tingilinde

when bell labs was magical

Greg points to a piece about the old Bell Labs that was recently aired on Studio 360.

When a monopoly allowed science and technology to flower in an industrial lab. There were warts, but it was an amazing place.

more on hedy lamarr and spread spectrum

We've talked about the story of Hedy Lamarr's contribution to technology (you pick up quite a bit of this when you are around David Hughes). Studio 360 has a piece on it:

pre-vannevar bush hypertext

Very neat! Early weblike work from 1934. A steampunk web

and a tip of the hat to Bjarne

a working difference engine

ah, the performing arts

thanks Nathan (not for the link, but for funding the project)!

how about a compiler Bjarne:-)

a different brief history of time

the first of three parts on quartz watches - thanks Greg!

2000 as seen from 1900

(thanks Tim)

Predictions of the Year 2000
from The Ladies Home Journal of December 1900

The Ladies Home Journal from December 1900, which contained a fascinating article by John Elfreth Watkins, Jr. “What May Happen in the Next Hundred Years”.

Mr. Watkins wrote: “These prophecies will seem strange, almost impossible. Yet, they have come from the most learned and conservative minds in America. To the wisest and most careful men in our greatest institutions of science and learning I have gone, asking each in his turn to forecast for me what, in his opinion, will have been wrought in his own field of investigation before the dawn of 2001 - a century from now. These opinions I have carefully transcribed.”

During the Year 2000, we included Mr. Watkins research in our feature articles. We invite you to comment on these predictions, whether they have been realized in some way or how they can never be accomplished! In any event, we know you’ll enjoy these entries.

Prediction #1: There will probably be from 350,000,000 to 500,000,000 people in America and its possessions by the lapse of another century. Nicaragua will ask for admission to our Union after the completion of the great canal. Mexico will be next. Europe, seeking more territory to the south of us, will cause many of the South and Central American republics to be voted into the Union by their own people.”

Prediction #2: The American will be taller by from one to two inches. His increase of stature will result from better health, due to vast reforms in medicine, sanitation, food and athletics. He will live fifty years instead of thirty-five as at present – for he will reside in the suburbs. The city house will practically be no more. Building in blocks will be illegal. The trip from suburban home to office will require a few minutes only. A penny will pay the fare.

Prediction #3: Gymnastics will begin in the nursery, where toys and games will be designed to strengthen the muscles. Exercise will be compulsory in the schools. Every school, college and community will have a complete gymnasium. All cities will have public gymnasiums. A man or woman unable to walk ten miles at a stretch will be regarded as a weakling.

Prediction #4: There Will Be No Street Cars in Our Large Cities. All hurry traffic will be below or high above ground when brought within city limits. In most cities it will be confined to broad subways or tunnels, well lighted and well ventilated, or to high trestles with “moving-sidewalk” stairways leading to the top. These underground or overhead streets will teem with capacious automobile passenger coaches and freight with cushioned wheels. Subways or trestles will be reserved for express trains. Cities, therefore, will be free from all noises.

Prediction #5: Trains will run two miles a minute, normally; express trains one hundred and fifty miles an hour. To go from New York to San Francisco will take a day and a night by fast express. There will be cigar-shaped electric locomotives hauling long trains of cars. Cars will, like houses, be artificially cooled. Along the railroads there will be no smoke, no cinders, because coal will neither be carried nor burned. There will be no stops for water. Passengers will travel through hot or dusty country regions with windows down.

Prediction #6: Automobiles will be cheaper than horses are today. Farmers will own automobile hay-wagons, automobile truck-wagons, plows, harrows and hay-rakes. A one-pound motor in one of these vehicles will do the work of a pair of horses or more. Children will ride in automobile sleighs in winter. Automobiles will have been substituted for every horse vehicle now known. There will be, as already exist today, automobile hearses, automobile police patrols, automobile ambulances, automobile street sweepers. The horse in harness will be as scarce, if, indeed, not even scarcer, then as the yoked ox is today.

Prediction #7: There will be air-ships, but they will not successfully compete with surface cars and water vessels for passenger or freight traffic. They will be maintained as deadly war-vessels by all military nations. Some will transport men and goods. Others will be used by scientists making observations at great heights above the earth.

Prediction #8: Aerial War-Ships and Forts on Wheels. Giant guns will shoot twenty-five miles or more, and will hurl anywhere within such a radius shells exploding and destroying whole cities. Such guns will be armed by aid of compasses when used on land or sea, and telescopes when directed from great heights. Fleets of air-ships, hiding themselves with dense, smoky mists, thrown off by themselves as they move, will float over cities, fortifications, camps or fleets. They will surprise foes below by hurling upon them deadly thunderbolts. These aerial war-ships will necessitate bomb-proof forts, protected by great steel plates over their tops as well as at their sides. Huge forts on wheels will dash across open spaces at the speed of express trains of to-day. They will make what are now known as cavalry charges. Great automobile plows will dig deep entrenchments as fast as soldiers can occupy them. Rifles will use silent cartridges. Submarine boats submerged for days will be capable of wiping a whole navy off the face of the deep. Balloons and flying machines will carry telescopes of one-hundred-mile vision with camera attachments, photographing an enemy within that radius. These photographs as distinct and large as if taken from across the street, will be lowered to the commanding officer in charge of troops below.

Prediction #9: Photographs will be telegraphed from any distance. If there be a battle in China a hundred years hence snapshots of its most striking events will be published in the newspapers an hour later. Even to-day photographs are being telegraphed over short distances. Photographs will reproduce all of Nature’s colors.

Prediction #10: Man will See Around the World. Persons and things of all kinds will be brought within focus of cameras connected electrically with screens at opposite ends of circuits, thousands of miles at a span. American audiences in their theatres will view upon huge curtains before them the coronations of kings in Europe or the progress of battles in the Orient. The instrument bringing these distant scenes to the very doors of people will be connected with a giant telephone apparatus transmitting each incidental sound in its appropriate place. Thus the guns of a distant battle will be heard to boom when seen to blaze, and thus the lips of a remote actor or singer will be heard to utter words or music when seen to move.

Prediction #11: No Mosquitoes nor Flies. Insect screens will be unnecessary. Mosquitoes, house-flies and roaches will have been practically exterminated. Boards of health will have destroyed all mosquito haunts and breeding-grounds, drained all stagnant pools, filled in all swamp-lands, and chemically treated all still-water streams. The extermination of the horse and its stable will reduce the house-fly.

Prediction #12: Peas as Large as Beets. Peas and beans will be as large as beets are to-day. Sugar cane will produce twice as much sugar as the sugar beet now does. Cane will once more be the chief source of our sugar supply. The milkweed will have been developed into a rubber plant. Cheap native rubber will be harvested by machinery all over this country. Plants will be made proof against disease microbes just as readily as man is to-day against smallpox. The soil will be kept enriched by plants which take their nutrition from the air and give fertility to the earth.

Prediction #13: Strawberries as Large as Apples will be eaten by our great-great-grandchildren for their Christmas dinners a hundred years hence. Raspberries and blackberries will be as large. One will suffice for the fruit course of each person. Strawberries and cranberries will be grown upon tall bushes. Cranberries, gooseberries and currants will be as large as oranges. One cantaloupe will supply an entire family. Melons, cherries, grapes, plums, apples, pears, peaches and all berries will be seedless. Figs will be cultivated over the entire United States.

Prediction #14: Black, Blue and Green Roses. Roses will be as large as cabbage heads. Violets will grow to the size of orchids. A pansy will be as large in diameter as a sunflower. A century ago the pansy measured but half an inch across its face. There will be black, blue and green roses. It will be possible to grow any flower in any color and to transfer the perfume of a scented flower to another which is odorless. Then may the pansy be given the perfume of the violet.

Prediction #15: No Foods will be Exposed. Storekeepers who expose food to air breathed out by patrons or to the atmosphere of the busy streets will be arrested with those who sell stale or adulterated produce. Liquid-air refrigerators will keep great quantities of food fresh for long intervals.

Prediction #16: There will be No C, X or Q in our every-day alphabet. They will be abandoned because unnecessary. Spelling by sound will have been adopted, first by the newspapers. English will be a language of condensed words expressing condensed ideas, and will be more extensively spoken than any other. Russian will rank second.

Prediction #17: How Children will be Taught. A university education will be free to every man and woman. Several great national universities will have been established. Children will study a simple English grammar adapted to simplified English, and not copied after the Latin. Time will be saved by grouping like studies. Poor students will be given free board, free clothing and free books if ambitious and actually unable to meet their school and college expenses. Medical inspectors regularly visiting the public schools will furnish poor children free eyeglasses, free dentistry and free medical attention of every kind. The very poor will, when necessary, get free rides to and from school and free lunches between sessions. In vacation time poor children will be taken on trips to various parts of the world. Etiquette and housekeeping will be important studies in the public schools.

Prediction #18: Telephones Around the World. Wireless telephone and telegraph circuits will span the world. A husband in the middle of the Atlantic will be able to converse with his wife sitting in her boudoir in Chicago. We will be able to telephone to China quite as readily as we now talk from New York to Brooklyn. By an automatic signal they will connect with any circuit in their locality without the intervention of a “hello girl”.

Prediction #19: Grand Opera will be telephoned to private homes, and will sound as harmonious as though enjoyed from a theatre box. Automatic instruments reproducing original airs exactly will bring the best music to the families of the untalented. Great musicians gathered in one enclosure in New York will, by manipulating electric keys, produce at the same time music from instruments arranged in theatres or halls in San Francisco or New Orleans, for instance. Thus will great bands and orchestras give long-distance concerts. In great cities there will be public opera-houses whose singers and musicians are paid from funds endowed by philanthropists and by the government. The piano will be capable of changing its tone from cheerful to sad. Many devises will add to the emotional effect of music.

Prediction #20: Coal will not be used for heating or cooking. It will be scarce, but not entirely exhausted. The earth’s hard coal will last until the year 2050 or 2100; its soft-coal mines until 2200 or 2300. Meanwhile both kinds of coal will have become more and more expensive. Man will have found electricity manufactured by waterpower to be much cheaper. Every river or creek with any suitable fall will be equipped with water-motors, turning dynamos, making electricity. Along the seacoast will be numerous reservoirs continually filled by waves and tides washing in. Out of these the water will be constantly falling over revolving wheels. All of our restless waters, fresh and salt, will thus be harnessed to do the work which Niagara is doing today: making electricity for heat, light and fuel.

Prediction #21: Hot and Cold Air from Spigots. Hot or cold air will be turned on from spigots to regulate the temperature of a house as we now turn on hot or cold water from spigots to regulate the temperature of the bath. Central plants will supply this cool air and heat to city houses in the same way as now our gas or electricity is furnished. Rising early to build the furnace fire will be a task of the olden times. Homes will have no chimneys, because no smoke will be created within their walls.

Prediction #22: Store Purchases by Tube. Pneumatic tubes, instead of store wagons, will deliver packages and bundles. These tubes will collect, deliver and transport mail over certain distances, perhaps for hundreds of miles. They will at first connect with the private houses of the wealthy; then with all homes. Great business establishments will extend them to stations, similar to our branch post-offices of today, whence fast automobile vehicles will distribute purchases from house to house.

Prediction #23: Ready-cooked meals will be bought from establishments similar to our bakeries of today. They will purchase materials in tremendous wholesale quantities and sell the cooked foods at a price much lower than the cost of individual cooking. Food will be served hot or cold to private houses in pneumatic tubes or automobile wagons. The meal being over, the dishes used will be packed and returned to the cooking establishments where they will be washed. Such wholesale cookery will be done in electric laboratories rather than in kitchens. These laboratories will be equipped with electric stoves, and all sorts of electric devices, such as coffee-grinders, egg-beaters, stirrers, shakers, parers, meat-choppers, meat-saws, potato-mashers, lemon-squeezers, dish-washers, dish-dryers and the like. All such utensils will be washed in chemicals fatal to disease microbes. Having one’s own cook and purchasing one’s own food will be an extravagance.

Prediction #24: Vegetables Grown by Electricity. Winter will be turned into summer and night into day by the farmer. In cold weather he will place heat-conducting electric wires under the soil of his garden and thus warm his growing plants. He will also grow large gardens under glass. At night his vegetables will be bathed in powerful electric light, serving, like sunlight, to hasten their growth. Electric currents applied to the soil will make valuable plants grow larger and faster, and will kill troublesome weeds. Rays of colored light will hasten the growth of many plants. Electricity applied to garden seeds will make them sprout and develop unusually early.

Prediction #25: Oranges will grow in Philadelphia. Fast-flying refrigerators on land and sea will bring delicious fruits from the tropics and southern temperate zone within a few days. The farmers of South America, South Africa, Australia and the South Sea Islands, whose seasons are directly opposite to ours, will thus supply us in winter with fresh summer foods, which cannot be grown here. Scientist will have discovered how to raise here many fruits now confined to much hotter or colder climates. Delicious oranges will be grown in the suburbs of Philadelphia. Cantaloupes and other summer fruits will be of such a hardy nature that they can be stored through the winter as potatoes are now.

Prediction #26: Strawberries as large as apples will be eaten by our great great grandchildren for their Christmas dinners a hundred years hence. Raspberries and blackberries will be as large. One will suffice for the fruit course of each person. Strawberries and cranberries will be grown upon tall bushes. Cranberries, gooseberries and currants will be as large as oranges. One cantaloupe will supply an entire family. Melons, cherries, grapes, plums, apples, pears, peaches and all berries will be seedless. Figs will be cultivated over the entire United States.

Prediction #27: Few drugs will be swallowed or taken into the stomach unless needed for the direct treatment of that organ itself. Drugs needed by the lungs, for instance, will be applied directly to those organs through the skin and flesh. They will be carried with the electric current applied without pain to the outside skin of the body. Microscopes will lay bare the vital organs, through the living flesh, of men and animals. The living body will to all medical purposes be transparent. Not only will it be possible for a physician to actually see a living, throbbing heart inside the chest, but he will be able to magnify and photograph any part of it. This work will be done with rays of invisible light.

Prediction #28: There will be no wild animals except in menageries. Rats and mice will have been exterminated. The horse will have become practically extinct. A few of high breed will be kept by the rich for racing, hunting and exercise. The automobile will have driven out the horse. Cattle and sheep will have no horns. They will be unable to run faster than the fattened hog of today. A century ago the wild hog could outrun a horse. Food animals will be bred to expend practically all of their life energy in producing meat, milk, wool and other by-products. Horns, bones, muscles and lungs will have been neglected.

Prediction #29: To England in Two Days. Fast electric ships, crossing the ocean at more than a mile a minute, will go from New York to Liverpool in two days. The bodies of these ships will be built above the waves. They will be supported upon runners, somewhat like those of the sleigh. These runners will be very buoyant. Upon their under sides will be apertures expelling jets of air. In this way a film of air will be kept between them and the water’s surface. This film, together with the small surface of the runners, will reduce friction against the waves to the smallest possible degree. Propellers turned by electricity will screw themselves through both the water beneath and the air above. Ships with cabins artificially cooled will be entirely fireproof. In storm they will dive below the water and there await fair weather.

getting around in the ussr sixty years ago..

... in the winter.

interesting soviet snow machines

In early 1960s in the US, surplus 85hp Continental airplane engines were available for almost nothing spurring many crazy designs involving skis and propellers.

philo farnsworth on tv

A 50 year old clip showing Philo Fransworth, one of the key inventors of television, on a show called "I've Got a Secret". Fransworth went through some amazing intellectual property battles with RCA under David Sarnoff. It isn't a black and white case, but he basically lost.

sort of sad ...

great nuclear predictions...

(thanks Thom)

The basic questions of design, material and shielding, in combining a nuclear reactor with a home boiler and cooling unit, no longer are problems... The system would heat and cool a home, provide unlimited household hot water, and melt the snow from sidewalks and driveways. All that could be done for six years on a single charge of fissionable material costing about $300.

–- Robert Ferry, executive of the U.S. Institute of Boiler and Radiator Manufacturers, 1955.

Nuclear-powered vacuum cleaners will probably be a reality in 10 years.

-– Alex Lewyt, president of vacuum cleaner company Lewyt Corp., in the New York Times in 1955.

I'm waiting for the nuclear leaf blower

more than 43 years ago

The first SR-71 flew on December 22, 1964. Amazing doesn't begin to describe the bird ... design speed was Mach 3.2 at over 80,000 feet, but there is considerable folklore that suggests Mach 3.4 was obtained. Titanium skin, special everything - and a bit of searching turns up parts of the flight manual. As a teenager I saw two fly - remarkable vertical performance under full reheat:-)

It has been argued that this was the last great airplane design where the slide rule was more important to the design process than the digital computer. The other magic was that it was built at the Skunk Works - run by Kelly Johnson who was a first rate aeronautical genius and something of a management genius...

lots of airplane p0rn follows

more on the radio hat

Some time ago we mentioned the radio hat that appeared in a 1949 ad. Here is an article describing it in some detail in the June 1949 issue of Radio Electronics.

Many choice tidbits.. the loop antenna rotates as the device was found to be "quiet directional":-) You also have the batteries in your pocket - a B and two As. The circuit is *very* basic as is the construction. I wouldn't want to wear it in the rain.

Using the historical CPI, the $8.65 price (including federal tax and postage -- I didn't know there was a federal tax on radios back then) is $69.99 in 2006 dollars .... hmmm

another vannevar bush paper

Instrumental Analysis, Vannevar Bush, Bull. Amer. Math. Soc. Volume 42, Number 10 (1936), 649-669. (pdf)

A lovely paper by the master taking on such things as differential analyzers - a semi-obscure method to solve differential equations by mechanical integration. They were replaced by electrical analog and then digital computers.

Here is one at Cambridge ... note the people in the second photo.

I came a reference to the technique while reading about the math that went into the famous bouncing bomb that was used by the English to deal with hydroelectric dams in the Ruhr Valley during WWII.

101 gadgets that changed the world

a neat list

It may be useful to write down a few dozen of your own before looking at it

infrastructure and property value

Infrastructure impacts property value - even for those who don't use it.

From the November 1907 (yes -- 100 years ago) Scientific American

Valuable Roads

Good roads in the Mississippi Valley pay better than almost anywhere else in the country, owing to the vivid contrast between them and the natural poor roads. The increase in valuation of property along the line of macadam roads in this section has been up to sixty per cent,and many new, thriving towns are today making strenuous efforts to attract settlers and investors through improving roads. It has proved an economical success to increase road taxation in order to secure higher real estate values.

It is too bad broadband and wireless service are not exactly leading edge in the US...

a helicopter in every garage

... and on every soldier.

ah past futures... (this one was from the Solar Gas Turbine company in 1957)

future travel

The future of travel as seen by Harry Dart around 1900. Past futures are great fun.

I do like the idea of one of the silliest forms of transportation you can image. The pedal blimp... A few have been made with the White Dwarf being the most famous example. A version with an electric motor and lithium batteries would be a lot of fun.

Alberto Santos-Dumont was an extremely colorful character in the early days of flight and the only mortal I can think of who used a private blimp to cruise around Paris. He was also something of a society type and is often credited for popularizing wrist watches among men. (he asked a friend - a guy named Cartier - to make a watch that would allow him to use both hands on his airplane and airship controls and still consult the time. Cartier fitted a pocket watch with a leather band and a small buckle and fastened it to Alberto's wrist).

historical futures..

Historical futures offer some insight into sociology ... probably more than anything else.

This is from 1967 looking towards 1999

(thanks for the link Jim)

on this day in 1945...

The Atlantic published As We May Think by Vannevar Bush... one of the more remarkable pieces to be penned in a popular magazine (or anywhere for that matter)

from the editor's forward

As Director of the Office of Scientific Research and Development, Dr. Vannevar Bush has coordinated the activities of some six thousand leading American scientists in the application of science to warfare. In this significant article he holds up an incentive for scientists when the fighting has ceased. He urges that men of science should then turn to the massive task of making more accessible our bewildering store of knowledge. For years inventions have extended man's physical powers rather than the powers of his mind. Trip hammers that multiply the fists, microscopes that sharpen the eye, and engines of destruction and detection are new results, but not the end results, of modern science. Now, says Dr. Bush, instruments are at hand which, if properly developed, will give man access to and command over the inherited knowledge of the ages. The perfection of these pacific instruments should be the first objective of our scientists as they emerge from their war work. Like Emerson's famous address of 1837 on "The American Scholar," this paper by Dr. Bush calls for a new relationship between thinking man and the sum of our knowledge

But I'm more in awe of J.C.R. Licklider who, among his many accomplishments, managed to divert ARPA funding to universities and start some important Ph.D. computer science programs. Some of his more interesting papers are

Man-Computer Symbiosis(1960)

The Computer as a Communications Device (with Robert Taylor and included in this tribute to him)

____

I'm sure someone is going to write and mention fundamental papers .. Darwin's Origin of the Species and Einstein's Annus Mirabilis papers for example ... but let's stick to technology projections.

front office user interfaces...

Coupling a pilot to the aircraft -- images of cockpits .

neat stuff - thanks for the link Milt

old steam

When I was a kid in Montana, one of the farmers in our county collected steam engines ... Big steam engines used for working farms before 1900. Big frightening steam engines that belched black smoke (most were coal fired). And they all had whistles.

Every Sept. the town was invited as enthusiasts from all over come to fire up the old beasts for the weekend.

That was a long time ago, but the collection still exists.

old suspension bridges

really old -- Incan.

snip:

Dr. Ochsendorf, a specialist in early architecture and engineering, said the colonial government tried many times to erect European arch bridges across the canyons, and each attempt ended in fiasco until iron and steel were applied to bridge building. The Peruvians, knowing nothing of the arch or iron metallurgy, instead relied on what they knew best, fibers from cotton, grasses and saplings, and llama and alpaca wool.

The Inca suspension bridges achieved clear spans of at least 150 feet, probably much greater. This was a longer span than any European masonry bridges at the time. The longest Roman bridge in Spain had a maximum span between supports of 95 feet. And none of these European bridges had to stretch across deep canyons.

(thanks for the link Roger)

if microsoft built cars ...

the user interface

(Popular Science, 1933)

lots of watches

Greg points out an interesting timepiece site.. Some are strange and most are remarkable in one way or another.

I built a wrist mounted transceiver (2 meters) as a teenager ... it could have had a watch pasted onto it (but didn't). Greg went much better and built a Dick Tracy wrist radio.

For years I've been hoping for the return of the walking stick (a nice platform for personal electronics when you think about it), but too many people see them as potential weapons

write a song for the dead

real innovation from a century long ago

a lucent pr piece

but it was dead before it was Lucent

(thanks Bjarne)

ten years for the new improved apple...

John pointed out that Apple announced it would acquire NeXT ten years ago today (some might argue NeXT acquired Apple). Apple got a good starting point for OS X and Steve Jobs came along with the deal.

Ellen Hancock isn't given enough credit for her tough decisions at Apple. She killed Copland - Apple's off the tracks next generation operating system and selected NeXT as the best choice.

Numerous accounts exist about this remarkable turn-around story - this one is similar to most.

the "good" old days

One of the first commercially available digital computers ... a main memory of 150,000 bits on a magnetic drum and a high speed memory of 10,000 bits.

The days when wrong answers were perhaps as likely to be hardware rather than software issues.

part two of bjarne's interview

Part 2 of Bjarne's interview (The Trouble with Programming) is up at Technology Review

recommended!

safety history

Reading about safety devices I came across a note that the use of seat belts in aircraft was pioneered by Adolphe Pegoud - the first person to fly an airplane inverted.

necessity is the mother of invention

donald duck and the dutch patent office

Carl Barks was a very clever guy. Under his pen Donald Duck stories were very creative, often with interesting gadgets - paint brushes that painted patterns to robotic helpers to raising ships with ping pong balls.

It turns out a ship was raised by this technique about fifteen years after the comic book was printed. The technique was patented, but the Dutch Patent Office claimed prior art (the comic) and turned down the application.

This became the stuff of legend. I remember the comic book - I've read most of the Donald Duck series (with great pleasure) and I remember descriptions of the real salvage in magazines like Popular Science. Here is the full (almost) story.

another fascinating computer

The Apollo guidance computer

many firsts

The goal of Apollo wasn't science, but its focus and drive ignited several important industries. I have a gut feeling that a major focus on other huge grand challenges - like global warming - would have a similar impact. Of course the trick for a successful grand challenge is to choose one that is possible in the time frame.

down the tubes

The description of the Internet as a series of tubes by Senator Stevens (stupid of alaska) made me think of the pneumatic tubes of a century ago (in most of the world - France kept them much longer)

An old note on the subject (author unknown)

Nearly 100 years ago, Postmaster General Charles Emory Smith looked into the 20th Century and made two predictions about the future of mail delivery in America. He was right about only one of them.

Smith's prediction that the new century would bring daily house-to-house mail delivery in every section of the country came true by 1910. But how he had expected it to be done was a bit more speculative:

"It would not be surprising to see . . . the extension of the pneumatic tube system to every house, thus insuring the immediate delivery of mail as soon as it arrives in the city," Smith wrote in The Brooklyn Eagle on Dec. 30, 1900.

Smith foresaw miles of underground tubes to be built crisscrossing U.S. cities to replace mail carriers. The system would use compressed air to send canisters filled with mail zooming beneath the streets to each home.

Others had seen such promise in pneumatic technology. In 1893, poet Ella Wheeler Wilcox predicted that within 100 years, "Airships will facilitate travel, and the pneumatic tube will be the means of transporting goods." Felix L. Oswald, a writer and naturalist, suggested the system would even traverse the oceans: "Transcontinental mails will be forwarded by means of pneumatic tubes."

There was even an attempt to adapt pneumatic tubes for the Manhattan subway system, and about 300 feet of tunnel was built in 1870 along Broadway as a demonstration. But it got no further.

The once-futuristic notion of mail whizzing underground now seems quaint. But what is most significant is not so much that Smith's prediction failed, but how widespread pneumatic tube use actually became before being eclipsed for good by cheaper forms of transportation.

Pneumatic tubes connected main post offices to a network of substations in New York and at least four other American cities, beginning in Philadelphia in 1893. By 1916, there were more than 112 miles in place, according to a brochure published by the company with contracts to operate the system in Boston (13.6 miles), Chicago (19.8 miles), New York (55 miles), St. Louis (3.9 miles) and Philadelphia (20 miles).

The $8 million system was launched after Smith, an itinerant newspaper editor, Republican stalwart and former ambassador to Russia, was appointed postmaster general by President William McKinley. The network featured canisters eight inches in diameter, each capable of carrying 500 letters per trip -- an estimated 200,000 letters an hour.

In Manhattan, mails silently flowed under city streets at upwards of 30 mph, moving down to Wall Street and up to 125th Street.

By 1898, the system connected 21 neighborhood post offices in Manhattan to the main branch there. Well into the 20th Century, 30 percent of the first class letters that passed through New York's main post office were distributed to branches by pneumatic tube.

"As the service is extended, business expands. Service is direct, efficient, economical and almost instantaneous," boasted the brochure. "Postal Pneumatic Tubes keep the mail moving. There is no chance for congestion . . . Pneumatic Tubes continue the speed of the 'Twentieth Century Limited' right through the distributing system."

But by 1918 there was a growing debate about the cost-versus-benefits of what had essentially developed as an inner-city, business district service. After World War I, Congress balked at the pricetag to continue the service.

"In the 1890s it seemed to many like a practical method to deliver the mails, but by 1920 it had grown into disfavor as Congress argued whether it could afford to buy, instead of continue leasing the system," said James H. Bruns, director of the Smithsonian Institution's National Postal Museum in Washington.

As one fundamental change in the mail delivery landscape, a committee appointed by the postmaster general in 1916 suggested the "advent of the automobile."

"It is clear that the automobile seemed a better alternative to move the mails, and once the cities adopted traffic control systems, the mails could get through," said Bruns.

The committee found "the $17,000 per mile per annum" for the pneumatic system was more than the total amount per mile paid for the mails on all the railroads entering New York City. The rental of tubes from the company that ran the service was labeled "exorbitant, unjustified and an extravagant waste of public funds" and was equal to one sixth of all the money being spent on the cost of vehicle service in all the cities of the country.

Chicago, Philadelphia and St. Louis lost the service first. New York briefly stopped it, but it was resumed in 1922 and remained in place until 1953, when the post office announced it had undertaken a review.

Its conclusion was that pneumatic mail delivery "may have outlived its usefulness."

Nowadays, the U.S. Postal Service, according to its historian, Meg Ausman, still gets inquiries from builders in Manhattan who come across remnants of the cast- iron pipe system. "We've kept the maps," she said.

In Paris, a more ambitious system of pneumatic dispatch called the carte pneumatique survived much longer.

The Paris system, in place for more than a century, evolved into a network spanning 269 miles, delivering millions of messages and mail annually. At first the system was designed to accommodate short messages, but later regular letters could be sent to post offices by canister -- and then often forwarded the rest of the way by a mailman riding a bicyle. The age of the computer and the fax arrived before the system was finally abandoned as unprofitable in 1983; but for a long time it was considered preferable to the telephone.

"You have to remember the phone system was once lousy; if you could get a phone, it was still a joke," recalled syndicated columnist Art Buchwald, who was the Paris-based correspondent for the old New York Herald-Tribune after World War II. "That's why the pneu was so popular ... it really worked."

the iceman goeth

a hundred Irishmen, with Yankee overseers, came from Cambridge every day to get out the ice. They divided it into cakesand these, being sledded to the shore, were rapidly hauled off.Thus it appears that the sweltering inhabitants of Charleston and New Orleans, of Madras and Bombay and Calcutta, drink at my well
    Henry David Thoreau Walden Pond 1847

In a discussion about old businesses that were displaced by technology, the subject of the 19^th century American ice trade was mentioned. Oddly enough I was once fascinated by this mostly forgotten business and recommend The Frozen Water Trade by Gavin Weightman as a starting point.

The hero is Frederick Tudor who spent a couple of decades perfecting the process and building the business - the trade with India caught everyone's attention and was a precursor to the crazy idea that you might take oil from the mideast and send it around the world (silly idea)

A great book for thinking about how opportunity is seen and then made obsolete. It is a bit more of a bio of Tudor than I would have cared for and ignores the trade that went on into the 1900s In North America the trade went on until the 20s ...

Some national brands emerged .. Pabst Beer was one of the first post-regional beers and was transported under railcars in ice filled containers. Refrigerated railcars and assembly line butchers build the Swift meat fortune... R&D into refrigeration started to grow in earnest with GE, Western Electric and many others betting on it. Western Electric (a branch of AT&T) dropped out, but GE made it a core business

What finally killed the trade was worries about pollution - compressor based refrigerators were still too expensive to be competitive in a direct comparison.

mumbling about plowshares

President Bush is calling for more nuclear power plants. There are many attractive things about nuclear power and I'm a fan if you can get past a few issues: fuel mining, proliferation, very high costs per watt, and fuel disposal. It may be that these issues are small in the scheme of global warming, but there are issues.

In the fifties nuclear power was going to solve all of our problems. Electricity too cheap to meter, canal digging (!), nuclear ships, trains, cars (Ford put together a model) and even airplanes.

The illustration is from Science and Mechanics in 1961... here is the article:

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.

What will take to the air sometime in 1964 aver sparsely populated western terrain and along 50-mile-wide “radiation corridors” promises some surprises for old-hand plane watchers.

America’s “hottest” bomber, big as a B-52, will have swept back wings and non-orthodox tail control surfaces. Although the NX2’s vital statistics are still shrouded in secrecy, the ship soon to be constructed at Convair’s plant in Fort Worth, Texas, will measure some 180 ft. from nose to tail and have a wingspan of about 150 ft. Its wings will carry no engines except for two conventional jet boosters planned for experimental flights only (Fig. 5). Thus the plane will have thinner and broader wings than the B-52 to balance its tail-heavy reactor and radiation shielding. Control surfaces on the vertical and horizontal stabilizers will be smaller than for jet planes of comparable size. This is because the plane’s center of gravity won’t shift as it does on jet planes as they consume fuel. One pound of fuel probably will carry the NX2 about 14,000 miles and keep it aloft for 24 hours or more.

Reactor Is Heart. A shielded, spherical reactor, heart of the NX2, will contain uranium 235 or plutonium 239, both easily fissionable materials, as fuel. The reactor—and there’s a possibility that there may be two of them—acts as the source of the heated air that provides thrust.

A single gram (or about 0.035 lbs.) of reactor fuel generates about 1 million watts during a day’s fissioning and boosts the reactor’s temperature well above 1,200 F.

Capt. Thomas L. Jackson, an Air Force nuclear technologist, has estimated that to power a nuclear bomber at near the speed of sound and to altitudes of 35,000 ft, a reactor must supply “in the neighborhood of 300 mgw.”

While this figures out to about 0.65 lbs. of atomic fuel a day, actually the “fast” reactor under development for NX2 is said to be far more efficient. A dwarf compared to ordinary power reactors, it nevertheless squeezes far greater power from a gram of reactor fuel.

Fast reactors differ from bigger, less volatile reactors in that they usually contain neither control rods nor moderators (see p. 93, Aug.’60S&M).

In the absence of control rods, fission is regulated by moving the fuel elements or reflector segments in the reactor’s core to increase or decrease the number of neutrons and thus the rate of fission. One nuclear technician suggests that NX2’s fast reactor may be controlled by a rotatable drum, coated on one side with boron, an element that captures neutrons. Controlled from the cabin, the drum’s boron side can be rotated to absorb neutrons and thus slow or stop the fission process.

Two Possible Power Systems. While NX2’s reactor is under test at the AEC National Reactor Test Station, Arco, Idaho, two jet engine systems are in advanced development. General Electric’s direct cycle power plant sucks air directly through the reactor’s radioactive core (Fig. 4). Piped to the jet engines, the superheated and compressed air expands violently. Blasting from exhaust ducts, it drives the ship forward.

Pratt & Whitney’s indirect cycle system taps reactor heat indirectly through a closed loop that circulates liquid metal from the reactor’s core to heat exchangers where compressed air is heated and turned into thrust.

Direct cycle advocates claim the system is the simplest, most reliable and easiest to maintain.

Other nuclear engineers are not so convinced.

“The direct system’s inherent limitations rule it out as a really high-performance supersonic power plant,” says one engineer. These limitations stem from the fact that air, being a poor conductor of heat, can seldom tap a reactor’s full potential. If it can, the reactor must be big enough to present a large heat transfer area to the airstream. Jet engine air also runs the risk of nuclear contamination through contact with reactor fuels. The indirect cycle system has several advantages. Liquid metal, the most efficient heat conductor known, can remove essentially all the heat from even the smallest, most compact reactor. Unlike a direct cycle system, the reactor and its fuel elements can be isolated against oxidation. Jetstream contamination is virtually impossible.

But there are some disadvantages. The indirect system involves a complex of piping and plumbing, including liquid-metal circulating pumps operated by engine air, that sap some of the turbojet’s thrust. Piping is prone to leaks, and a reactor left uncooled can explode. Remote plumbing requires shielding not necessary in the direct cycle system.

However, both systems pose one of the thorniest problems to confront designers of advanced aircraft reactors (the only type that can generate enough power to propel planes at supersonic speeds): where to find materials that can withstand the tremendous reactor temperatures in the 3,000 F° range.

A mixture of heat-resisting ceramics and reactor metals called cermets may help solve the problem, say some engineers. Among the refractory cermets now being developed for aircraft fast reactors are beryllium oxide, beryllium carbide and graphite compounds.

Shielding Problems. The joint AEC-Air Force Aircraft Nuclear Propulsion (ANP) program has both civilian and military research teams studying the problems involved in flying a “hot” plane.

These ANP researchers, deployed at a dozen strategic nuclear test centers coast to coast, are currently at work on these problems:

• How to devise relatively lightweight shields that effectively stop gamma rays, the deadliest of radiation rays. One solution lies in using alternate layers of neutron and gamma shielding. A layer of lead stops gamma rays and a liquid layer of borate solution blocks neutrons.

• How, in the face of radiation damage, to prevent NX2’s reactor from melting and adjacent aircraft parts from falling to pieces. Under “slow neutron” bombardment, many common metals completely change their form. Aluminum becomes silicon; copper turns to nickel and zinc. Shielding the components near the reactor with such radiation-thwarting metals as beryllium may offer one solution.

• How to lengthen the life span of other common aircraft materials. When irradiated, high-strength metals become brittle and weak, rubber loses its elasticity, lubricants become gaseous and gummy. Hundreds of radiation-stable materials are now being developed.

There also are problems in shielding the crew. Although they must work, sleep and eat together for a period up to five days, every cubic foot of cabin space means anywhere from 50 to 500 lbs. of shielding. Lop off a cubic foot and shielding and weight are reduced. Designers have no choice but to miniaturize.

“Of course, an atomic plane’s reactor could be completely shielded against the least radiation leak,” says Andrew Kalitinsky, head of Convair’s nuclear department.

“But to shield a reactor completely,” he continues, “you would end up with a much heavier shield, and a much heavier airplane, for the same engine power and thrust. The performance of such an airplane would obviously not be as good.”

So designers have compromised by using divided shielding (Fig. . Some shielding rings the cabin, and some is distributed throughout the ship to protect such components as electric conduits, lube lines and vulnerable instruments. The cabin will have complete protection.

It’s when the A-plane lands that the difference between this aerial giant and non-atomic planes will become most apparent. Seconds after landing, the big plane will wheel to a radiation vault. There, either by remote manipulators or shielded vehicles, its reactor will be lifted out and remotely disassembled. Radioactive components will then be immersed in a water-filled “reactor well” to both cool the reactor and block the escape of deadly gamma and beta rays.

Only then, with the reactor removed, will a shielded escape vehicle wheel to the A-plane’s cabin, mesh its tubular air-lock with the crew’s escape hatch and provide a shielded runway through which crewmen exit.

Radiation Risks. Although some radiation, and the experts refuse to speculate how much, may leak from the less-than-maximum shielding, people on the ground would experience a negligible exposure while the ship flies overhead at 400 to 600 mph.

Inside the plane, crewmen will wear radiation dosimeters. When a man’s dosimeter indicates a total 30-roentgen radiation dosage, he will be scratched from flying A-planes. Thus, unless every precaution is taken, a crew is no more trained than they are up to their radiation limit and must be pulled from the flight roster and grounded.

Nuclear engineers have computed several possibly critical crash situations and their probable radiation danger.

Two of these situations concern weather conditions. On a sunny, breezy day, fission products will quickly disperse with relatively little danger. But in bad weather, when dispersion is poor, more concentrated contamination would likely occur over a greater area.

Two other possible situations concern reactor crash damage. Meltdown could occur when the reactor’s core melts because of coolant system failure. This may not necessarily be serious as long as the reactor shielding remains intact. Runaway could happen if control failure permits the reactor to speed up until its fiery heat vaporizes the core. This could be serious because vaporizing releases more fission products than melting.

Weighing these variables — reactor damage and weather—the experts have arrived at an appraisal of crash danger:

No serious danger beyond 2,000 to 3,000 ft. of the crash.

Farther than one mile from crash site: no radiation high enough to cause even temporary sickness.

Yet under the most adverse conditions, such as a reactor runaway during bad weather, persons in a narrow belt as far as 35 miles downwind may receive “maximum permissible exposure,” a non-damaging dosage, but nonetheless an appreciable exposure.

Strategic Design. The NX2’s design speed of a subsonic 500 to 600 mph and its modest ceiling of about 40,000 ft. reveals, far more than does its odd configuration, its strategic mission as a CAMAL bomber (Continuous Airborne Alert Missile Launcher and Low-Level Penetration Airplane).

“Missiles have wrung the premium out of a plane’s speed and altitude,” says one designer.

Thus a new strategic concept: bombers with unlimited range and capable of penetrating radar defenses at extremely low levels.

CAMAL A-planes would maintain a continuous airborne alert. Ordered into action, they would drop to altitudes of 500 to 1,000 ft., but suffer none of the power loss common to low-flying jets.

Atomic-powered bombers will fit the CAMAL concept; they require no vulnerable midair fueling and could stay aloft almost indefinitely.

An atomic-powered plane has a nearly unlimited range. The limiting factor is the crew’s ability to remain aloft for days in cramped quarters (Fig. 7) without suffering mental or physical breakdown.

Reactor-jet engines, fueled by superheated air, not by combustible and oxygen-dependent chemical fuels, are nearly as efficient at low levels as at high.

An A-plane’s range isn’t limited by the size of the payload. Add 1 lb. of payload to a jet plane and you increase gross weight (mostly in added fuel) anywhere from 3 to 10 lbs. The same pound would increase an A-plane’s gross weight only 1.5 to 4 lbs. and this mostly in strengthening its airframe and landing gear, and increasing reactor size slightly.

___

Which brings us to Test Area North ...

an ad from 1953

An ad scanned from a 1953 magazine...

bell labs on studio 360

Greg and Lillian noted a piece on Bell Labs on the public radio show Studio 360. It starts about 20 minutes into the current show (you can find it as a podcast on iTMS or here)

semi-recommended. It is far too short to go into any detail about the remarkable place and its demise, but it is interesting nonetheless.

photovision

30 line tv

John Logie Baird was one of several early TV experimenters ... I recommend this talk. (realmedia format)

clouds of copper needles

Steve points out Project West Ford - a Cold War communications scheme before communications satellites became available (remember Echo?)

The idea was to orbit a huge number of tiny copper wires cut be the half wavelength of 8 GHz microwaves making a nifty probabilistic reflector for ground to ground communication.

I leave it as an exercise to the reader to determine what sort of an effort it would take to silence gps or communications satellites...

build an enigma

Rather than hunting down a real enigma or attempting to build an authentic replica, a fairly simple electronic replica is available that should be buildable by anyone who knows which end of a soldering iron to grab.

Of course there is a java variant, but hardware is better.

slipsticks in sciam

The May 2006 issue of Scientific American arrived today -- page 80 reveals an article on slide rules by Cliff Stoll (yes that Cliff Stoll)!

I maintain that you get a nice feeling of numbers and develop a talent for keeping track of orders of magnitude and approximations in your head. I still use one and there are others (waves to Dave K.)

Read the article and scrounge up a rule from eBay and learn to use it (the homemade design in the magazine will last about 3 minutes)

what fun!

apple 1 ad

Scanned from a book of old technology ads.

Things have come some distance. Remember that this is about a factor of 3.4 to account for inflation.

andy hertzfeld on mac history

A 20 minute interview with Andy Hertzfeld on early Mac days from the San Francisco Chronicle.

Several other interviews are available - I haven't had the time to check them out.

computer networks, c. 1972

history ... networking as funding by APRA in 1972. (mentioned everywhere)

television in 1936

Reading Science News this morning, I came across this piece from seventy years ago:

Field tests of television will begin in the New York area within 8 weeks, states the annual report to the stockholders of the Radio Corporation of America.

The field test, emphasizes David Sarnoff, president of RCA, does not mean that regular television service is at hand. Transmission from studios atop the Empire State building will be pioneering tests to estimate and define the possibilities of the system under actual working conditions rather than the refined and controlled laboratory conditions of the past.

Problems to be solved during the tests will include determination of how far transmission can be achieved, with what consistency and regularity can pictures by television be transmitted in the present stage of development of the art, and the possibilities of the television camera for indoor and outdoor pick-up.

a passing

after so many years ... (thanks Paul)

Effective January 27, 2006, Western Union will discontinue all Telegram and Commercial Messaging services. We regret any inconvenience this may cause you, and we thank you for your loyal patronage.

the mac is 22 today

One of the "best" ads of the 20^the century by many accounts and a fascinating piece to study^*

a bit of background.

Many of the professional fashion models and actresses had difficulty spinning in place and then accurately throwing the sledgehammer as called for in the script. In fact, one errant sledgehammer toss almost killed an old lady walking down a path in Hyde Park where the casting call was being held. As luck would have it, one model, Anya Major, was also an experienced discus thrower and was hired to play the female lead because she looked the part and didn't get dizzy when spinning around preparing to hurl the hammer.

The ad insert that went into Newsweek

And an updated version of the ad (done by Apple)

It is strange to see Pixar go to Disney on this day and John Sculley's new company make their debut yesterday ...

___

^*I find the audio in the 1984 ad amazing. I'm not an expert and won't dissect it, but the first few seconds build up an aural depression - perhaps a dread. It is multilayered and somewhat disorienting, which adds to the sensation. The young woman's theme - a D followed by another D an octave lower with a lovely decay that lasts to the next announcement must have been designed by someone with synesthesia - it is almost overpowering. The timing of the leader's speech and the visuals is impressive as is her release and cry ... amazing craft.

the first computer generated book

and it isn't from O'Reilly...

In the 19^th century a few books were woven on a Jacquard loom --- the first book was Livre de Prières Tissé d’après les Enluminures des Manuscrits du XIVe au XVIe Siècle printed in Lyon in 1886 with about 100,000 punch cards.

Some history on the subject of punch cards...

The reason for noting this is an email from Octavo noting an upcoming photographic reproduction of the first book.

Warning ... knowing about Octavo can be a dangerous thing, but is cheaper than the real thing.

small stirling engines

Years ago I made a small Stirling engine (technically a single cylinder beta configuration engine - there are three basic types) in an attempt to learn how to use a metal lathe and milling machine.

Stirling engines are wonderful to play with and exotic enough to be conversation pieces. Here are some small working models - ready made and pre-machined assembly kits. (I haven't played with this maker's engines, but they look promising)

2200 year old death ray prototyping

Wayzen notes feasibility testing of one of Archimedes' ideas by an MIT class.

early transistor radios and the ipod

Recently several sites have been talking about the Regency TR-1 and how it offered important design clues for the iPod. Apart from being really small compared with normal radios and about $250 to $300 (in current money) ....

It is interesting to look at the circuitry. Clearly before the transistor myth period when transistor count was the main advertising point of a radio (we see this sort of advertising even today - give someone without an understanding of a device nothing but a number ....). This design used TI transistors. Daily production transistor production rates were in the hundreds of devices a day ... not too many of these radios at first.

retro computing

There are some elements of retro design that I like, but retro digital computing isn't something that grabs me ... But some like it.

more hi-way hi-fi

Continuing on the car audio theme. 1956 and 16-2/3 rpm. By 1961 RCA introduced 45 rpm models that were compatible with common media. Some models held 150 minutes worth of 45s ...

A note for Dave K. -- this would give you the coolest mini on the planet. Think of that smug feeling driving by someone jogging with an iPod...

Years ago I had an amazing sound reproduction system in my car (a yellow 1976 VW Rabbit) ... Amy, a cellist friend, gave me a birthday present of her laying down in the back of the car (rear seat out) with her early 18^th century cello (made by Matteo Goffriller - a really nice instrument worth about 10x as much as the car). A friend of hers took the front seat with his viola and we drove around the Northern Fork of Long Island on a late Spring morning. The sound was - well - like being there. The looks from people at stoplights were worth the trouble - much better than a Mel Brooks movie. Sadly I only had a few hours with this system - we had to stop and feed it lunch (sandwiches and pie if memory serves).

the bright bush