Atlanta tri-weekly journal. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1920-19??, 1922-03-18


these days. 1t has gone, in for radio
phoning Suddenly, everybody has begun to
talk radio, play with radio and invite you
to studio ether-tapping parties. The once
SO popular ouija board is now a back NUM-
Der when it comes to receiving weird and
amusing messages. Instead, the family gath
ers about it's little radio-receiving apparatus
and listens to the varied program of music
lectures, news dispatches and children's bed
time stories nightly broadcasted by the large
commercial radio companies.
Although this ETHEREAL entertainment has
been popular for some time, it is only with
in the past two or three months that the
passion for radio has become acute, 200, 900
new receiving sets, it is said, having been
installed in that time. Recent estimates
show that approximately 100000 American
homes, schools, churches, halls and office
buildings are now equipped as receiving sta
tions, while the Federal government has
licensed more than Is, 1000 stations for trans
hitting messages of one kind and another.
Every evening at o'clock, thousands of
amateur radio operators, scattered all over
New York City, New Jersey, Long Island
and up through New York state, start twirl-
ing the curious knobs on top of their radio
boxes; adjusting their headpieces, and listen
ing to the loud, clear sounds of a phono-
graph record which is being played many
miles away. They continue to listen intense
ly and rapturously, not because they find
the record so edifying Git would sound much
better played on their own photography =,
but because it is so delightfully."- uncanny to
hear it from such a distance over the radio
telephone.
Static Mars the Music
"Oh,'' exclaimed young woman breath
lessly, the other evening, as she sat for the
first time with the receivers in her ears,
cts quite clear, and I can. even hear the
scraping. sound of the record. It's Caruso
He's singing Ave Maria Where is it COM
ing from? Trenton? Think of that-Tren-
ton! And he's been dead all these months,
yet here is his voice singing to us and per-
haps to thousands of others way out there
in the night Perhaps his voice can be
heard all the way over in Italy, where he
lies buried-do you suppose SOP"
Eyes," said the owner of the radio box,
perhaps it could, if sent from one of the
big broadcasting stations"
"I wish the sound of the record were not
50 terribly loud, though" complained the
young woman. sometimes II crowns ou'
the song.
''That is not the sound of the record you
hear the owner laughed. That is "nat
we call old Man Static Sounds ike Try
ing bacon on red-hot fire, doesn't II
Sometimes it's much worse than it is to-
night. but it's always pretty bad. One OF
the mean features the radio inventors nave
not succeeded in overcoming
"He's finished" interrupted the young
woman "Now they're putting something
else on. mans voice. He is giving the
letters of his station-KG-somet
can't quite hear the last letter. He's read
ing some news, all about Lloyd George in
England, and now it's about a. rum schooner
found off the coast of didn't get that
OH yes, he says it will be cloudy, with east
erly winds tomorrow. Goodness, there's
your friend, Static, again-its quite deaten-
/ ing isn't it? All, here's some more music,
but now they are playing two records at
once, and it sounds frightful. One is jazz
record, and the other is TQstfs 'Good-by.
| It's all right; the jazz has stopped. I sup
| pose the 'Good-by' song ends this particular
program, doesn' it?"
| "Probably," assented the owner of the
apparatus, taking the headpiece from the
young woman's head, "but something else
! from some other quarter will doubtless start
| up in few minutes. The broadcasting goes
| on all evening. The most interesting thing,
| though, is to get on the high wave-length,
where you can hear the wireless telegraph
| spark signaling news from the great Nauen
station near Berlin or from the big British
plant in the Welsh hills near .Carnarvon to
Deal Beach, New Brunswick or Arlington,
in this country. That makes you realize
the enormous power of the radio"
sRalI Sets Cover 100 Miles
! Most of the radio sets sold to private in
| divduals possess a guaranteed range of 100
miles, which is sufficient to let the owners
7 in on the regular commercial programs, but
which excludes them from intercontinental
! conversation. Fortunately for the dignity Of
! international diplomacy, it requires cou-
| pie of hundred foot steel towers, several
| thousand feet of copper wire and hundred
| thousand watts or so of electric energy to
talk to Europe Amateurs are restricted to
| 2O0-meter wave-lengths or less, and are