Milwaukee School of Engineering - EMF Yearbook (Milwaukee, WI)

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Ml. -'HIE 1020 ...1.M ) Ah, NORA i Your . t Ac Aor Afejl 0n r Hundred Thirty-five

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Ia U' April fifteenth brought the glad tidings and quitting school early I dashed down to Dewey’s store, the amateur’s “hang-out” in Milwaukee and got an abundance of flash-light batteries to supply the plate voltage of the audion. an important part of the receiving set. Then “home” where the apparatus lay waiting ready for use except for the batteries. These were soon soldered in and with the nervous excitement of a little boy on Christmas eve I slipped the “phones” (so typical of the radio set) on and turned on the bulb prepared to hear everything in the air. What an exciting moment that was can best be described by the results. My aerial comprised only a wire in the attic yet the stations heard ranged from (NAT) New Orleans to Boston while the boats on the Great Lakes roared into the room. Much of the news of the NC-4’s famous flight across the Atlantic was heard on various evenings while the R-34, British dirigible was “followed across” by listening to her messages being relayed by coast stations to Washington. Of course my chief interest in listening is among the amateurs, boys of my own age who are scattered by the thousands all over the United States. Hundreds of them have transmitting sets of remarkable efficiency. A range of 500 miles transmitting is the rule rather than the exception with only one- half k. v. a. input. As I sit at my table in my room with both detector and amplifier glowing warmly and an electro chemistry manual in my hand, I dream as I copy the signals of the far-distant station whose faint signals arc registering on my “phones.” Possibly a station is sending from Kentucky to an amateur in Kansas. Perhaps he is sending a message for a boy in school in New York to his mother in California. It can and is done every night. The stations “drone” and “sing” continuously. The majority of the people who have never heard wireless have the impression that it consists of short and long ticks just as in a line telegraph station. This is, of course, entirely wrong. Each station has its own peculiar tone, sounding very much like the notes of a flute. They arc very musical and when numbers of stations are transmitting at once the effect is indescribable. While we sit listening now to Guantanamo Bay. Cuba, then to Seattle, Washington and next to Key West, Florida or Mexico City. Mexico simply by turning two or three knobs, we suddenly hear a human voice speak clearly, “Hello, Paul?” Then the reply, “Hello, do we get some music tonight?” “Sure, the first will be, ‘Oh, What a Pal Was Mary ” Then just as clear as though the music were downstairs or in the next room, we hear it being transmitted by wireless telephone over the air from many miles away. For the next hour it is continued with various selections and one’s feet invariably tap the floor in time to the music which varies from grand opera to “jazz,” while in the left hand lies the electro chemistry manual “forgotten but not gone.” Thus one can see wherein the charm lies in owning a radio station. Page One Hundred Thirty-four

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Page One Hundred Thirty-six