Walker Lake bulletin. (Hawthorne, Nev.) 1883-1926, 1922-01-07
Engineers Foresee Amplifiers
Bearing Presidents Voice
% Entire Nation.
IN ITS INFANCY, THEY SAY
Current Frc.~ Arlington Was Multi
piled 100000, 900, ooo, ooo, ooo. ooo,-
100000 Times-Rival Of
"canned Music"


New Yorh.-President Harding,
who set record for ng-dlstance or
atory on Armistice day by addressing
simultaneously three great throngs of
more than 100000 persons, gathered at
Arlington National cemetery, San
Francisco and New York, may easily
find himself talking to an audience
running high into the millions and
scattered through every state In the
Union, before he leaves the White
House.
Indeed, says r. w. King. one Of the
American Telephone and Telegraph
company engineers. whose work ON
the loud-spealling device made posi-
BILE the ushering In of new epoch In
space humiliation at the ceremonies
over the bier of Americas unknown
soldier, 1t Is well within the range of
possibility that President Harding may
see the day when President can sit
at ease In the White House and talk
at once to every city, town and ham,
let In the United States that is tapped
" tSiCpiiohC WINS. All uuultDCt VI
5O,O0O,0OO perhaps Or 1OO,OOO,00Ol
They don't even blink at figures like
that-these telephone company engin-
GERS. For ability to look, unabashed,
into the faces Of column of ciphers,
marching in threes across great open
white spaces, is one of the prerequl-
sites even to thinking about that mar
velous contryance, the electrical am
| plifier, of which the loud-speaking de-
vice Is only one In long list of prac-
| teal applications.
| Sees Nation as Audience.
For instance, the electrical current
that carried President Harding's fiji
neral Grafton to the crowds at Airing
ton, San Francisco and New York was
multiplied 5000, 100000, 900 OOO, OOO,-
OOO,OO0,OO0 times before it rolled out,
converted into great sonorous sound
waves, over the heads of three audi
ences.
1t took 100000, OOO,OOo,OOO amplifi-
cations to convey the grafton and the
other ceremonies to San Francisco so
that they could have been heard
through an ordinary telephone receiv-
err. Then they had to be amplified a
million million times by the loud
speaking device.
A mere ten-mllion billlons-1O,000
100000 100000 amplifications were
necessary to bring the ceremonies out
clear and strong in New York. Ten
thousand were used to bring the cere-
MONIES here, and million million to
raise them to audibility for the New
York audience. The other million mil
lion amplifications were used to carry
the Presidents voice to the Arlington
crowd.
| By providing a few more scores of
thousands of miles of wire, some thou
sands of loud-speaking devices and a
few foolscap sheets filled with tiny
ciphers indicating more amplifications,
the entire country might hear future
public ceremonies, Mr.. King said.
1t would be relatively simple, he de-
clared, to set up equipment In the capt.
tails of the 48 states through which
10000 persons In each city-a total of
1900 0OO-could hear ceremony In
Washington or elsewhere as distinctly
as If they were seated within few
yards of the speaker.
A Rival Of Canned" Music.
| Canned" music. too. faces n poten-
tlul rival In the loud speaker. Tele-
| phone engineers say the Armlstice day
experiment proved that music could
be reproduced over the wire circuits
at least as purely MS 1t Is reproduced
on the best photograph records and
that It will be matter of but few
| years when the last vestige of metallic
ring will be eliminated.
Mr.. King believes 1t will be but
| short time, too. until all the principal
public halls and large university audi
| forums are equipped at least with To-
cal loud speakers. These, he pointed
| out, could easily be switched on long
| distance circuits carrying public ad-
| dresses and similar events from other
cities.
While the loud-speaking device is
| development Of the last two years, the
amplfier which made II possible has
been In widespread use, piling up
ciphers unseen on every long-distance
telephone line In the country, since the