Amazing! If the President wants to talk to an admiral at Pearl Harbor the call can be connected in under 10 minutes!

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The WHITE HOUSE Talks to the WORLD

WHAT might properly be called the “number one” telephone in the nation is listed in the Washington phone book as National 1414. This is the official home of Franklin D. Roosevelt. Better served is he by telephone than any other person in the world. Better by far than any President we’ve ever had.

At any moment, day or night, Mr. Roosevelt can select any one of 150 phones and talk with friends, official emissaries of our government, in fact, anybody in almost any nation in the world. Sixty different countries are now linked by telephone service. These countries have an aggregate of over thirty million telephones, according to official estimates, of which some eighteen million are on the North American continent and over ten million in Europe.
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Filling in the Hudson to Rebuild New York

by ALFRED ALBELLI

PLUG up the Hudson river at both ends of Manhattan . . . divert that body of water into the Harlem river so that it might flow out into the East river and down to the Atlantic ocean . . . pump out the water from the area of the Hudson which has been dammed off … fill in that space . . . ultimately connecting the Island of Manhattan with the mainland of New Jersey . . . and you have the world’s eighth wonder—the reconstruction of Manhattan!

That is the essence of the plan proposed by Norman Sper, noted publicist and engineering scholar. It is calculated to solve New York City’s traffic and housing problems, which are threatening to devour the city’s civilization like a Frankenstein monster.
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Dig That Crazy Ribbon!

UP IN Greenwich, Conn., the night air was shattered by the 60-db roar of an African lion. Frantic phone calls to police headquarters brought a safari on the run, armed with ropes, nets and high-powered rifles. After carefully surrounding the wooded residential area where the beast had been reported, the police cautiously closed in.

But instead of a prowling predator, they bagged —of all things—a loudspeaker. It seems that there was a party in the neighborhood, and the host—a tape recording fan—had hidden a strong-muscled speaker in the bushes outside. As the party was slowing down, he played some tapes he had made at the zoo, “just to pep things up!” That’s what he told the judge—which goes to show that, while most uses for tape recorders in science and industry are pretty serious, tape has its zanier moments as well.
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Remember, EVERYONE should have a Geiger counter! No exceptions. If you don’t build one now, you’re going to feel mighty stupid when you’re trying to evade the radioactive hot spots in post-apocalyptic America.

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Geiger-Gun

Ultra-simple counter useful on camping trips or in CD survival kit

EVERYONE, prospector or not, should have a Geiger counter. Many wise householders are assembling survival kits of food, bandages, and water. By adding this handy, inexpensive radiation detector, you can provide your family with a means of detection of contaminated material in the event of atomic warfare. Simple as the counter may be, it will detect radiation as feeble as that given off by a watch dial—or it could make you rich by locating a uranium ore vein.
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I Battled An OCTOPUS For Treasure

No legendary treasure was ever guarded by a more terrifying dragon than the one which the author encountered when he searched below the sea for silver bullion.

by Lieut. Harry E. Rieseberg

WHEN George Harding, an ex-diver, asked me to join him on a treasure salvage expedition I jumped at the opportunity.

I had been laid up in John Sealy Hospital in Galveston, Texas, as a result of an accident, and upon my discharge I was eager to find any way to bolster my sadly depleted finances. Since I have long been a diver and treasure salvor, Harding’s offer was practically perfect.

The tale Harding told was one to whet the adventurous appetite of any man, much less one of my profession. He told me of a steel hulk, the liner Columbia of the one-time American Panama Mail Company, which was now lying in shallow waters off lower California with more than $100,000 in silver bars some place inside her.
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Flying Saucer Camera will be used by Air Force to clear up saucer questions. One lens takes regular picture; the other separates light into colors so scientists can judge the source and make-up of saucers.

Gallery of new toys for the 1946 Christmas season, the first one toy makers could gear up for after WWII. Check out the “reaction jet engine” on page 3 and the proto-legos on the last page.

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The Return of The Toys

This year’s mechanical marvels are sturdier, more realistic —and more expensive.
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Very interesting article about the industrial designer Egemont Arens, who designed some of the classic consumer goods of the last century (some, like the Kitchen Aid stand mixer, are still available), and his philosophy of design, which sounds remarkably modern.

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egmont arens -industrial “humaneer”

arens’ design’s got to look good, sound good, feel good, taste good, smell good, he asks, how easy is it on the nerves?

AFTER ten years of being one of the best industrial designers in the country, Egmont Arens has now become an expert “nerve specialist.” Arens has designed everything from a locomotive to a baby carriage, from a welding torch to a cigarette lighter, from a juke box to a toy horn, and what he has discovered is that the success of any designed object is determined basically by only one thing: how easy it is on the nerves.

Trapped in the nerve-jangling complications and tensions of present-day living, Arens believes that what modern man needs most are simplicity and relaxation in his surroundings. Instead of designing solely for “sales appeal”, or “esthetic presentation” therefore, Arens concentrates on designing an object to the “specifications” of the human system. He calls it “industrial humaneering.” Arens “humaneers” an object by giving it a color and contour which are relaxing to the eye, by giving it a texture and shape which are pleasing to the touch and inviting to the grasp, by muffling any noises which may jar on the ear, by eliminating any odors which may offend the nose, and lastly—if the object is, say, a reed musical instrument or a toothbrush—by making sure it is compounded of materials which figuratively, as well as literally, will leave the user with a pleasant taste in his mouth. After making it easy on the nerves, Arens completes his humaneering of the object by making it easy on the muscles. In designing, say, a household-cleaning appliance, he will use every trick in the book to insure that in lifting, carrying, cleaning, operating and storing the appliance, the user will be required to do just as little bending, stooping, squatting, reaching, and wrenching as possible.
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Promise of a golden future
Yellow uranium ore from the Colorado Plateau is helping to bring atomic wonders to you

Long ago, Indian braves made their war paint from the colorful sandstones of the Colorado Plateau.

THEY USED URANIUM-Their brilliant yellows came from carnotite, the important uranium-bearing mineral. Early in this century, this ore supplied radium for the famous scientists, Marie and Pierre Curie, and later vanadium for special alloys and steels.
Today, this Plateau—stretching over parts of Colorado, Utah, New Mexico, and Arizona —is our chief domestic source of uranium. Here, new communities thrive; jeeps and airplanes replace the burro; Geiger counters supplant the divining rod and miner’s hunch.
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Wow, that’s pretty cool. I wonder why don’t they do that in the mega-chruches. Can’t you just imagine Jerry Fallwell shooting lightning from his finger tips? He’d look like a pudgy version of the Emporer from Star Wars… Oh. Mabe that’s why they don’t.

Fingertip Sermon is given by George E. Speake at a Christian Endeavor convention. One million volts arch from his body through electrodes on his fingertips. Sparks really fly when he’s on the pulpit!

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AROUND THE WORLD BY KART!

“They said we were crazy to try — but we’ve already traveled 10,000 miles!”

By William Glen Davis

DRIVE a kart around the world?

Man, you’re nuts! You’ll never make it!”

This was the almost universal reaction that greeted my announced intention to circle the globe on a four-wheeled beetle smaller than many a baby carriage. Now, 10,000 miles later, I like to think the scoffers have been silenced.

My plan was first to drive from Los Angeles to Mexico City and back in order to test the feasibility of a ’round-the-world trip by kart. Then I would head for New York and from there take a boat to Europe. Once in Europe I would work out the details of my itinerary.
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One interesting side note about this passage:

“Another man who made a highly profitable find in the food field in recent years is Leo Peters, originator of the “Pak” margarine package, made out of plastic and containing a capsule for coloring. By merely kneading the “Pak,” a housewife can give a pound of margarine the appetizing hue of butter. It took Peters a long time to put the idea across, but once it was accepted by manufacturers he began collecting royalties estimated at $1,000,000 a year.”

Why, you might ask, couldn’t they just put the dye in the margarine? Well it turns out that the dairy lobby in this country had/has some serious pull. They saw margarine as competition to butter and had many laws passed that restricted the it’s appearance, primarily making it illegal to dye it to look like butter. The last state to repeal these laws was Wisconson in 1967. In Quebec, Canada it is STILL illegal to sell yellow margarine. More information on wikipedia.

Oh, and does anyone think that machine below looks at all “human-like”?

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GADGETS Can Make Your FORTUNE

By West Peterson

THIRTY-FIVE thousand inventions will be patented in the United States this year. If one of them is yours— possibly a simple gadget with universal appeal—you may reap a fortune!

Anything from a new household appliance to an improved method of food processing, from a unique use of plastics to another member of the wonder drug family can pay off huge dividends to the lucky— and skillful—discoverer. While it’s true that many inventions are now made by research teams in well-equipped laboratories, there’s still plenty of opportunity for the scientific or gadget-minded individual.
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