RADIO WONDERS GROW.

Press, Volume LVIII, Issue 17472, 5 June 1922, Page 12

RADIO WONDERS GROW.

ENTHUSIASM IN U.S.A.

(ruoit OUR OWN CORRESPONDENT.) SAN FHANCISCO, May 5. Radio communication is arousing national interest throughout America, and endless possibilities are predicted by the army of enthusiasts who are now scattered all over the United States and Canada. From New York it has been announced that in the early future it will be possible for ordinary telephone subscribers to take up iheir 'phones and talk to a friend at sea, for it is regarded as but a question of time until a demand for such ship-to-shore telephony will maice the ottering of this new telepnone service practicable. In anticipation of this demand, the Bell system and the Radio Corporation of America are carrying out all necessary preliminary developments. The number of problems, both technical and commercial, which the service involves is great, and not all of them have been solved. A most encouraging start, however, lias been recorded. At a recent demonstration in New York City, a successful radio-wire connexion between the steamship America, 370 miles out' at sea, and a point 100 miles inland, was shown in operation. The clearness and loudness of tlie voices coming over the circuit were, at practically' all times, comparable with those supplied entirely by wire connexions. The offering of ship-to-ehore. service will involve the building of coastal radio telephone stations at _ suitable points for communication with ships at sea. It will also involve the extension of the present nation-wide telephone lines relaying messages from the wires to the ether, and vice versa. This composite system will enable a passenger on shipboard, even though several hundred miles from shore, to talk with anyone throughout the entire Bell telephone system of the United States, but it is pointed out that the | same certainty and "satisfactoriness" i of telephone service is not yet expected to be rendered over waters as now obtains by wires. There will always bo "static" interference, mutual interferences between messages and the variability of the earth's atmosphere to harass the radio operator. In spite of these difficulties, however, it is confiilently anticipated tUat practicable ship-to-shore ficrvice can be established if the commercial dem;uid be sufficient to warrant it.

Ploughing toy Radio. Farmers will plough their fields hy radio, if E. D. Glavin, a radio enthusiast p3rfect3 an ingenious invention lie has' been working on in New York. Olavin already lias siiccjedsd in operating an automobile by wireless. Now he wants to make it possible for the farmer to fiit comfortuiil;/ at home while operating his tractor in the field 1 "I've worked on tip project since 1911," said the inventor, "but, I .have not completed it yet. The idea is not to propel the machine by wireless, but to direct its course. When an electric auto stops, ita power is disconnected. ■ Close the switch, completing the circuit, and the car will continue on its way. In my model I control this switch by radio." .. ! Glavin's model is a- smali boat-like af- j fair with a spiral aerial.reaching vertically eight feet in the air. * "This is all right for demonstration purposes," j he said, "but it is not much good jirac- j tically. We cannot have chauffeurless , autos running around in crowded I streets, but we can have a wireless- j directed tractor operating on a flat; field." I

On a. table three feet by twedve feet, in a room adjoining the office of MajorGeneral Squier, Chief of the United States Signal Corps in Washington, stand the most unique long-distance radio receiving sets in America. Everything connected with the two seta is contained within the walls of the room. There are no outside antennso, with aerial towers and wiree to catch, the wireless waves from.the open ether. The windows slant, the keyholes plugged, every chink through which a fugitive wavelet might be expected to creep in tightly closed, and' yet the instruments in this room will pick up the messages broadcasted from Bordeaux, France, Nauen in Germany, or Carnarvon in North .vv ales, as clearly and distinctly a3 will the Arlington station with its three massive towers and its network of high-strung antennas.

Penetrating through brick and plaster and glass, the radio waves are picked up by small co.i or loop antennae, strung like yarn on a reel about three feet in diameter. Each dot and dafih, however, is clear and distinct and easily read by anyone familiar with the Morse alphabet. The development of the loop antennae, General Squier says, removes one of the serious problems following the rapid expansion of radio. In cities, the entire sky threatened to become overhung with a network of radio wires. This unsightly and complicated . web of wires may now be altogether dispensed with and each receiving set so built, that no part of it need extend outside the four walls of the room where the set is located. I

Novel Ontario Scheme. The following letter from T. K. Rodger at Sudbury, Ontario, Canada, to his father T. liodger, superintendent of Grand Trunk Telegraphs of Montreal, well illustrates the wonders of radio: "We are having an interesting time here with our new radio installation. 1 have a regenerative receiver with detector and three stages amplification. We are getting ail the radio concerts from Pittsburg, Schenectady, Newark, New Jersey, Chicago, loud < enough so that I can put the receiver j on the Bell telephone and send it over ' the town. "The articulation is perfect, almost weird, and the same as if the music were right in the room. Last night was the first and I only did some testing. Got a steamer 1000 miles east of! New York, on the Atlantic; could hear conversation all round the room, also hear Avalan, Santa Catalina Island in the Pacific, off Los Angeles, California. Very plain conversation, could hear away from 'phone receiver. Heard concerts in Denver, Colorado. "It is all certainly far beyond my expectations. We get the New York stock market quotations, and a grand opera piece from the Metropolitan Opera House, I think, "Carry Me Back to Old Virginy" was played on a harp from another station. One would really think the harp was in the room: beautiful is no name for it." Marconi's Views. America has more amateur wireless operators and owners than any other country, according to Uuglielmo Marconi, the wizard of wireless, who says that with so many youngsters growing up with wireless, they will devolop a desire to improve it and to widen its scope. This means that America may be expected to add widely in the next -v years to the world's knowledge and ase of wireless. "It is impossible," he said, "to predict how far wireless may be developed in the next few years. There is apparJntlv no limit. To-day we send messages 12,0C0 miles from London to Australia, and that is about the greatest distance you can get between, practicable points on this globe. "\\ ireless telephony between Europe ind America is technically possible right now. But it would require a very high |

, electric power which would make it very expensive. Experiments are being made looking toward the manufacture of telephone instruments which would not require such, high power. .That will cut the cost of operation. The practicability of wireless telephony is proved beyond question. Last summer, sitting m mv wireless room in my yacht Ln Italian waters, 1 talked with London and Spain. "When the radiophone is further developed, it will give international business men, hankers and diplomats the advantage of direct contact nnj direct speech. It would be far more satisfactory than cabled messages or than let- j ters. "You must never overlook tne important personal element that enters into actual conversation, as against cold cables or letters.

"The'most interesting everyday use of wireless telephony in the world is in Holland. The smallness of the country, the density of its population, the wealth and world-interests of its business men have made practicable and jirofitable the service we have set up there. Every day in Amsterdam a young man picks up the telephone and reads into it the latest Amsterdam stock quotations and the financial news of the world, as received there. About 150 persons in banks business houses, shipping offices and stock brokers agencies all over Holland have the wireless telephone receiver to their ears and get this message simultaneously. Everybody who takes this service gets an even break. Also every day in Amsterdam a young man reads into the radiophone an entire newspaper news service to 40 newspaper i offices all over Holland."