The Redwood gazette. [volume] (Redwood Falls, Minn.) 1873-1940, 1880-03-11
DiapEote and Telopucon.

Wonders win never cease. Invcn-
tions transmitting thoughts long dis
tances and writing them out by cleo
tricity. painting pictures by sunlight,
copying and reproducing the human
voice, talking to people miles away in
the tone of tete-a-tete conversation,
are followed by an invention which
brings the figures Of the persons hold
ing converse ut distance directly into
each others presence. In other terms
the telegraph, photograph, photograph
and telephone are followed by the dia:
photo, by DR.. Licks, of Bethlehem.
Pa. and the telephote-telican, or telop-
ticon whichever name may be adopt
ed), by Connolly and McTighe. of Pitts
burg. The latter inventions claim to
send the picture of the speaker along
with the voice by telephone. It is
stated that the Licks diaphote requires
. large number of wires, and rather
complicated machinery to make it work,
which may render it impracticable for
general use, while the Connolly and
McTighe telopticon requires but one
wire. and is in other respects recon-
mended by its simplicity. 1t is further
reported that these inventions have
been tested by experiments be-
fore scientific committees, and are
found to work. DR.. H. E. Licks
claims that his instrument will
send forms and colors by wire as words
are sent The apparatus consists of q
receiving mirror, the transmitting
wires. q common galvanic battery and
the reproducing speculum. After wit
Messing some late experiments with the
diaphote, one of the investigating pro-
fessors made q few remarks upon the
probable scientific and industrial appli-
cations of the invention. He said, in
substance, that with the telephone and
diaphote it might be possible for
friends separated by the Atlantic Ocean
to hear and see each other at the same
time, and to talk as it were face to
face. It might be used to enable rail-
road men to see hundreds of miles of
railroad track at once, and in connec-
ton with photo-lithography it might be
so employed as to print the great En-
glish dailies in New York few hours
after their appearance in London. DR..
Licks has applied for seven patents to
secure his invention, and he seems to
have no doubt about its practicability
and ultimate perfectibility.
The telopticon claims to be able to
transmit the physical wave force of
light electrically, similar to transmits
sion by telephone. 1t having been
demonstrated that electricity is q con-
dition of solar light, this invention, con-
verts electricity back again into the
condition of light. The inventors be-
lieve they will be able to transmit in
simultaneously, from one point to an
othe-, any written or printed document
even the entire side of a newspaper.
The reproduction of the image is ex-
planned to be the result of chemical
changes which are perfectly well known
to all photographers. The image of
any object is sent in diminished size,
and is magnified at the receiving point
to the required size. The inventors ad-
NIT that the telopticon is yet in its in
fancy, out they have no doubt whatever
of its ultimate perfection. In "a
Strange Story" Bulwer thought he was
writing fiction when he invested Mar
grave with the power of casting his i'm
age wherever he willed it to 20, by a
sort of occult magnetic projection.
These inventors of the diaphote and
telOpticon, if their claims are fully SUBJ
stantiated. proclaim the novelist's Wis
ions fulfilled prophecies and marvellous
facts.-St. Louis Republican.