Source: VIEWING POSITIONS: WAYS OF SEEING FILM, Linda Williams (ed.), Rutgers University Press 1995 ISBN 0-8135-2133-5, 1995.
Leaflet grenades and the Monroe bomb
From Hans Moonen
[Bruce Sterling remarks: the Dutch collector Hans Moonen has the largest archive of propaganda leaflets that I’ve ever seen. The “Monroe bomb” and propaganda grenades are new to me, but he seems very well-informed.] “That the Americans saw the importance of psychological warfare can be seen from the fact that Captain James Monroe of the USAAF invented a bomb for the spreading of leaflets.
“The so-called Monroe bomb was taken into service. This bomb consisted of a paperboard cylinder in which up to 80,000 leaflets could fit. These bombs were dropped like normal bombs. A small detonator caused the cylinder to open at any given height. The leaflets were spread over a large area. All makes of bombers were used: American Flying fortresses B-17 and later B-24. Ten of these bombs fitted exactly in the bomb bay of a B-17.
“The picture shows a ground crew loading the Monroe bombs into a B-17. In England, over 75,000 Monroe bombs were produced. The only thing was that on (some very few) missions a bomb didn’t open. That’s why unopened Monroe bombs were found in Holland sometimes. Even 25 years after the war the Dutch bomb disposal had to dig up one still filled with, tightly packed, readable leaflets! “I want to ask any visitor if they could help me to get original manuals (US / GB / German or other) for this kind of leaflet-drop related equipment (bombs, shells, balloons etc.). “The shelling method “For short range combat propaganda, another technique was used: the shooting of leaflets with artillery grenades. This method was often used in North-Africa (1942/43) and after D-day on the front in Europe.
“For this purpose, smoke grenades were used. The smoke-cartridge was removed and replaced by small rolls of up to 400 leaflets. The British used a lot of 25 pounder grenades. See the picture of a unit filling grenades with leaflets. (The picture was taken in the vicinity of my hometown in the south of the Netherlands; I also know what leaflet is being filled here).
“The Americans used lots of 105 and 155 mm howitzer grenades in a similar way. A time fuse caused the grenade’s explosive charge to expel the leaflets in air over enemy trenches. The firing of the gun often ‘pushed together’ the leaflets in the grenade which causes a very characteristic folding pattern on the leaflets. Also the expelling charge often burned parts of the leaflets. That’s why those leaflets are mostly in a bad condition if seen on expositions.
“Nowadays still sometimes unexploded leaflet grenades are being found filled with readable leaflets.
software innovation in the Magic Lantern era
To the modern eye a magic lantern most resembles a kerosene-fired slide projector. This preconception overlooks the slides themselves, however.
Lantern slides were large, bulky, complex objects of glass, paint, wood and metal. Many had built-in mechanical features.
So the lantern’s projected images were not necessarily static, but could be graced with limited animation. Some slides could even create complex, constantly moving screen displays.
Lantern slides came in several physical formats.
Peck and Snyder’s proprietary slides were 4 ½ by 7 inches.
The “usual English pattern” was 3 ½ x 3 ½ and
The “French pattern” was 3 ¼ by 4 inches.
But specialized slides could be over a foot long, containing gears, cranks, cogs, or even belts and pulleys. Slides were attached in front of the condensing lenses, outside the body of the lantern itself. They slid into place horizontally through metal runners at top and bottom.
Lever Action Slides
A lever protruded from one corner of the slide, attached to a second, overlapping pane of painted glass. When the lever was depressed or lifted the second glass rotated through a brief arc, resulting in a single animated movement on the lantern’s screen. The Peck and Snyder catalog enthuses: “The moving effects produced on the screen are very life-like. The horse is put in motion by the lever, and appears to be cantering. The children go up and down as natural as can be, and the audience can hardly believe that they are not alive. The No. 2 Electro Radiant Magic Lantern reproduces these pictures 8 to 12 feet in diameter. We conside the Lever one of the very best mechanical effects.” Peck and Snyder sold lever-action slides for between $1.75 and $2.25. Brian Coe’s History of Movie Photography describes double and even triple lever-action slides, but the truly elaborate ones were apparently rare. Peck and Snyder does not offer any doubles or triples.
Slip slides
Slip slides had two panes of glass, with a thumb-and-finger notch cut into one corner of the wooden frame. The moving pane of glass was gripped and pulled by hand, a very simple operation. Slip slides often used black patches to obscure and reveal details of the background slide. Coe describes sub-varieties of “slipping slides” that were pulled with tabs. Peck and Snyder: “Part of the picture is painted on one glass and the other on part on another glass. The two are arranged in a frame so that one glass slips over the other, and very comical effects are produced. It is a great mystery to the uninitiated, and they cannot understand how the transformations are made.” Peck and Snyder retailed these for a thrifty seventy-five cents each.
Mechanical Slides
Rackwork and Pulley Slides. Early rotary slides sometimes used a belt-and-pulley drive, with two brass disks turned in contrary directions by belt drives and a little hand-crank. This technique was rivalled and eventually replaced by the neater and more accurate rack-and-pinion system. A single round disk of glass with a toothed brass rim could be cranked and rotated indefinitely. This caused repeated rotary animation on the screen. Rackwork slides cost $4.25 to $5.00 in Peck and Snyder’s catalog. The catalog offers no pulley slides circa 1886.
Chromatropes
Says Peck and Snyder: “These are handsomely painted geometrical or other figures on two glasses, which, by an ingenious arrangement of crank pinion and gear wheels, are made to revolve in opposite directions, producing an endless variety of changes, almost equal to a grand display of fire-works.” Chromatrope cranks could produce single rackwork rotation against a fixed background, or double counter-rotation of both disks of glass. Peck and Snyder’s chromatropes could project various brightly colored psychedelic moire’ patterns up to twelve feet across. Professional chromatrope displays in large urban theaters must have been quite mind- boggling. The Eidotrope was a chromotrope variant using counter-rotating disks of perforated metal, showing a swirling pattern of brilliant white dots on the screen.
“Tinters” or colored translucent sheets could be added to tint the display. Coe describes Eidotropes, but Peck and Snyder does not offer any Eidotropes for sale circa 1886. C. W. Ceram’s Archaeology Of The Cinema states that Eidotropes were powered by pulleys and “superseded” by Chromatropes. The Cycloidotrope (see Coe p 19) was a truly remarkable variant, a kind of lantern spirograph. A black disk of smoked glass rotated within the slide frame, and a stylus on a pivoted arm traced a pattern in the soot against the moving glass. This appeared on the screen as a brilliant white line tracing a regular geometric design, an increasingly complex animated display. The stylus could be re-set as the cycloidotrope rotated, producing interlocking rosettes and similar mechanical geometries. Peck and Snyder do not sell or mention this impressive but labor-intensive graphic device. Images very similar to those generated by the Eidotrope and Cycloidotrope are now quite popular in computer screen-savers.
Dioramic Slides.
These very elongated slides were twice as wide as normal slides, 4 ½ by 12 or 14 inches. Peck and Snyder: “These slides are exceedingly beautiful. The painting is artistic and elaborate, and the wonder is they can be sold so cheaply. A scene is painted on fixed glass, and over this is made to pass a long procession of figures—soldiers, vessels, trains of cars, caravans, as the case may be—with the most pleasing and wonderful effects.” The colored background image was sma
ll and square, but the pane with little figures was over a foot long. The figures slid along in front of the painted background. Peck and Snyder sold dioramic slides for $3 each. Panorama slides. These landscape-style slides were over a foot long and could be gently drawn past the condensing lenses, “panning” across the picture. Like diorama slides, they often had a procession of moving figures as well. They cost $3.35 to $4.50 from Peck and Snyder. Coe states that a London optician named J. Darker succeeded in attaching a kaleidoscope to the lens of a magic lantern in the 1860s. Says Coe: “His projection Kaleidoscope produced a remarkable effect when used to fill a large screen with a colorful, constantly changing pattern.”
(The Kaleidoscope itself, an optical toy which is very much alive, was invented by Sir David Brewster and patented in 1817.)
Source THE HISTORY OF MOVIE PHOTOGRAPHY by Brian Coe, Eastview Editions, Westfield NJ, 1981, ISBN 0-89860-067-0 Peck and Snyder’s Catalog (aka Price List of Out & Indoor Sports and Pastimes) 1886, reprinted 1971 by Pyne Press (LC# 75-24886, ISBN 0-87861-094-4) ARCHAEOLOGY OF THE CINEMA by C. W. Ceram, Harcourt Brace and World (1955?), LC # 65-19106
mechanical encryption systems of the 1930s; The Comparator; the Rapid Selector
From Bradley O’Neill
Here’s some information on pre-encryption/decryption technologies of the 1930s and 40s. These creatures were the stillbirths of Vannevar Bush’s projects at MIT and OP-20-G (Naval encryption division).
Most people know Bush as grandaddy of info-science, and prognosticator of hypertext (in the famous article in a 1945 edition of Atlantic Monthly, Bush envisioned a hyper-linked bibliography system called MEMEX, an idealized machine that was never built).
Well, when I started looking into developmental background on BOMBE decryption devices for the German ENIGMA encryption system, I stumbled onto a source examining Vannevar Bush’s role in creating Rapid Selector/Tabulating machines for the Navy and private industry, all inventions that predate Bush’s idea of MEMEX.
THE COMPARATOR:
70mm Eastman-Kodak paper-tape based electronic crypto-analytic prototype, funded by the US Navy, built mostly at MIT, first assembled in 1938. The Comparator was plagued by years of mechanical setbacks. Bush wanted a “high-speed” (projected to be 100 times faster than 1920s tabulators) parallel processing analyser that utilized photo-cell light readings to index (and thus decode) up to 50,000 character comparisons per minute. Very low memory capability caused printing/retrieval problems. Bush realized that without microfilm density, the processing speeds were also unachievable. And if microfilm was used, then the reading/recording capabilities would suffer from insufficient resolution.
THE RAPID SELECTOR
Begun in 1937. Bush’s MIT team first built this analyser in 1940. Funding was dropped by a disgruntled FBI and subsequently picked up by various private foundations including Eastman and NCR (Bush was apparently an undaunted spinner of techno-dreams ala Steve Jobs). The Rapid Selector went through several incarnations, but was conceived as a specialized data- retrieval system for business records or scientific research. The Rapid Selector was a microfilm-based analyser consisting of a 7’ tall relay rack, housing the film drives. Like its sister,the Comparator, it used a light- sensing reader system to allow speedy retrieval of microfilmed information. The user compiled a series of punchcard notes that were indexed into microfilm storage by a system operator/librarian. The Rapid Selector would then allow the user to cross-reference other researchers’ additions to the user’s “specialized area” without sorting through irrelevant texts. Bush saw the Rapid Selector as an eventual replacement for card catalogues. Although Bush conquered his basic speed/retrieval problems, the required coding system to access information ultimately proved prohibitively complex. The specialized typewriter for the code-punch was also unworkable. Burke’s text is full of other useful information, follies, and successes that orbit around the development of these pre-digital machines.
Source: Information and Secrecy: Vannevar Bush, Ultra, and the Other Memex by Colin Burke; Scarecrow Press, Inc. Metuchen N.J., 1994. LOC: HD9696.C772B87 1994
The Experiential Typewriter
From Bradley O’Neill
Built by Timothy Leary and Richard Alpert (Ram Dass) in the winter of 1962-1963, Cambridge, Mass. An instrument for recording and charting the psychedelic experience.
“The purpose of the ET was to deal with the ‘words cannot express’ aspects of accelerated-brain experience. The subject could indicate any of various levels of consciousness that they were unable to describe at the moment by pressing the appropriate buttons on the typewriter. The signal was recorded on a revolving drum, much the way temperatures are graphed in meteorological stations.
“After the session, when consciousness was operating at slower speeds, the subject would have leisure to examine the recorded data and describe the sequence of events fully and precisely.”
I’d like a more detailed account of this curiosity, as Dr. Leary does not elaborate in Flashbacks. But it’s definitely dead.
Source: Flashbacks by Timothy Leary, 1983, 1990; Putnam Publishing Group, New York. LC# BF109.l43A3 1990
Dead Cryptanalytic Devices of World War II
From Bradley O’Neill
Here are various cryptanalytic machines developed before and during WWII. An “ notes those items for which I will submit more detailed working notes. I am listing all of them here beforehand, for purposes of scope, and to encourage any interested souls.
BOMBE - Electro-mechanical machines built by Britain and the US to attack ENIGMA.
COLOSSUS - Britain’s special purpose electronic computer to attack the German FISH system.
COMPARATOR - Bush’s tape based-electronic cryptanalytic machines.
COPPERHEAD - OP-20-G [Naval cryptology division] WWII advanced versions of tape-based electronic cryptanalytic machines.
ENIGMA - German encrypting device.
FISH - German teletype-like automatic encryption systems and devices.
FREAK [no joke!] - U.S. electromechanical cryptanalytic machine, WWII.
FRUIT - Special electro-mechanical adding machine built for OP- 20-G by NCR during WWII.
GOLDBERG - OP-20-G advanced version of Bush’s Comparator.
HYPO - Analog optical crypanalytic machine built by Eastman-Kodak, during WWII.
ICKY - OP-20-G special microfilm machine.
IC MACHINE - Film plate machines, MIT-Eastman made for OP-20-G, WWII.
LETTERWRITER - Special data entry machines IBM built for OP-20-G, WWII.
LOCATORS - OP-20-G and SIS [US Army Cryptanalytic Agency] machines built for identifying locations of code items, but not for counting or tallying. Built during WWII.
MADAME X - SIS relay-based machine to attack German ENIGMA.
MATHEW, MIKE - U.S. electro-mechanical cryptanalytic machines, WWII.
PURPLE - SIS/OP-20-G analog machine built for attack on Japanese diplomatic ciphers.
PYTHON - OP-20-G electrical analog of Japanese enciphering machine, during WWII.
RAPID ARITHMETICAL MACHINE - An unbuilt Vannevar Bush computer of the 1930s.
RAPID SELECTOR - Bush’s ill-fated bibliographic micro-film device.
RATTLER - U.S. Navy electronic machine to attack Japanese automatic encryption systems.
ROBINSON - Britain’s tape-based electronic machines, similar to the COMPARATOR.
ROCKEFELLER ANALYSER - Vannevar Bush/MIT updated version of Differential Analyser, financed by Rockefeller Foundation, completed in late 1930s.
WAVELENGTH ANALYSER - MIT optical-electric analog scientific measuring device, 1930s.
WHIRLWIND - Postwar electronic digital computer built at MIT by group outside of Bush’s circle.
There you are. A veritable fleet of dead (military) media waiting to be explored. These machines are, in many ways, ‘missing links’ in the popular conception of computer evolution.
Source: Information and Secrecy:
Vannevar Bush, Ultra, and the Other Memex, by Colin Burke, Scarecrow Press, Metuchen N.J. 1994. LC# HD9696.C772B87 1994.
Tongan Tin Can Mail
From Suzanna Layton
“When copra traders set up operations on the island (Niuafo’ou) near the turn of the century, a method of communications became necessary. At one time passing steamers would seal incoming mail for the island in ship’s 40-pound biscuit tins which were then thrown overboard to native swimmers.
“The swimmers had maneuvered a mile or more through the turgid surf, towing the outgoing mail that had been carefully soldered in tins. The swimmers and ship would exchange mail containers and each would be on their way. From this unique method of mail delivery, the island became known as Tin Can Island and the letters carried thus are called Tin Can Mail.
“The swimming mail lasted until 1931 when a shark killed a swimmer. From then on, mail was brought in by outrigger canoe.”
[Bruce Sterling remarks: in a further astonishing twist, the Kingdom of Tonga now makes a commercial business of selling Internet domain names. There is now an automatic registration site on the Web, Tongan Network Information Center (tonic.to) based in a server in the Tongan consulate in San Francisco. TONIC sells Tongan domain name registrations for a hundred dollars each, and is managed by former virtual reality entrepreneur Eric Gullichsen, a notable pioneer of modern dead media.]
Source: Tonga and Tin Can Mail Study Circle
Edison’s Electric Pen and early desktop publishing
From Darryl Rehr
Desktop Publishing is a phenomenon of the late 20th century. Modern products have made it possible for any office staff to produce material that looks professionally printed.
The Dead Media Notebook Page 5