster dashed into a scene, stopped and crowed. A crow with split tongue talked with apparent intelligence for the sound camera. Read the rest of this entry »

Plane Silhouettes on Playing Cards Help Identify Aircraft

Civilians can join in one of the soldier’s favorite pastimes—identifying combat aircraft—with playing cards that have silhouettes of Allied and enemy planes on their faces. The United States planes are spades, British are hearts, German are diamonds, and Japanese are clubs. In the corners are the “pip” signs. The airplane card idea was suggested by officers of the Third Air Corps, Tampa, Fla., who have been conducting classes in aircraft identification.

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Money Making Toys For Christmas

By JOSEPH H. KRAUS

How to Make Money from These Plans OF four items illustrated here, only the “Human Roulette Wheel” requires much work. Three are well fitted for profitable sales, the roulette wheel and the illusion box most so. The track circuit for toy trains is an ideal window display. Sell your services to local toy stores, offering to arrange for them an automatic display which is mysterious and attracts attention. The light twinkler makes an excellent display, but is best for home use. Read the rest of this entry »

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Tweeter Globe

By Steven Hahn

This novel addition to your hi-fi system will overcome the problem of high frequency distribution.

ONE problem in high fidelity reproduction is the distribution of high frequency sounds. In the low frequency range, this is a minor problem because of the comparatively large size of the speaker radiating element and the distribution patterns of the sound waves. However, as one increases the frequency, the waves begin to take on more and more the characteristics of light beams; that is, they are comparatively narrow and have a tendency to reflect from various surfaces. Read the rest of this entry »

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What’s Keeping Television Out of your Home?

Why hasn’t television achieved popularity as a means of home entertainment? Here’s an authoritative article on television’s present status that outlines the reasons for delay in public acceptance.

by J. EARLE MILLER

FOR four years the radio world, as represented by several million American homes, has been waiting for television. With a number of stations now transmitting radio television programs on schedule, together with a decided indication of real showmanship about to replace haywire experimentation, the average household is waiting in readiness to consider radio-vision as something more than a passing news item. But what equipment is necessary? What stations are broadcasting? Most of all, what is delaying the ultimate popularity of television? Such questions are becoming commonplace.
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Racing Electric Planes Is New Aviation Game

Aviation fans may play at a round-the-world race in a new game designed by Assen Jordanoff, veteran pilot and frequent contributor to Popular Science Monthly. Each of the players, which may number up to twenty, chooses a toy plane that moves across a large-scale map of the world. Read the rest of this entry »

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Easy Juggling Tricks

by Sam Brown

Tricks of the juggler aren’t always as difficult as they seem to be. With a few simple preparations, as described in this article, you’ll be able to stage a juggling exhibition which will leave your audience gasping at your skill.

ONCE upon a time there was a man. And he did a very clever trick with seven matchboxes. He held one box in his left hand. And on this box he balanced the six others. And people thought he was very clever. But he only laughed . . .

He laughed because the whole trick, like many another juggling trick, was so simple. Try it for yourself: After taking the first box in your left hand, you must secretly push out the drawer about one-half inch; and, since the back of your hand is towards the audience, this passes unnoticed. Read the rest of this entry »

Unique Film Trebles Width of Movies

MOVIES three times as wide as usual are made possible by a new lens invention. The principle of the lens designed to widen the photographing capacity of the average movie film three times is much the same as the distorting mirrors at the circus. Set into a copper frame which fits into the front of the camera are finely ground cylinders of glass, one concave, the other convex. Read the rest of this entry »

I like that one of the ingredients in the Buckaroo Beans is 1/2 teaspoon of MSG.

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Give an Old West Chuck-Wagon Party

“Go West” Invitations

Have your party in the wide-open spaces of your own back yard, with all the Western atmosphere you can muster. Even the invitations can have a “Go West” appeal for 7- to 11-year-olds if they’re made this way: Paste brown wrapping paper onto thin cardboard; from it cut out a wagon like that above. From plain cardboard, cut out a wheel; sew it to the wagon, using a button as a hub. At the opposite end of the wagon, punch a hole; run yarn or twine through the hole; then tie it in place. On the wagon, write the rhyme, place and time of party, etc.
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HANDY HANDSET

Sound-powered telephones make superlative yuletide toys

By HAROLD P. STRAND

SURE THEY WORK—and you don’t even need batteries! What are they? Just a pair of sound-powered telephones that are certain to turn a couple of kids into a pair of happy hooligans for many a fun-time session. And what’s the secret? There really isn’t any— other than the fact that a crystal earphone will work as either an earphone or a microphone, depending on whether you talk or listen. Read the rest of this entry »

And of course we all play Bilgo and Poogo to this very day.

Modern Mania for Mergers Now Menaces Minor Sports

RAILROADS, banks, and other big business organizations have no monopoly on the merger idea. Inventors, bereft of original ideas, are now turning their attention to combining separate ideas into one complete whole merging, as it were, the well-known ideas of the past.

Nowhere, perhaps, has this tendency been so pronounced as in the world of minor sports. Polo long ago merged with swimming in a game known as water polo, tennis and fly-swatting emerged as ping-pong, dominoes and rummy met in China and returned as mah jong, while labyrinth puzzles and golf united in the popular craze of putt-putt.
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“Ether Wave PIANO” Plays all MUSIC

MUSICAL sound waves are literally created from the ether with the new Martenot radio piano, which recently entertained radio audiences in a program given by the inventor, Maurice Martenot, in conjunction with a popular symphony orchestra. Claimed to be the most outstanding musical invention of the twentieth century because of its ability to reproduce the tones of any musical instrument or voice and to create entirely new tones, the device is operated by direct mechanical control of a series of oscillating radio tubes, which generate the sound waves of variable pitch and volume. Read the rest of this entry »