tingilinde

the developing car user experience

The operation of the Ford model T from the early 20s.  Within five years much of what we expect to be in a modern car had been developed.

what we've avoided to point ...

except at the beginning..

A dramatic look at the cold war.  A representatation of all of the nuclear detonations through 1998 in locatoin, size and country.  It starts slowly, but then takes on a disturbing pattern.

And this short video of the most powerful H bomb ever tested - about 3,500 times as powerful as the device that was used against Hiroshima.

mining the sky

How did ancient Egyptions fashion iron objects before anyone mastered the necessary smelting?  It turns out some (perhaps all) of it was through the use of meteorites.

The paper is here

Analysis of a prehistoric Egyptian iron bead with implications for the use and perception of meteorite iron in ancient Egypt

Johnson, D., Tyldesley, J., Lowe, T., Withers, P. J. and Grady, M. M. (2013), Analysis of a prehistoric Egyptian iron bead with implications 

for the use and perception of meteorite iron in ancient Egypt. Meteoritics & Planetary Science. doi: 10.1111/maps.12120

Author Information
1Department of Physical Sciences and Centre for Earth, Planetary, Space and Astronomical Research, The Open University, Milton Keynes, UK
2Faculty of Life Sciences, The University of Manchester, Manchester, UK
3The Manchester Museum, University of Manchester, Manchester, UK
4Henry Moseley X-Ray Imaging Facility, School of Materials, University of Manchester, Manchester, UK
5The Natural History Museum, London, UK
*Corresponding author. E-mail: diane.johnson@open.ac.uk

Abstract

Tube-shaped beads excavated from grave pits at the prehistoric Gerzeh cemetery, approximately 3300 BCE, represent the earliest known use of iron in Egypt. Using a combination of scanning electron microscopy and micro X-ray microcomputer tomography, we show that microstructural and chemical analysis of a Gerzeh iron bead is consistent with a cold-worked iron meteorite. Thin fragments of parallel bands of taenite within a meteoritic Widmanstätten pattern are present, with structural distortion caused by cold-working. The metal fragments retain their original chemistry of approximately 30% nickel. The bulk of the bead is highly oxidized, with only approximately 2.4% of the total bead volume remaining as metal. Our results show that the first known example of the use of iron in Egypt was produced from a meteorite, its celestial origin having implications for both the perception of meteorite iron by ancient Egyptians and the development of metallurgical knowledge in the Nile Valley.

(hat tip to Sukie)

3d printing c .1947

As imagined by AT&T's advertising department and collected on archive.org

the nth country experiment

When the US conducted an experiment to learn if three recent Ph.D physicists who were not trained in nuclear physics could design a working atomic bomb using their skills and publically available information...

It turns out three was enough.  The problem is obtaining the fissile material.

early memory device

A mediæval bookmark.  

attached to a string it could be slid up and down to mark the position on a page.  Most books of the time had multiple columns, so a rotating disk was used to mark that information.  (via wikipedia)

I'll venture a guess that artisan bookmarks using this theme would be desirable in some circles.

how to use a telephone

Shown around the US in theaters in 1927 (via archive.org)



It wasn't a "talkie" and didn't convey color information, which became important later as the user interface  evolved.

 

The movies continued as shorts before the main attractions. Here is a history as seen by AT&T from 1935 (also from the archive)

early naca/nasa photos

A nice repository of historic photos from the past of American aviation and space research.

properly in black and white

the first few decades of commercial aviation

A glamorous image was painted - and flying was extremely expensive and not terribly comfortable.  But there certainly was service.

 

dashcam c. 1956

A drive around Le Mans in a lovely Jaguar D type ..

Mike Hawthorn(Lemans winner 1955) driving a preview lap on the Lemans track in a Jaguar.(1956!) from MotorsportMediaNL on Vimeo.

Note the traffic