Evening star., 1923-10-14
Heard and Seen

Radio is something like religion,
one has to experience 1t personally
before 1t amounts to anything.
It has been year or so now since
the general public became more or
less initiated into the mysteries of
such terms as broadcast cats
whisker," and "antenna-"
Yet to the person not possessing q
lradio receiving apparatus such words
still smack of the strange and out
landish. He may have heard a
friends radio. but has dismissed it
with a few words, kind or otherwise.
Let such a man install in his own
set, and Immediately he becomes an
enthusiast What before was only
| an occasional topic of conversation,
! suddenly, over night-literally-b
comes a real thing, vital, mysterious.
X x
The writer last week. with the aid
| of a kind neighbor, installed a crys-
/, tai receiving set. On. B.-The neigh
! Dor did most: of the installing.) Inn
part of a group o. more than $4,000
radio fans in the District who
, daily and nightly are listening in.
1t is marvellous the way radio takes
on interest when one listens in on his
own receiving set, however humble
1t may be. With receivers clamped
to ears, the listener finds that another
enthralling chapter has been opened
| in his experience.
Not only does he hear ball games,
speeches, music, etc, but II he has
one spark of appreciation for the
mystery Of life, he realizes that he is
sapping at the source one of the true
, great modern miracles.
1t is so easy TO become dulled in
this day and age to slide along, ac-
only 100 years ago would have put
n man in jail, If not in danger of his
life, for. even suggesting.
Nowadays we think nothing of
just electricity, isn't it?" some one
says.
Sure-that's all!
The radio, to my way OF thinking,
transcends, perhaps, all the other
wonderous things of today. Recently
in these columns ] listed the air
plane, radio and phonograph as three
of the greatest modern inventions.
A few evenings of personal expe-
rienee with the radio has made me
all the more sure that the selection
was well made.
Here is the recipe for radio enjoy
ment:,
Take a small crystal set-any
handy person can make his own for
three or four dollars-sling up your
antenna, get the whole connected up
right, get out your watch and the
radio program in the paper and
stand by"
Right on the dot you will hear the
| announcer with his suave voice
| will begin music or whatever is on
| the program. In the afternoon will
come the opportunity to hear a play
by-play account of the world series
games, the actual cheering of the
! throngs as Casey Stangel 1ams out
| his home runs.
Or it may be your pleasure to pick
up the phones some evening right
Fin the middle of broadcast by an
| official of the Civil Service Commits
sion of announcements concerning fu-
ture examtnttons and to recognize
the voice Of Jour old friend H. B.
| Morgan of the commissions staff.
Some other evening you will listen
| in to the music at a motiop-picture
comedy and find yourself laughing
| with the roars of the audience miles
The thing is mysterious, niracu-
| lous, anything you wish to call 1t.
| Whether you like ii just for what
you hear or the opportunity to tin
ker around with WlreSy etc-, NOT q
! fan" eyerlooks the wonder of 1t all.
From this standpoint the crystal
| detector sets are the most wonder
! full 1t is not so hard for US to feel
/ that we know how an elaborate
| mechanism, with batteries and other
| electrical devices, picks up messages
/ out OF the air.
But how on earth can a little box
| containing wrapped wire, hitched to 9
4 bit of crystal, tickled by fine wire
gather up the human voice and music
| slithering in great waves through the
/ air?
| it it brings one face to face with al
creation, and the Creator. 1t Is safe
4 % say that no man, woman or chiie
4 who listens in on his radio is ar
atheist.
] cHAKLEs E. TRAcEwELh-