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About Omaha daily bee. (Omaha [Neb.]) 187?-1922 | View Entire Issue (Feb. 26, 1911)
Uifi l.UAM.V MWUAl ' 1M: I'lMWU'AHl JH. 11)1!. Union Pacific to Order Train Service by Wireless 'Phone , '"""" f ) - U: -lUltJlUHWlWJi'.UIIU WIWWVWUIW illWIIIIi, X.WIIMIIJ1B IBWIIIHII llsW-y j ' fW' "5. , WWWWW. " . J" i 1 ' r : r'-; ; ' ' " " YmZLEU TLLEiVOXE, XCUVLhQ I r . p . . i STecaar comzlexc. 60 cycles ' I w ill ...ivi - 'W1-' s' ",; w" : ?:V; j . I C3?- tiTyy - i 1 J t WJX V-J3 V - ,71 A" - " m ii MS. - M m ' M . mi. .... " .. . ...... . in .... . . r:i: "ii -:" -FTT02f . - -i mmusbiuli Deiore me ciose or tne present i - ' r li'1'" ,y i I TTT) I year the Union Pacific railroad will have S 4 ' TfV77?i WZSfTVTl jfr " N. I il 1 It" wireless telephone By8tem working i . f S Atks OT . i ,.,,,.-1 along th line on all trains. The rail- ' rsiQ 1 X2.' ' X ' ' ,1 I '''Ii road offlclals will not say this, and they 'I0rS'' V X t,',' ' . n,.vJ do not care particularly to have others j ! Ui- ; ; I say it. for a sure thing. Neither will Mi II XT L . ' - . ', ; B I 'rz'r 'WW v- '.' f r ;, ':. j,' 1 ' ""W J y ' j ii i iimmiiiiiiiiiiii him urn ,t -: ..-::- . L U- h :-w"- - J I I .Lag ---T-"""1 . ' f ::r:.. 1 1 I j 4 WWX.l.'J.W I I I "mMi M-i I -"' I ii ' A T027ED TUMTORARY WZZOL&SS ZEUZPBUNZZ TATlOtr I . v I i Dr. Frederick H. Millener, who has for four years been experimenting and working out the details, make the positive statement. He has all the conservatism of the earnest scientist and is very careful In outlining what he expecta to do; but In a lecture before the New York Railway club In New York City on Febru ary 17 Dr. Millener did say: . y "Wireless telephony from a moving train is more than a practical probability, and I may say that within a year or so from now it will be a feature of the daily operation of trains on the Union Pacific railroad." It has been a long,' carefully conducted work that baa brought the results predicted by Dr. Millener. No laborer expense baa been too great to stand In the way of whatever experiments were necessary, and now apparently these experiments have been carried to the point where they may be pronounced successful. With this accomplished, one of the greatest and most "unique forward steps In the history of railroading will have been taken. Both the Union Pacific and Dr. Millener will have won for themselves undying glory. Sidney, Neb., and Cheyenne, Wyo., have been se lected by Dr." Millener as the points at which two wire less stations will soon be erected for the actual test of the new development In the quick control of trains. These stations are 103 miles apart, on a single track. The Inventor Talks of Ills mans. "We expect to keep up communication with mov ing trains between theBe stations and others that are to be established," said Dr. Millener In his New York lecture. "These wireless stations will be close to the train dispatchers' offices, so that communication may be established quickly whenever it Is neccessary. We have discovered through our experiment! that wire less waves will follow thVdlrectien of the rails farther than in any other direction, and more closely. It Is well known that they will follow a stream of water or metallic conductors better than they will pass over a wooded country or even a treeless plain, and that these waves work better In stormy weather than when the titles are clear." The wireless telephone already devised by the In ventor, and which he has been using In Omaha, Is luffllcently powerful that messages may be received from a considerable distance. Note In the Illustra tions the man on the freight car and the man on the ground with umbrellas raised. The first is receiving a wireless message while the train is moving, and the other la receiving a similar message while walking about the yards attending to any little duty that de mands his attention. In each case the receiving ap paratus is attached to an ordinary umbrella, to be held over the head of the person receiving the mess&ge. Vmhrell lUbs as Wire. Through this umbrella telephone the tones of the hnman voice are reproduced'perfectly; far better. Dr. Millener saya, than by the ordinary business telephone. The man under the wmbrella usee the ordinary "head set" worn by the office operators. How does he get a message ? Why, ihrouau the ribs of ths rain stick, which are utilized aa the corresponding antennae or aerials of the fixed telephone plant. The umbrella Itself Is cheap, but the Inventor will tell you that It la very wasteful to use an umbrella for this purpose, because It requires more electricity; and this precious fiuld must not be wasted. So you need not expect to see 'trainmen sasnhaying along the rocking tops of trains with umbrellas for balancing poles, catching wireless messages. v The railroad will not Invest In umbrellas for this very laudable purpose; they will buy something more solid, stable and expensive. Dr. Millener simply used the handiest available Instru ment to demonstrate his very practical experiment.- In another of the Illustrations la shown an ordi nary flat car being moved along by wireless waves, and the men surrounding the car are watching the making of remarkable history In the field of telephony. Dr. Mlllener's Ingenuity has another effective illus tration In the rlggtng he has made for a tttatlonary engine, a derrick and a shanty. The wires running from the derrick to the shanty show how the connec tion Is made; and another Illustration shows the man Inside a shanty taking the message. Just as he would take any other message over the 'phone. The engine, derrick and ahanty, with the connecting wires, form what Dr. Millener calls "a tuned temporary wireless telephone station." It 1 not very pretty, but it has proven to be tuned all right, and through It results have been secured that are not to be discounted. What of the practical, every-dsy usefulness of te DECEIVING WISELSSS TELXLTHQNE cSACZS TEBQUGK ZB&XZBS OTJtfT CNB8EZLA WSZLS WAT.KCNC ABOUT XCT THS SATZKOAD YARDS OMAHA wireless telephone system? possibilities hard to realize. It Is manifold and Its Says Dr. Millener: Great Usefulness Assured. "On a railroad an electrically-controlled automatic block signal must work at least 100,000 times without a failure. The hundred thousandth time, perhaps. It may go wrong. The lighting of an arc lamp or some atmospheric disturbance may cause the signal arm to fly up and the signal to be set at 'danger.' The engi neer of the train that it halts has to wait until he gets orders to proceed. On these rare occasions when the signals go wrong the track may be clear, but the engi neer does not know anything about what Is ahead of him except what the signal tells him. Therefore he waits. "The delay may be so long that traffic may be de layed In an ever lengthening line from the point where the signal has stopped the movement of the trains. This costs the railroad more or less money; It means the loss of the productive labor of a great many employes and the idleness of a lot of rolling stock, as well as annoyance to travelers and shippers. "Now, the Union Pacific has the finest system of block signals of any railroad In America; they make tra'el safe and expedite It. Perfect as it is, however, there Is this remote but possible element of delay of loss In the battle against time that must be elim inated. The Union Pacific decided that the only way to do this was to devise some means by which an en gineer In his cab could, either while the train was In motion or, if It was stopped anywhere on the line by some Inexplicable danger signal from the automatic devices, 'call up' the train dispatcher's office and find , out what was wrong whether to stay where he was or to go ahead. Therefore, about four years ago, I was asked to devise a means of overcoming this diffi culty. The solution seemed to be In wireless commu nication by telephone. "We have been prosecuting these researches ever since then. The conclusions we have, reached have! been satisfactory. We are not prepared to state In detail the methods we have followed, for the work la not yet absolutely completed. Cost Can Easily be Saved. "If we save one fruit train from freezing it will pay for the cost of practically the whole installation. More thaji that, however, it. will make travel by rail even safer than It Is now on the safest railroads. With, properly constructed wireless stations there is no chance of failure. There will be no more trouble with the block signals; no delays or annoyances because wires have been blown down by storms, or anything of that sort "During our Investigations in wireless telephony we made a thorough study of what Is called the 'speaking arc' in connection with generators capable of producing currents of aa high as 50,000 alterna- Queer Bills in State Legislatures a MONG a Job lot of "freak" legislation noticed by various papers throughout the country is mentioned the nine-foot bed-aheet bill of ' Representative John Sink of Grand Island. Mr. Sink insists that his law la health legislation and necessary, but so much rannot be said for some other specimens. Indiana has furnished one of the most recent sam ples; it is a. bill requiring every person wishing to take a drink to take out a license. Representative Colvert prepared the bill. "We have personal licenses to hunt and fish and do other things and follow out certain-occupations," said Colvert in an interview, "so why not a license to drink? It would be a source of heavy revenue to the counties and all money derived from the sale of licenses could be turned over to the educational fund. Licenses could be issued in the form of small pocket card, permits reading that the bolder has been licensed to drink. In Colorado k bill is introduced In the legislature providing that any surgeon who ahall perform an op eration for appendicitis and thereafter be unable to prove that the appendix was in a diseased condition shall be guilty of malpractice and punishable under the penal code. Iowa's contribution is a bill making it unlawful for you to put your feet on your desk that la. if you happen to be a legislator. A resolution has been in troduced In the legislature prohibiting legislators from smoking In chambers and from putting their feet on deeka while dictating to feminine committee clerks and atenographers. That much abused class, the poor bachelors, are being abused once more, this time In New Mexico, where a bill' has been introduced in the legislature providing for the classification of bachelors and wid owers and the levying of a tax against them. Bach elors between the ages of 25 and 45 are to pay 1 10 annual tax. Aa for Texas, not content with making drastic pro hibition laws which forbid you from taking a drink of your own whisky out of your own flask on a rail road train, or in sight of a residence, the legislature is now seriously considering the enactment of a law to put in Jail those who use bad language to the tele phone receiver. The bill has already been reported favorably from the house committee on criminal Juris prudence. The tongues of the railway station agents In Mis souri may be loosened If a bill now pending Is passed. It provides a fine of from $25 to $50 for any agent who refuses to answer questions put by travelers. Representative Tuggle, the introducer, said years of rebuffs by country agents, of whom he had inquired If trains were on time, had aroused In him a lingering longing to one day "get back" at the sphinx who hides behind the wicket Washington la catering to its lady voters. Polling places are going to be made very attractive for them. The city council of Seattle started the ball rolling with the introduction of a resolution prohibiting smoking in polling places at elections. This is the first legisla tion resulting from the adoption of the woman suffrage amendment to the Washington constitution. It Is proposed to make the election boths very pretty with decorations, flowers, easy chairs and polite attendants. The senate of Oregon has unanimously passed a bill requiring that applicants for marriage licenses be provided with a certificate of good health from a licenced physician. Kansas and Illinois are after bachelors and mar ried men who pose as bachelors. Representative Cron of Topeka Introduced a bill In -the legislature to tax bachelors over 45 years of age to the tune of $25 a year. State Senator Samuel A. Ettelson of Illinois favors the passage of a bill to differentiate between married men and bachelors by conferring on bachelors some suitable title that will indicate that they are; unmarried, Just as "Miss" indicates single blessedness and "Mrs." Indicates the married state. "Let us make it a felony," says Ettelson, "for a married man to use a bachelor's title. The change will be for the good of society. It will be a bulwark for the home; It will protect susceptible unmarried ladies; it will abolish at one blow all the married flirts." The Loiiuuu COUuty CCuuCii COiitf iuutea m full lis requiring school teachers to superintend the washing of children who go to school with dirty hands and faces. A curious case, not due to freak legislation, but to the law's complexities, came up in Michigan re cently, says the Chicago American. Eugene Rous seau, a resident of Newhall, south of Escanaba, that state, appealed to Judge Judd Yelland of the Escanaba municipal court for advice in his predicament. Under the Michigan laws bears are protected game. On the other hand, tie re are laws under which parents may be prosecuted if they do not send their children to school. Mr. Rousseau Informed the court that two of his children had been chased by bears while on their way home from school and that be himself bad been made to sprint by a big black bear. Not. being able to shoot the animals, the homesteader was In a quandary whether to break one law by not sending his children to school or to break the other law by going out and shooting bears and wolves so that his children could go to school without fear of being scared out of their w its by prowling wild animals. Judge Yelland Informed Rousseau that the protec tion of bears ended last November 1 for the season and that he could go out and shoot as many as he cared to if he felt that In doing so he wss Insuring the future safety of his children. FROVLWZIUa SHA1T7X TO A MOVING, TRAIN tions per second. As a result of these researches r unciutnu m uvllj. ui bix wu uguis wuca we causes u talk and give forth musical sounds when persons spoke or instruments were .played into the telephone trans mitter. At the Land show In Omaha recently we llgbted these axes first by wireien. Some of i'uoiu we placed in a reflector of a locomotive headlight This greatly increased the range of distance through) which they could be heard. This 'speaking arc,' how.4 ever, seems destined to be nothing more than a scien tific toy. "Another thing that we did In the course of our research work was to take an electrlo truck weighing 6,500 pounda and run it around the shop yards at Omaha by. wireless waves. The car was equipped with an aerial, and we ran it at four different speeds. forward or back, under perfect control." Dr. Millener a Student. Dr. Millener, the Inventor, has been in the employ of the Union Pacific as an electrical expert for the last five years. He is now about 35. Prior to his going with the Union Pacific he Wks a practicing physician in Buffalo, N. Y., and distinguished himself there by his research work in the field of X-rays and other electrical phenomena. He Is a graduate of the Jeffer son Medical college of Philadelphia. He haa given several most Interesting demonstrations of his work at various exhibitions held la the Omaha Auditorium, the latest during the Land show held in January. Dr. Millener bas also demonstrated hiay discoveries for different 'clubs and organizations at borne and else where and bis work has not onl astonished, but pleased, all who have witnessed it