The Indianapolis times. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1922-1965, 1936-01-06

Recovery means an emf
rather than a mere resump-
ton of old activities because
there never was a depres-
sion in scientific research.
The wheels of industry slowed
down, even stopped in some
places. The furnace fires f1ickered
lower and lower. Rust gathered
on lathes and drill presses.
But in the laboratorie the Bun
sen burners were kept going. No
dust gathered on test tubes and
retorts. The microscopes, the gall
vanometers, the testing machinery
of all sorts, were kept brightly
polished and in perfect working
order.
WISELY, the leading indus
w trial concerns of the nation
kept their research laboratories
going full blast throughout the
depression.
They were looking ahead to the
days of recovery.
Many smaller concerns did the
same. This is not to say that
there were not research men
whose salaries were cut or even
research men who lost their jobs
through the failure of the concern
employing them or through the
adoption of short-sighted policy.
But by and large research men
were kept on the job through the
years of the depression.
In addition, engineers and
chemists and other technically
trained men who found their
usual activities curtailed or termi-
mated began to turn to research in
those depression years as the
way to solve their personal prob
lens.
4 S a result, the volume of re-
4 n search work went up as bust
ness activity went down. and now
that recovery is manifesting it.
self the nation stands ready to
profit by the research boom that
went on during the economic de-
preston.
The new world Is going to be
built out of stronger steels,
tougher allows, better aluminium
products, more useful plastics,
harder abrasives, more power
full machine tools, more ingen-
ious automatic controls, new chem
ical compounds and new chem
ical processes.
New things and better ways of
making old things are the foun-
dations of this more glorious
future.
Along with these products has
come a new appreciation of beau
ty, a new interest in design. The
smooth CLEAN of stainless steel,
the inviting luster of aluminium,
the infinite possibilities of the
new plastics have inspired indus
trialists and engineers to call IA
nous artists into consultation, to
become artists themselves.
Not only is streamlining, first
learned in the air and then ap-
piled to the automobile being car
ried to the railroad locomotive and
the auto bus because it means
increased efficiency, but because
it means increased beauty.
And the clean attractiveness Of
streamlining is being carried to
many household appliances, where
there is no question of wind re-
sistance.
THERE is question, however,
l. of beauty, modern beauty
that refectse the new world of
progress.
You may ask: What is the
sense of streamlining washing
machine or a carpet sweeper? The
carpet sweeper is never going to
move at a speed where wind re-
SiStance is important and the
washing machine stands still.
The answer is that the stream
lining is symbolic. Washing ma
chimes. carpet sweepers and many
other household articles are being
made of new materials which not
only increase their efficiency and
lengthen their lives, but which are
capable of expressing beauty.
Modern beauty is most appro-
pirate to them. They are ma
chimes, and so it is appropriate
that their beauty should be the
proud beauty of the machine at
its best.
Modern furniture is a good ex-
ample of what is happening in the
world of design. The first wild
excuses of moderniStic design
have given way to a synthesis of
the old and the new. New fab