Great Falls daily tribune., 1920-01-09

Washington, D. G., jan 5.-A method
by which the captain OF q ship III mid
ocean can find his exact position, in lati-
tude and longitude, by the use of wire
less and without the aid of the stars
and the sextant which have guided marin
a member of the United States Naval
reserve, and is published to the world
this month by the United States navy.
This new method is interesting, and
the man who invented it is still more so.
Lieutenant Commander Abner B. Glenn
ents, q. s. n. r. F., is a banker, law
yer and financier, who has been known
chiefly as speculator in copper mines
and figure in so-called copper war"
who know Clements as man of busi-
ness are aware that he graduated from
the Naval Academy at Annapolis back
in 1875 and that he was an officer in
the navy for II years. He spent several
years at the Naval Observatory in
Washington studying astronomy and
navigation in business hours and law out
Of business hours. When he had finished
his legal education, he said goodbye to
the navy and entered business life.
There was nothing unusual about that.
great many young men OF ability were
leaving the navy about that time, be-
The civil war had created glut of Of
ficers. The situation in respect to pro-
motion was much the same as that which
Naval academy graduates of this and
the next few years will face.
The unusual feature Of the Clement s
case is that, although he left the navy
he did not neglect the sciences of mathe-
| ted him as a student. During the most
| strenuous phases Of a somewhat spec
tacular career in finance, he found his
| recreation in working out problems in
ballistics, navigation and astronomy. The
| formulae of calculus and trigonometry,
which the average college man forgets
within three years Of his graduation
thirty years after he had severed his
connection with the navy. That relief
from business worry which other men
found in dissipation and sport. he got
with far less waste Of energy and money
| by studying the stars and advising rifle
manufacturers how to make barrels that
would give the projectile a flat traJec-
| tory.
| When the war broke out, the govern
ment cashed in on Clements hobby. He
| found his place in an officers school al
Mare Island where he taught the tech.
nique of naval warfare to men. some OF
whom ought to have known more about
it than he did.
Now as to his invention, which is not
a machine but a method so simple Ia:
mathematical methods go) that it seem!
a wonder no one thought Of it before.
During the war, device was perfected
by the navy for detecting the, director
of radio waves from another ship. This
device, very briefly, consisted of an eiec
trical coil turning on a perpendicula
axis. If the radio waves strike the edg'
of this coil a current is started am
the operator can recognize the fact b,
the loud buzz which it giyes IS off; IT., If thdn tn
IS no current and no buzz BY turnin,
the coil until the point is found wher
the buzz is loudest, or at least, the di
rection from which the radio waves ar
coming can easily be determined. Ii
this way. ships often located enem
ships.
mediately suggested itself. A ship go
ing into a harbor in fog, would sem
out radio message to a shore station
The shore station would get the direc
ton of the ship by this direction finder