May 24, 2006

VIOLET-RAY LAMP PROBES NOSE TO CURE HAY FEVER (Nov, 1931)

Yes, cure Hay Fever with a sun-burnt nostril. Sounds like it should work to me…

VIOLET-RAY LAMP PROBES NOSE TO CURE HAY FEVER
SUNBURNED backs, as all know, may now be had from a “health lamp”; but here we have a mercury-vapor lamp in a quartz rod, small enough to pass up the nose and sunburn its inside. Four out of five cases of “hay fever” are cured.

Proposes Orientable Roof-Top Airports For Cities (Jul, 1938)

It sure would screw up your property value if someone tried to build a billion ton sky-darkening airport over your house. Also I’m not quite sure why it needs to rotate…. bonus feature?

Proposes Orientable Roof-Top Airports For Cities
PROPOSED as a solution to the problem of locating an airport in the heart of any big city, a design for a long orientable runway, which would be mounted on circular tracks atop tall buildings, as sketched above, has been conceived by a French engineer.

Details on the NX2 — Our Atomic Plane (Jan, 1961)

Details on the NX2 — Our Atomic Plane

When will our “hottest” bomber take to the skies? How will it perform? What about the radiation danger? Here are the answers

By JAMES JOSEPH

OUR long-awaited atomic-powered airplane—Convair’s Model NX2—is finally on the drawing boards, its components in various stages of construction and testing.

After 14 years’ research and an investment of close to 1 billion dollars, the plane’s reactor is under test and two different engine systems, both slated for early flight testing, are in advanced development.

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May 19, 2006

$5,000 for Proving the Earth is a Globe (Oct, 1931)

This reminds me a lot of the intelligent design movement.

$5,000 for Proving the Earth is a Globe
by JAY EARLE MILLER

Post and Gatty didn’t fly around the world, according to Wilbur Glenn Voliva, they merely flew in a circle around the North Pole. This article presents Voliva’s theory of a flat world, and tells you how you can win his offer of $5,000 for proving that he is wrong.

WOULD you like to earn $5,000? If you can prove that the world is a sphere, floating in space, turning on its own axis, revolving around the sun, you can earn a prize of that amount. Such a prize has been posted for years, offered by Wilbur Glenn Voliva, general overseer of Zion, 111., home of the Christian Catholic Apostolic Church, founded some thirty years ago by the late John Alexander Dowie.

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May 13, 2006

Water Succeeds Gasoline As New Invention Is Perfected (Dec, 1935)

Water Succeeds Gasoline As New Invention Is Perfected

WATER powered automobiles are predicted for the not too distant future as the result of an invention of G. H. Garrett of Dallas, Texas, which substitutes water for gasoline.

Garrett uses an electrolytic carburetor which breaks up water by electrolysis into its component gases, hydrogen and oxygen, and then forces the explosive hydrogen into the combustion chambers for fuel.

For operating the automobile motor on which the tests have been conducted, Garrett has added an over-size generator to supply the extra electricity needed by the carburetor. Beyond that, the motor has needed no changes, though it has been in operation continuously for several days.

Garrett has protected his device with patents.

May 5, 2006

The “Dynamic Control” Ocean Liner (Nov, 1934)

The “Dynamic Control” Ocean Liner

By Hugo Gernsback

THE tendency at the present time in airplane building is toward constantly increasing size. It is probably realized by all who have concerned themselves with aircraft that the larger machines are not very far in the future. From the earliest Wright airplane, which weighed approximately 1/2 ton, to the present record holder, the DOX, which weighed fifty tons, took a period of some 26 years. The 10,000 ton airplane, projected on a like time-scale, would, therefore, make its appearance not later than the year 1952. However, with the nature of the present-day technique, it is quite possible, at this moment, that the 10,000 ton plane will be here much sooner.

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May 4, 2006

RACING DEER NEWEST SPORT (Apr, 1935)

RACING DEER NEWEST SPORT

FLEETFOOTED deer are being trained for the hurdles and obstacles of the steeplechase course in California’s newest racing sport. They have been taught to circle a race track and leap hurdles with greater ease and grace than the best horses.
Mr. and Mrs. Wilbur Timm, of Kelsey, Calif., started the new sport. More than a year ago they caught five young deer in Oregon. When the animals were three months old, the first step in training began. Each deer was taught to wear a collar with a leash.

The leash was attached to a wire fastened between two trees to permit the deer to run back and forth. Because of the danger of the animal injuring itself in its efforts to get free, the trainer was with it night and day.

When the deer became accustomed to the collar and leash, he was taught to lead. For two days the animal was led about without stopping. Worn out, the animal finally gave in and followed the trainer willingly.

The hurdles were next, the deer following the trainer over each hurdle. Because a deer will not run fast unless pursued, a horse and rider urged him to racing speed.

After many races the deer got the idea of racing and vied for the lead. The horse, however, always follows them.

April 30, 2006

Stretch Paper to Align Typing (Sep, 1934)

This is certainly an interesting approach to kerning.

Stretch Paper to Align Typing

A NEW invention permits typewritten material to be lined up just as evenly on both sides as is the copy on this page. Typing is done on corrugated horizontal strips the width of a typewritten line, which in turn are cemented to a solid backing sheet. The copy is lined up after removal from the typewriter by lifting the right hand ends of each strip and stretching them to the required uniform width.

April 20, 2006

Tests Graded By Weight (Oct, 1935)

This is pretty neat though it seems that you could just punch more than one hole for a question and get the answer right…

Scale Corrects Examination Papers
WHEN a Kentucky professor discovered that nearly 75 per cent of all students’
examination papers were incorrectly marked, he invented a robot examination corrector which automatically corrects 75,000 questions an hour without an error.
Prof. Noel B. Cuff of Eastern Kentucky State Teachers College is the inventor of the robot, called the testometer. The meter is used in true and false or in the multiple choice examinations in which the student is given a perforated card, the holes to be punched bearing the number of the question asked.
The perforated card is then placed on the testometer, and wherever the correct answer has been punched, a 1/4-ounce weight drops through the hole onto the scale. The total weight registered is the student’s mark.

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Ray of Death Kills at 6 Miles (Aug, 1935)

Ray of Death Kills at 6 Miles
LATEST of the death rays designed for I modern warfare comes from Bourges, France. Henri Claudel, well known French scientist, is the inventor.
Recent experiments with the delicate apparatus have proved it to be unusually deadly when directed at small forms of life. The inventor estimates that the machine, which he calls “Rays of Death,” will kill any living thing at a distance of 10 kilometers, or approximately 6-1/4 miles.
The rays are projected by means of a slender tube mounted on a tripod, permitting the operator to send them in any direction or at any angle. Details regarding the construction of the death ray machine are being kept a closely guarded secret, only the results of the experiment having been made public.

April 18, 2006

Lunar Explorers May Ride in Squirrel Cage (Aug, 1960)

Lunar Explorers May Ride in Squirrel Cage
SPACE explorers may roll around the moon’s surface in a squirrel cage-type vehicle much like this one.
Once a space craft lands on the moon, the collapsible Moon Sac would be inflated, then equipped to house and provide for explorations by a two-man team. The inflating gas would also serve as an atmosphere and allow natural breathing, speaking and eating.
The lightweight, bar-bell-shaped vehicle was designed by Scully-Anthony Corp., a division of Scully-Jones Co., Chicago, 111

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April 17, 2006

STENO for the BLIND (May, 1954)

STENO for the BLIND
The Stenomask, a silent microphone that can be attached to most office dictating machines, enables the blind to take dictation faster than the average person using shorthand. With it, the stenographer merely repeats the words of the speaker into the mouthpiece, which completely silences her own voice. The dictating machine in turn records her voice, playing it back later for transcription. Invented by Horace L. Webb, president of Talk, Inc.

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