Grand Forks herald. [volume] (Grand Forks, N.D.) 1916-1955, 1921-12-19
AMPLFlERS TO
WORK WONDERS
in TELEPHONY
Long Distance Oratory May
Be Heard In All Parts of
U. S. simultaneously

Ia NAAA53 WIZ oCl IL IcCoJu 4Ol IoA46
distance oratory on Armistice day by
addressing simultaneously three great
throngs of more than 100000 persons,
gathered at Arlington National Gem
etery, San Francisco and New York,
may easily find himself talking to an
audience running high into the mil
lions n scattered through every
state in the union, before he leaves
the White House.
Indeed, says r. w. King, one of the
American Telephone Il Telegraph
Company engineers whose work on
the loud speaking device, made pos
sible the ushering in of a new epoch
in space humiliation at the cere-
4nonies owe the bier of Americas
Unknown Soldier, it is well within the
range of possibility that President
Harding may see, the day when a
President can sit at ease in the White
House and talk at nee to every city.
town and hamlet in the United
States hat is tapped by telephone;
| wires. ~ .
An audience of $4,000 perhaps! Or
They don't even blink at figures
like that-these telephone company
engineers. For ability to. look, I'M
abashed, into the faces. of a column
of ciphers, marching in threes across
great open. white spaces|+iS one Of
prerequisites gel to thttlking about
that marvellous contrivance, the cleo
trical amplifier, of which the loud
speaking device is only one in a long
list of practical applications.
A Great Deal OF, Multiplication.
For instance-thc electrical cur
rent that carried President Harding's
funeral Grafton to the crowds at Ar
lington, San Francisco and New York,
was multiplied 5000, 600, 000, 010, 001,-
100000, 900, 900 times before it rolled
out, converted into great sonorous
sound waves, over the heads of three
audiences.
It took 5000, 900, 600, 900, 900 ampli-
fcations to conve tho GRAFTON and
the other ceremonies to San Francisco
so that they could have been heard
through an ordinary telephone re-
ceiver. Then they had to be ampli-
fled a million-million times by the
loud speaking device.
A mere ten million bilIens-10,-
000, 000, 600, 600, O0O-of amplifications
were necessary to bring the ceremon-
les out clear and strong in New York.
Ten thousand were used to bring the
ceremonies here, and a million million
to raise them to audibility Tor the
New York audience.
The other m!llion-million amplif-
cations were used to carry the Presi-
dents voice to the Arlington crowd.
By providing a few more scores of
thousands of miles of wire,5 some
thousands of loud speaking devices
n a few foolScap sheets filled with
tiny ciphers indicating more ampli-
f%ications, the entire country might
hear future public ceremonies, Mr..
King said.
Innovation Relatively Simple.
1t would be relatively simple, he
declared, to set up equipment in the
which 10000 persons in each city-a
total of 1900, 000-could hear a cere-
mony in Washington or elsewhere as
distinctly as if thew were seated with
in a few yards of the speaker.
Canned" music, too, faces a po-
tential rival in the loud speaker. 1t
would be as simple to connect the
stage Of the Metropolitan Opera
House up with the nation at large as
to connect a President, once the
equipment was set UP.
Telephone engineers say the Arm
istce Day experiment proved that
music could be reproduced over the
wire circuits at least as. purely as 1t
is reproduced On the best phono-
graph records and that it will be a
matter OF. but a few years when the
last vestige of metallic ring will be
eliminated.
Mr.. King believes it will be but q
short time too, until all the principal
public halls and large university u-
ditoriums are equipped at least with
| local lnIld Snnn knrS rFhaca he mint
ed out, could easily be switched in
4 on long distance circuits / carrying
: public addresses and similar events
from other cities.
While the loud speaking device is
development of the last two years,
the ampliier which made it possible,
has been in widespread use, piling up
ciphers unseen on every long dista nee
|. telephone line in the country, since
lopened in 1915. A long distance call
from New York to San Francisco In
wolves zoo. 900. 600, 00o. 900 ampliica-
tons. The number OF complications
necessary between any two points de-
ponds not only upon the distance but
upon the nature OF. the circuit.
But the principle of the arnplifer
is not limited to telephonic use.
1t Is "a fundamental Of radio and
wire telegraphy; Of radio ttelephon-
ing; OF all long distance electrical
signaling.
It was the amplifers that picked
up during the war. water vibrations
caused by enemy submarines and
Translated them into sounds by which
commanders of allied warships were
able to locate the hidden Toe.
It made possible the fog line" In
New York harbor--that m~agnetized
J cable leading up the channel. which