Postblogging Technology, August 1954, I: Alert and Eureka

R_.C_., 

The Lakehouse,

Twenty-five hundred years after the invention of the Chinese
abacus, this abacus-like device has turned up on the frontiers
of electronics. Its similar purpose: to help businessmen
with their arithmetic. The network of black magnetic
beads smaller than a postage stamp, is one of a number
of input-output "memory" units in the new "702" electronic
calculator built by International Business Machines. The
702 was designed for the world of commerce to help handle 
the vast quantities of sums involved in figuring business
payrolls, inventories, production schedules. 

Nakusp,

Canada

Dear Father:

And just like that, our business trip-slash-family vacation to Toronto in August is over, and we are back in blessedly cool Toronto. As far as I can tell the Super-Viscount will not be high-winged. On the one hand I'm not surprised since I think of high-wing airliners as a British affectation. On the other hand, the Lockheed C-130 is the closest plane to the Super-Viscount, and it is high winged. This is admittedly because the Air Force actually needs high wing cargo planes, but the C-130 could have been competition, and now it's not. The Super-Viscount is not going to enjoy the same kind of clear field that is giving the Viscount its enormous sales, but there doesn't seem to be any American competition in sight. It is, essentially, just the Britannia. 

James is unfortunately not with us, as he flew out of Toronto on Navy business bound for an undisclosed location that is certainly not Hong Kong, where he is certainly not going to be interpreting in a very urgent meeting about Koumintang pirates. 

I'm sorry that we weren't able to meet during our trip, but look forward to seeing you at Christmas. 

Your Loving Daughter,

Ronnie

The Electric City, VII: Normalising Telegraphy

 

So, and as will come as no surprise, I've had the experience of a short work week pulled out from under my feet at something like the last minute. It was perhaps not impossible for me to write Postblogging Technology, August 1954, I: I Know Eyewash When I See It, and I'm honestly not sure who besides me to blame for my taking a day off on the 11th and yesterday, but I'll settle for Larian Studios, for making Baldur's Gate III so seductive. That, of course, means that instead of something long, with a lot to chew over, you're getting a bit of a dive into semi-random thoughts I had this week. 

In this case, and as a development of "smokeless powder is just another textiles industry development, therefore the modern rifle, and modern war, comes out of industrial cotton," I am wondering about how normal early telegraphy was. (Is the rifle, or telegraphy, more important to the transformation of war before 1914?) So 

let's forget about all that "information  industry" stuff, and look at the telegraph as it came in, and try to understand why people might take the first steps to improve on semaphore and heliographs and pony expresses, and see where we are.

Gathering the Bones, XXXI: Raven And The First Men

 

This morning I am thinking about Raven the trickster, creator and king. but I also travelled on the weekend and visited my world-travelling doctor brother and his wife, who in conversation chanced to mention how much better the Pacific Northwest art held at the British Museum is than that shown here in its homeland.

"After the great flood had at long last receded, Raven had gorged himself on the delicacies left by the receding water, so for once, perhaps the first time in his life, he wasn't hungry. but his other appetites, his curiosity and the unquenchable itch to meddle and provoke things, to play tricks on the world and its creatures, these remained unsatisfied.

Raven gazed up and down the beach. It was pretty, but lifeless. There was no one about to upset, or play tricks upon. Raven sighed. He crossed his wings behind him and strutted up and down the sand, his shiny head cocked, his sharp eyes and ears alert for any unusual sight or sound. The mountains and sea, the sky now ablaze with the sun by day and the moon and stars he had placed there, it was all pretty, but lifeless. Finally Raven cried out to the empty sky with a loud exasperated cry.

And before the echoes of his cry faded from the shore, he heard a muffled squeak. He looked up and down the beach for its source and saw nothing. He strutted back and and forth, once, twice, three times and still saw nothing. Then he spied a flash of white in the sand.

There, half buried in the sand was a giant clamshell. As his shadow fell upon it, he heard another muffled squeak. Peering down into the opening between the halves of the shell, he saw it was full of tiny creatures, cowering in fear at his shadow.

Raven was delighted. Here was a break in the monotony of the day. But how was he to get the creatures to come out of their shell and play with him? Nothing would happen as long as they stayed inside the giant clamshell.

They were not going to come out as long as they were so afraid of him. So Raven leaned over his head, close to the shell, and with all the cunning and skill of that smooth trickster's tongue, that had so often gotten him in and out of so many misadventures during his troubled and troublesome existence, he coaxed and cajoled and coerced the little creatures to come out and play in his wonderful shiny new world."

"Raven and the First Men" is a Haida creation myth, here truncated. The second image is a rattle, used in shaman and healing dances. The specific meaning belongs to the owner who commissioned it, but the general theme is the transfer of power, which is another way to understand the creation myth. Deprived of its context by the decision to sell it to an outsider, it remains an eerie symbol of the relationship between Raven and one man, no doubt privileged.  I would be stretching nonexistent wings in a ludicrous play at exegesis to go any further (Raven would approve!), but we can reasonably ask how it was made around here.

Postblogging Technology, July 1954, II: Somewhere Between Unacceptable and Unattainable

Because Betty Boop cartoonist Ving Fuller is in a What's New segment. Deep cut, I know.

R_., C.,
Nakusp,
Canada

Dear Father:

Well, I left my current numbers of Aviation Week and The Engineer on the train when I dashed to catch a connection to Weybridge. So if this letter isn't to your liking, blame the clowns at Handley Page for not putting the tail of the Victor on firmly enough to balance flying without the "weapon system"-y radar that's supposed to go in the nose. (James thinks, anyway. He was right about the Comet, though!) This led to an all-hands-on-deck sales meeting over the Viscount replacement, from which I had to turn around for my flight to Montreal, upon which I am writing these words, far away from replacement copies, and there you go.

As for the meeting, the super-Viscount, or whatever they're going to call it, might be completely different from the Victor, but that isn't stopping the American industry, as you can see from the Newsweek coverage. to be fair, it is good news for them that the Victor won't be out setting high publicity speed records while there is a Vickers team still touring the States. I know I would have loved  some British Pathe footage of the Victor prototype landing in Montreal, not that it was even vaguely close to ready for a trans-Atlantic flight, but a girl can dream. 

Your Loving Daughter,

Ronnie