News and Music Transmitted from New York by Wireless Telephone Every Evening to Amateur Wireless Stations Within Hearing Radius of New York -- DeForest Wireless Equipment Used for the Purpose
War bulletins and important world happenings now and then interspersed in a nightly musical program from the air without wires and for public benefit in the office, aboard ship, or at home, is the new era of wireless telephony now being demonstrated by Dr. Lee de Forest, at the De Forest radio experimental laboratories at Highbridge, N. Y., after a series of experiments in wireless telephony covering the greater part of nine years.
Announcement of this new wireless age, marking according to the published notice, a remarkable step forward in the distribution of the world's news and music, was made recently in the form of "an invitation-to-listen" sent out by the high-powered oscillating audion transmitter at the De Forest laboratories. The notice itself was novel, first in the sense that it was entirely "wireless," and again, in being addressed to the several thousand amateur wireless operators within a hearing radius of New York, it foretells, according to the inventor of the audion lamp, the coming of the worlds first regular spoken, or wireless telephone newspaper.
Among the musical numbers on the nightly program are selections from Wagnerian operas and from Puccini, popular dance music like the "Kangaroo Hop," sentimental songs including "Come Back to Erin," as well as Hawaiian medleys, the Native of Vienna Waltz by Strauss and the 1812 Overture by Tschaikowsky. In point of clearness, the xylophone and the accordion are among the best instruments for wireless transmission, although the brass band, and the human voice, especially if soprano, oftentimes are equally clear to all the listening amateur stations.
To transmit the human voice by wireless telephone, the speaker, or operator, talks into an ordinary microphone, like those used on the regular telephone apparatus in the city service. In the case of a musical selection, the microphone is placed inside the cabinet of a Columbia graphophone, where it will get the full volume of sound. When the Columbia record is made to play, the musical notes, like the vibrations of the human voice, are taken by wire to a coil where they are transformed into high frequency waves of high voltage. Thus they are sent out by the oscillating audion for public enjoyment. At the receiving end, the music or spoken word is heard by means of the regular wireless ear pieces which are like those used by the girl operators at the public telephone stations.
The large illustration shows the type of oscillion telegraph and telephone apparatus, together with motor generator and receiving cabinet as used by amateur private stations and small motor boats. On the left is located the receiving cabinet which is said to be capable of receiving damped or undamped wave signals on wave lengths of from 200 to 2,500 meters from stations 2,000 to 4,000 miles when used in conjunction with a fair-sized aerial.
In the middle is the oscillion, undamped wave transmitter which is capable of telephoning over a distance of 20 miles and telegraphing twice that far when used with a fairly large aerial. On the right is the motor generator used to furnish the high voltage direct current.
Another illustration shows the small type of oscillion undamped wave transmitter used for telegraphy. It is also used by the United States Navy.
The remaining illustration shows a larger type of oscillion transmitter used for the transmission of music by the De Forest Radio Telephone & Telegraph Co., New York City.
This type of transmitter is to be used by a number of power companies for their transmission lines and may be utilized for many other purposes where either a wireless telegraph installation or a regular line installation is used. This is the new type of transmitter which is very rapidly replacing the old spark type.
Co-operating with Dr. De Forest in the development of the musical part of the program is Dr. C. M. Goldstein, scientific director of research for the Columbia Graphophone Co., who has taken this modern means of demonstrating the new Columbia records.
"It was hardly more than a year ago," said Dr. De Forest the other day, "when the public heard of the Arlington Station wireless telephone test, which recorded by means of the audion lamp, the transmission of the human voice from Washington, D. C., to Honolulu, without the use of wires. Experimental work on such a scale is highly interesting from the point of view of a wireless stunt. It is only the practical application of this work, however, that directly concerns the public, and the possibilities in the direction are clearly shown, we believe, in the wireless concerts we are now sending out at our laboratories.
"Personally I can see no reason why the wireless telephone transmission of news in the near future will not be a regular means of communication, and a very valuable one, too, in supplementing by bulletin the various editions issued by the metropolitan newspapers. All that is needed is the news, and a comparatively few, well-located, high-power stations capable of covering the entire country. Already we have in the United States, I should say, at least 200,000 amateur wireless outfits waiting to receive news and music by the wireless telephone."
In addition to the scientific advance made by the wireless telephone, Dr. De Forest further calls attention to the novelty of a bulletin, or musical wireless journal. "The publishers of such a news service will be the only ones in the world, I fancy, who are not affected in one way or another by the higher cost of paper.
"We are certainly the first to make use of the oscillating audion as a printing press, when we speak our news, or as an organ, when we play our phonograph concerts. In short, this is pioneer service in producing news and music from the electric bulb. This news and music has the further great advantage that it can be delivered instantly and without the nerve-racking cry of extra, in the quiet of your home, without opening the door, or even ringing your bell."
