5.11 Cubic feet (consisting of 11 boxes, 1 folder, 2 oversize folders, 1 map case folder, 1 flat box (partial.))
Type:
Collection descriptions
Archival materials
Publications
Business ephemera
Manuscripts for publication
Steel plate engravings
Technical reports
Letterheads
Business cards
Advertising mail
Advertising fliers
Sales letters
Printed ephemera
Sales records
Advertising cards
Advertisements
Trade cards
Periodicals
Commercial catalogs
Manufacturers' catalogs
Manuals
Legal documents
Receipts
Invoices
Print advertising
Advertising
Ephemera
Business letters
Sales catalogs
Printed materials
Illustrations
Trade catalogs
Trade literature
Catalogues
Commercial correspondence
Business records
Printed material
Correspondence
Legislation (legal concepts)
Reports
Technical manuals
Date:
1819-1985
Summary:
A New York bookseller, Warshaw assembled this collection over nearly fifty years. The Warshaw Collection of Business Americana: Accounting and Bookkeeping forms part of the Warshaw Collection of Business Americana, Subseries 1.1: Subject Categories. The Subject Categories subseries is divided into 470 subject categories based on those created by Mr. Warshaw. These subject categories include topical subjects, types or forms of material, people, organizations, historical events, and other categories. An overview to the entire Warshaw collection is available here: Warshaw Collection of Business Americana
Scope and Contents:
The subject category Steel largely represents business records and advertisements created by steel manufacturers and distributors of steel-based goods or services. Additional materials include biographical writings about Andrew Carnegie, documentation about the effect of the steel industry on society, and educational material about the steel industry.
No complete set of business records are represented within the collection, however the United States Steel Corporation has notable representation within the business records.
Technical documentation about the production of steel-based products as well as background information about the United States Steel Industry and Andrew Carnegie are strong research strengths of this subject category.
Arrangement:
Steel is arranged in three subseries.
Business Records and Marketing Material
Genre
Subject
Forms Part Of:
Forms part of the Warshaw Collection of Business Americana.
Series 1: Business Ephemera
Series 2: Other Collection Divisions
Series 3: Isadore Warshaw Personal Papers
Series 4: Photographic Reference Material
Provenance:
Steel is a portion of the Business Ephemera Series of the Warshaw Collection of Business Americana, Accession AC0060 purchased from Isadore Warshaw in 1967. Warshaw continued to accumulate similar material until his death, which was donated in 1971 by his widow, Augusta. For a period after acquisition, related materials from other sources (of mixed provenance) were added to the collection so there may be content produced or published after Warshaw's death in 1969. This practice has since ceased.
Restrictions:
Collection is open for research. Some items may be restricted due to fragile condition.
Rights:
Collection items available for reproduction, but the Archives Center makes no guarantees concerning copyright restrictions. Other intellectual property rights may apply. Archives Center cost-recovery and use fees may apply when requesting reproductions.
Warshaw Collection of Business Americana Subject Categories: Steel, Archives Center, National Museum of American History, Smithsonian Institution.
Sponsor:
Funding for partial processing of the collection was supported by a grant from the Smithsonian Institution's Collections Care and Preservation Fund (CCPF).
Early aviation catalogs, photographs, periodicals, class notes, and scrapbooks as well as other materials collected by Javier Arnago detailing the evolution of early aircrafts built before and during World World I.
Scope and Contents:
This collection consists of early aviation materials, collected by Javier Arango, pertaining to the development of early 20th century aircrafts. The bulk of the material consists of air meet programs and memorabilia, engine and aeroplane catalogs, articles and periodicals, maps and charts, postcards and correspondence, class notes and technical manuals, scrapbooks and journals, and a variety of photographs. Materials in English, French, German, and Dutch. Aviators pioneers include: the Wright Brothers, Henry Farman, Louis Bleriot, Hubert Latham, Glenn Curtiss, Louis Paulhan, and other French and American pilots. Aircraft manufacturers represented include: Wright Brothers, Curtiss-Wright, Blériot (France), Antoinette (Société Anonyme Antoinette) (France), Deperdussin (France), Farman, Voisin (France), and other American, French, German, and British inventors prior to World War I.
Arrangement:
Collection organized into eight sections by material type. The first three sections 'Aeroplane Catalogs,' 'Engine Catalongs,' and 'Air meet Programs' are in original order, which is alphabetically arranged by company, aircraft, or engine name and thereunder chronologically by year. The 'Periodicals' section is also alphabetically arranged by title and thereunder chronologically by year. 'Additional Text Materials,' 'Scrapbooks and albums,' and 'Class notes and journals' alphabetically arranged by creator's surname or title. The 'Photographs' section is organized by subjects or event, orginially grouped by Arango, and thereunder alphabetically arranged.
Biographical / Historical:
Javier Arango (1962-2017) was an investment consultant, aircraft collector, avid pilot, and board member of the Smithsonian Institution's National Air and Space Museum. Graduating at Harvard University, he studied the history of science and became an authority of World War I aviation focusing on the progression of warplanes. Establishing his Aeroplane Collection with the construction of a triplane in 1980, he began collecting original materials from the 1900s and 1910s. With a passion for understanding and preserving the history of flight, Arango amassed an exemplary study of the evolution of early aviation.
Provenance:
Javier Arango Living Trust, Gift, 2022, NASM.2022.0033
Restrictions:
No restrictions on access
Rights:
Material is subject to Smithsonian Terms of Use. Should you wish to use NASM material in any medium, please submit an Application for Permission to Reproduce NASM Material, available at Permissions Requests.
3.25 Cubic feet (consisting of 7 boxes, 1 folder, 2 oversize folders, 1 map case folder.)
Type:
Collection descriptions
Archival materials
Catalogs
Invoices
Business records
Advertising fliers
Publications
Advertising mail
Commercial correspondence
Correspondence
Business ephemera
Printed ephemera
Business letters
Exhibition catalogs
Receipts
Sales letters
Trade literature
Advertising
Sales records
Ephemera
Manuals
Business cards
Sales catalogs
Illustrations
Trade catalogs
Print advertising
Advertising cards
Technical manuals
Advertisements
Periodicals
Reports
Mail order catalogs
Catalogues
Letterheads
Trade cards
Photographs
Manufacturers' catalogs
Date:
undated
1791-1943
Summary:
A New York bookseller, Warshaw assembled this collection over nearly fifty years. The Warshaw Collection of Business Americana: Accounting and Bookkeeping forms part of the Warshaw Collection of Business Americana, Subseries 1.1: Subject Categories. The Subject Categories subseries is divided into 470 subject categories based on those created by Mr. Warshaw. These subject categories include topical subjects, types or forms of material, people, organizations, historical events, and other categories. An overview to the entire Warshaw collection is available here: Warshaw Collection of Business Americana
Scope and Contents:
Scales contains business records and advertisements created by manufacturers and distributors of scales, as well as companies employed to weigh items for communities. Additional materials include scale design patents and educational material on weights and measures.
Extensive business documentation for the Riehlé Brothers is present. The Riehlé Brothers were a scale and testing-machine manufacturer based in Philadelphia. In 1865, Frederick Riehlé purchased two-fifths of interest in the Banks, Dinmore and Company and later helped coordinate the purchase of the Abbott Scale Works company. Frederick's brother Henry later purchased another three-fifths of interest in Banks, Dinmore and Company and the brothers changed the company name to the Riehlé Brothers in 1867.
Material concerning specific subject areas within the topic of scales provides a narrow window into the field of scales, weights, and measures but nonetheless a unique one. The subject category contains a broad view of the business of manufacturing scales and measuring goods for communities, as well as a small amount of social commentary on the necessity of the field in the 19th and 20th centuries.
Arrangement:
Scales is arranged in three subseries.
Business Records and Marketing Material
Genre
Subject
Forms Part Of:
Forms part of the Warshaw Collection of Business Americana.
Series 1: Business Ephemera
Series 2: Other Collection Divisions
Series 3: Isadore Warshaw Personal Papers
Series 4: Photographic Reference Material
Provenance:
Scales is a portion of the Business Ephemera Series of the Warshaw Collection of Business Americana, Accession AC0060 purchased from Isadore Warshaw in 1967. Warshaw continued to accumulate similar material until his death, which was donated in 1971 by his widow, Augusta. For a period after acquisition, related materials from other sources (of mixed provenance) were added to the collection so there may be content produced or published after Warshaw's death in 1969. This practice has since ceased.
Restrictions:
Collection is open for research. Some items may be restricted due to fragile condition.
Rights:
Collection items available for reproduction, but the Archives Center makes no guarantees concerning copyright restrictions. Other intellectual property rights may apply. Archives Center cost-recovery and use fees may apply when requesting reproductions.
Warshaw Collection of Business Americana Subject Categories: Scales, Archives Center, National Museum of American History, Smithsonian Institution.
Sponsor:
Funding for partial processing of the collection was supported by a grant from the Smithsonian Institution's Collections Care and Preservation Fund (CCPF).
2.44 Cubic feet (consisting of 4.5 boxes, 1 folder, 5 oversize folders, 2 flat boxes (partial), 1 map case folder.)
Type:
Collection descriptions
Archival materials
Business ephemera
Business letters
Publications
Receipts
Business cards
Trade literature
Logs (records)
Sales catalogs
Print advertising
Ephemera
Catalogs
Advertising mail
Commercial catalogs
Invoices
Trade cards
Technical reports
Trade catalogs
Advertising
Manuals
Reports
Manufacturers' catalogs
Commercial correspondence
Catalogues
Printed materials
Illustrations
Bulletins
Technical manuals
Printed material
Transcripts
Letterheads
Printed ephemera
Advertisements
Advertising cards
Radio scripts
Correspondence
Advertising fliers
Business records
Date:
1893-1992
Summary:
A New York bookseller, Warshaw assembled this collection over nearly fifty years. The Warshaw Collection of Business Americana: Accounting and Bookkeeping forms part of the Warshaw Collection of Business Americana, Subseries 1.1: Subject Categories. The Subject Categories subseries is divided into 470 subject categories based on those created by Mr. Warshaw. These subject categories include topical subjects, types or forms of material, people, organizations, historical events, and other categories. An overview to the entire Warshaw collection is available here: Warshaw Collection of Business Americana
Scope and Contents:
The radio category contains material primarily related to radio company products, radio broadcasts and programs, technical documentation on the use of radios, and material documenting the effect of radio on modern life. The bulk of the material covers sales catalogues and advertisements, though no complete records for single companies are present.
The radio broadcast transcripts and programs include fictional or anecdotal stories, transcripts of contests, interviews, or speeches, and notifications about future broadcasts.
Literature concerning the effect of radio on modern life includes brief radio historiographies, discussions about the need for advanced education for the radio field, and documentation of the use of radio in leisure time or in rural life. Additional publications address the uses and effects of radio during times of war. While no extensive documentation exists on any one topic, the publications may provide general histories of the radio with snapshots of specific facets of radio history.
Arrangement:
Radio is arranged in three subseries.
Business Records and Marketing Material
Genre
Subject
Forms Part Of:
Forms part of the Warshaw Collection of Business Americana.
Missing Title
Series 1: Business Ephemera
Series 2: Other Collection Divisions
Series 3: Isadore Warshaw Personal Papers
Series 4: Photographic Reference Material
Provenance:
Radio is a portion of the Business Ephemera Series of the Warshaw Collection of Business Americana, Accession AC0060 purchased from Isadore Warshaw in 1967. Warshaw continued to accumulate similar material until his death, which was donated in 1971 by his widow, Augusta. For a period after acquisition, related materials from other sources (of mixed provenance) were added to the collection so there may be content produced or published after Warshaw's death in 1969. This practice has since ceased.
Restrictions:
Collection is open for research. Some items may be restricted due to fragile condition.
Rights:
Collection items available for reproduction, but the Archives Center makes no guarantees concerning copyright restrictions. Other intellectual property rights may apply. Archives Center cost-recovery and use fees may apply when requesting reproductions.
Warshaw Collection of Business Americana Subject Categories: Radios, Archives Center, National Museum of American History, Smithsonian Institution
Sponsor:
Funding for partial processing of the collection was supported by a grant from the Smithsonian Institution's Collections Care and Preservation Fund (CCPF).
National Museum of American History (U.S.). Division of Electricity and Modern Physics Search this
Extent:
220 Cubic feet (534 boxes, 25 map-folders)
Type:
Collection descriptions
Archival materials
Technical manuals
Clippings
Patents
Correspondence
Blueprints
Letters patent
Photographs
Sale catalogs
Technical drawings
Date:
circa 1880-1950
Summary:
The collection forms a documentary record of over half a century of the history of radio, with the greatest emphasis on the period 1900-1935. The collection includes materials that span the entire history of the growth of the radio industry. It is useful for those historians and other researchers interested in technological development, economic history, and the impact of applications of technology on American life.
Scope and Contents:
The materials accumulated in this collection represent the overriding collecting passion of one individual, George H. Clark. The collection forms a documentary record of over half a century of the history of radio, with the greatest emphasis on the period 1900-1935.
The collection includes materials that span the entire history of the growth of the radio industry. It is useful for those historians and other researchers interested in technological development, economic history, and the impact of applications of technology on American life.
In particular, the collection is rich in biographical information on the men who developed the technical aspects of radio and the industry; information on the inception, growth, and activities of radio companies, most notably the National Electric Signaling Company and RCA; and in photographs of all aspects of Radioana.
While most materials document technical aspects of radio, there is much information (e.g. Series 109, 134) on broadcasting and on the early history of television.
The collection, housed in over 700 boxes (about 276 linear feet), was organized into 259 numbered "classes" or series by Clark. Sixty series numbers were never used or were eliminated by Clark and combined with other series. The unused numbers are scattered throughout the filing system. The collection also includes material from series that were eliminated. These materials were never reclassified and are included as an unprocessed series at the end of the series descriptions. The collection also contains material that was never assigned a "class" designation by Clark (Lettered Series: D, E, F, G, H).
The arrangement of the collection is Clark's own; his adaptation of the Navy filing system he helped devise in 1915. Clark periodically revised the filing system and reclassified items within it.
Clark assigned class numbers to types of equipment (e.g. broadcast receivers), systems (impulse-excited transmitters and systems), scientific theories (circuit theory), and topics (company history, biography). Box 1 contains descriptions of the classification system.
When Clark classified an item and filed it he also assigned a serial number. This classification begins with 1 (or 1A) for the first item in the class and continues with successive numbers as items were added. As a consequence, the order of individual items within a series reflects the order in which Clark filed them, not any logical relationship between the items. Clark created cross references for items dealing with more than one subject by making notations on blank sheets of paper placed in related series.
Clark made cross references between series when there was no logical relationship between them; that is, when a person using the collection would not normally look in the series. For example no cross reference would be made of an engineer from series 87 (portraits) to series 4 (biography), but one would be made from series 87 to series 142 (history of television) if the item showed the engineer, say, working on a television installation.
Clark created the insignia "SRM" as the sign on the bottom of all sheets of paper numbered by him for binding. SRM stood for Smithsonian Radio Museum. This replaced the earlier though not greatly used sign "CGM." For a time about 1930, the class number on each sheet was preceded by these: "C.G.M.", for Clark, Martin, and Goldsmith, the earliest contributors to what would become the Clark Radioana Collection. After about 1933-34 Clark used C.W.C. for Clark Wireless Collection.
There are many photographs located in most series throughout the collection. But there are also three exclusive photographic series. Lettered series A, B, C. See index; and also series descriptions under lettered series.
Arrangement:
The collection is divided into 223 series.
Numbered Series 1-233:
Series 1, Library Operating System, 1915-1950
Series 2, Apparatus Type Numbers, 1916-1931
Series 3, Photographic Lists, 1925-1928
Series 4, Biographies of Radio Personages, Technical Index to Correspondents in Series 4
Series 5, History of Radio Companies, 1895-1950
De Forest Radio Company, 1905-1930s
Jenkins Televsion Corporation, 1924-1931
Marconi Wireless Telegraph Company, 1908-1929
National Electric Signaling Company, 1896-1941
Wireless Specialty Apparatus Company, 1906-1929
Radio Corporation of America, 1895-1950
Series 6, Shore Stations, 1900-1940
Series 7, Marine Stations, 1900-1930s
Series 8, Broadcasting Stations, 1910s-1940s
Series 9, Amateur Stations, 1910s-1940s
Series 10, Miscellaneous Information, 1911-1914
Series 11, Radio Antiques, 1921-1938
Series 13, Specifications of Radio Apparatus, 1910s-1930s
Series 14, General History, 1899-1950s
Series 15, Radio Companies Catalogues & Bound Advertisements, 1873-1941
Series 16, Log Books, 1902-1923
Series 17, Radio Companies' House Organs, 1896-1942
Series 18, Prime Movers, 1904-1911
Series 19, Batteries, 1898-1934
Series 20, Rectifiers, 1875-1935
Series 21, Motor Generators, 1898-1936
Series 22, Nameplates of Apparatus, 1928
Series 23, Switchboards and Switchboard Instruments, 1910-1935
Series 24, Radio Frequency Switches, 1905-1905-1933
Series 25, Transmitter Transformers, 1893-1949
Series 26, Operating Keys, 1843-1949
Series 27, Power Type Interrupters, 1902-1938
Series 28, Protective Devices, 1910-1925
Series 30, Message Blanks, 1908-1938
Series 31, Transmitter Condensers, 1849-1943
Series 32, Spark Gaps, 1905-1913
Series 33, Transmitter Inductances, 1907-1922
Series 34, Transmitter Wave Changers, 1907-1924
Series 37, ARC Transmitters, 1907-1940
Series 38, Vacuum Tube Type of Radio Transmitter, 1914-1947
Series 39, Radio Transmitter, Radio-Frequency, Alternator Type, 1894-1940
Series 41, Vacuum Tubes, Transmitting Type, 1905-1948
Series 43, Receiving Systems, 1904-1934
Series 45, Broadcast Receivers, 1907-1948
Series 46, Code Receivers, 1902-1948
Series 47, Receiving Inductances, 1898-1944
Series 48, Receiving Condensers, 1871-1946
Series 49, Audio Signal Devices, 1876-1947
Series 50, Detectors, 1878-1944
Series 51, Amplifiers, 1903-1949
Series 52, Receiving Vacuum Tubes, 1905-1949
Series 53, Television Receivers, 1928-1948
Series 54, Photo-Radio Apparatus, 1910-1947
Series 59, Radio Schools, 1902-1945
Series 60, Loudspeakers, 1896-1946
Series 61, Insulators, 1844-1943
Series 62, Wires, 1906-1945
Series 63, Microphones, 1911-1947
Series 64, Biography, 1925-1948
Series 66, Antennas, 1877-1949
Series 67, Telautomatics, 1912-1944
Series 69, Direction Finding Equipment, Radio Compasses, 1885-1948
Series 71, Aircraft Transmitters, 1908-1947
Series 72, Field or Portables Transmitters, 1901-1941
Series 73, Mobile Radio Systems, 1884-1946
Series 74, Radio Frequency Measuring Instruments, 1903-1946
Series 75, Laboratory Testing Methods and Systems, 1891-1945
Series 76, Aircraft Receivers, 1917-1941
Series 77, Field Portable Receivers, 1906-1922
Series 78, Spark Transmitter Assembly, 1909-1940
Series 79, Spark Transmitter System, 1900-1945
Series 82, Firsts in Radio, undated
Series 85: Distance Records and Tests, 1898-1940
Series 87, Photographs of Radio Executives, and Technical Types, 1857-1952
Series 90, Radio Terms, 1857-1939
Series 92, Static Patents and Static Reducing Systems, 1891-1946
Series 93, Low Frequency Indicating Devices, 1904-1946
Series 95, Articles on Radio Subjects, 1891-1945
Series 96, Radio in Education, 1922-1939
Series 98, Special Forms of Broadcasting, 1921-1943
Series 99, History of Lifesaving at Sea by Radio, 1902-1949
Series 100, History of Naval Radio, 1888-1948
Series 101, Military Radio, 1898-1946
Series 102, Transmitting & Receiving Systems, 1902-1935
Series 103, Receiving Methods, 1905-1935
Series 108, Codes and Ciphers, 1894-1947
Series 109, Schedules of Broadcasting & TV Stations, 1905-1940
Series 112, Radio Shows and Displays, 1922-1947
Series 114, Centralized Radio Systems, 1929-1935
Series 116, United States Government Activities in Radio, 1906-1949
Series 117, Technical Tables, 1903-1932
Series 120, Litigation on Radio Subjects, 1914-1947
Series 121, Legislation, 1914-1947
Series 122, History of Radio Clubs, 1907-1946
Series 123, Special Applications of Radio Frequency, 1924-1949
Series 124, Chronology, 1926-1937
Series 125, Radio Patents & Patent Practices, 1861-1949
Series 126, Phonographs, 1894-1949
Series 127, Piezo Electric Effect, 1914-1947
Series 128, ARC Transmitting & Reciving Systems, 1904-1922
Series 129, Spark Systems, 1898-1941
Series 130, Vacuum Tubes Systems, 1902-1939
Series 132, Radiophone Transmitting & Receiving System, 1906-1947
Series 133, Photo-Radio, 1899-1947
Series 134, History of Radio Broadcasting, 1908-
Series 135, History of Radiotelephony, Other Than Broadcasting
Series 136, History of Amateur Radio
Series 138, Transoceanic Communication
Series 139, Television Transmitting Stations
Series 140, Radio Theory
Series 142, History of Television
Series 143, Photographs
Series 144, Radio Publications
Series 145, Proceedings of Radio Societies
Series 146: Radio Museums
Series 147, Bibliography of Radio Subjects and Apparatus
Series 148, Aircraft Guidance Apparatus
Series 150, Audio Frequency Instruments
Series 151, History of Radio for Aircrafts
Series 152, Circuit Theory
Series 154, Static Elimination
Series 161, Radio in Medicine
Series 162, Lighting
Series 163, Police Radio
Series 169, Cartoons
Series 173, Communications, Exclusive of Radio (after 1895)
Series 174, Television Methods and Systems
Series 182, Military Portable Sets
Series 189, Humor in Radio (see Series 169)
Series 209, Short Waves
Series 226, Radar
Series 233, Television Transmitter
Lettered Series
Series A, Thomas Coke Knight RCA Photographs, circa 1902-1950
Series B, George H. Clark Collection of Photographs by ClassSeries C, Clark Unorganized and/or Duplicate Photographs
Series D, Miscellaneous
Series E, News Clippings Series F: Radio Publications
Series G, Patent Files of Darby and Darby, Attorneys, circa 1914-1935
Series H, Blank Telegram Forms from many Companies and Countries Throughout the World
Series I (eye), Miscellaneous Series
Series J, Research and Laboratory Notebooks
Series K, Index to Photographs of Radio Executives and Technical Types
Series L, Index to Bound Volumes of Photos in Various Series
Series M, Index to David Sarnoff Photographs
Series N, Federal Government Personnel Files
Series O, Addenda Materials
Biographical / Historical:
George Howard Clark, born February 15, 1881, at Alberton, Prince Edward Island, Canada, emigrated to the United States at the age of fourteen. He worked as a railroad telegraph operator for the Boston and Maine Railroad during high school and college. In his unpublished autobiography he wrote:
In 1888, when I was a lad of seven, I suddenly blossomed out as a scrapbook addict, and for years I gave up boyhood games for the pleasure of sitting in a lonely attic and 'pasting up' my books ... By 1897, in high school, I graduated to beautiful pictures, and made many large size scrapbooks ... Around that time, too, I became infatuated with things electrical, and spent many evenings copying in pen and ink the various electrical text books in the Everett, Mass., Public Library. Clark began collecting material pertaining to wireless or radio in 1902. In 1903 he graduated from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology with a Bachelor of Science degree in Electrical Engineering. During his last year of college he specialized in radio work under the instruction of Professor John Stone Stone and after graduation went to work for Stone's radio company, the Stone Telegraph and Telephone Company, of Boston.
In 1908 Clark took a competitive examination open to all wireless engineers in the United States and entered the civilian service of the Navy. He was stationed at the Washington Navy Yard, with special additional duty at the Navy's Bureau of Steam Engineering and at the National Bureau of Standards.
In 1915 Clark helped devise a classification system for Navy equipment, assigning a code number to each item. This system of classification for blueprints, photographs, reports, and general data, was prepared by Arthur Trogner, Guy Hill, and Clark, all civilian radio experts with the US Navy Department in Washington. In 1918 Clark adopted the 1915 Navy classification system for organizing the radio data he was accumulating. Clark created the term "Radioana" at this time. He began spending his evenings and weekends pasting up his collection and numbering pages. At this time he bound the accumulated material. It totaled 100 volumes.
In July 1919, after resigning from the Navy, Clark joined the engineering staff of the Marconi Telegraph Company of America, which became part of the Radio Corporation of America (RCA) later the same year. His first work was at Belmar and Lakewood, New Jersey, assisting the chief engineer, Roy A. Weagant, in his development of circuits to reduce the interference caused by static (static reduction). Clark and his wife were assigned to the unheated Engineer's Cottage. His wife decided not to stay and left for Florida. Clark moved his trunks of wireless material to the heated RCA hotel at Belmar and spent most of the winter "pasting." As Clark mentions, "From that time on I was wedded to scraps."
After a year of work in New Jersey, Clark was assigned to the sales department in New York, where he devised the "type number system" used by RCA. This type number system, for example, gave the designation UV 201 to the company's first amplifier tube.
From 1922 to 1934 Clark was in charge of RCA's newly created Show Division, which held exhibits of new and old radio apparatus at state fairs, department stores, and radio shows. About 1928 Clark started an antique radio apparatus museum for RCA. RCA's board of directors announced:
Recognizing the importance of providing a Museum for the Radio Art to house the rapidly disappearing relics of earlier days, and the desirability of collecting for it without further delay examples of apparatus in use since the inception of radio, the Board of Directors of RCA has made an initial appropriation of $100,000, as the nucleus of a fund for the establishment of a National Radio Museum. A plan for ultimately placing the museum under the wing of the Smithsonian Institution was coupled with the goal of the Institution's gathering the largest possible library of wireless data.
Around 1933 the RCA traveling exhibition program ended and Clark started classifying his collected "radioana" material. The objects of the museum were eventually turned over for exhibit purposes to the Rosenwald Museum in Chicago and the Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn, Michigan, when space was not forthcoming at the Smithsonian. A list of objects sent to the two museums (with tag and case numbers) is in Series 1, Box A. The "radioana" collection remained under Clark's care during the 1930s, and became of increasing use to RCA. Clark continued to add to the material.
Between 1934 and 1942 Clark was in court many times regarding patent infringements. Clark's wireless data was useful and he testified frequently, for example, in RCA's suit against the United States in the Court of Claims over the Marconi tuning patents and in the Westinghouse Company's suit against the United States over the heterodyne. Patent specifications and material regarding these and other radio industry suits are found throughout this collection.
In 1946 RCA retired George Clark and denied him space to house his "radioana" collection. Clark wished to remain in New York and house the collection somewhere in the city where it would be open at all times to the public and where it would be maintained. He hoped to continue cataloguing the collection and writing books from its information. He wanted to keep the collection under his control for as long as he was capable of using it.
George H. Clark died in 1956 and his collection was subsequently given to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. In 1959 the collection was given to the Smithsonian's new Museum of History and Technology, where space was available to house it. The collection remained in the Division of Electricity until the spring of 1983 when it was transferred to the Archives Center.
Brief Company Histories From The Radio Industry, 1900-1930s:
Introduction
At the end of the nineteenth century, when Guglielmo Marconi began his first wireless company, Western Union, Postal Telegraph, and the American Telephone and Telegraph Company (AT&T) were the major enterprises in electrical communications. General Electric, Western Electric, and Westinghouse were the major producers of electrical equipment. All these earlier developments set the stage for the expansion of the radio industry.
General Electric, which dominated the lighting industry, was formed in 1892 as a merger of the Edison and Thomson-Houston companies. It was active in building central power station equipment; controlled nearly all the important early patents in electric railways; took a leading part in the introduction of trolley systems; and was the principal supplier of electric motors. Westinghouse promoted the alternating current system and installed the first AC central station in Buffalo, NY, during the winter of 1866-1867. After years of patent litigation, in 1896 GE and Westinghouse agreed to share their patents on electrical apparatus.
American Bell Telephone Company purchased Western Electric in 1881. Western Electric had a strong patent position in telephone equipment and in industrial power apparatus, such as arc lamps, generators, motors, and switchboard equipment.
Until RCA was formed in 1919, these established electrical companies played no active part in the early development of the American radio industry. They were in difficult financial positions, reorganizing, or concentrating their efforts and resources on improving their existing products.
The revolution in "wireless" technology, which began in earnest after 1900, centered in New York City, home of the Lee de Forest and American Marconi companies, and in Boston, headquarters of John Stone Stone and Reginald Fessenden.
Information in this section was compiled from the Clark Collection; the Invention and Innovation in the Radio Industry by W. Rupert Maclaurin, Macmillan Company, New York, 1949; and Radio Pioneers, Institute of Radio Engineers, Commemorating the Radio Pioneers Dinner, Hotel Commodore, New York, NY, November 8, 1945.
The De Forest Companies
Lee De Forest (1873-1961), inventor of the three-element vacuum tube or triode (1906) and the feedback circuit, was one of the first Americans to write a doctoral thesis on wireless telegraphy: "The Reflection of Short Hertzian Waves from the Ends of Parallel Wires," Yale University, 1899. The grid-controlled tube or audion of De Forest was first a radio detector, 1906-1907; in 1912 was adapted to an amplifier; and later to an oscillator. When it was perfected as a high vacuum tube, it became the great electronic instrument of electrical communications.
De Forest began work in the Dynamo Department at the Western Electric Company in 1899. Six months later he was promoted to the telephone laboratory. In 1900 De Forest went to work for the American Wireless Telegraph Company where he was able to carry out work on his "responder." However, after three months when De Forest refused to turn over the responder to the company, he was fired.
In the following year De Forest had a number of jobs, was active as an inventor, and created numerous firms to manufacture his inventions. In 1901 De Forest joined with Ed Smythe, a former Western Electric colleague and a collaborator in his research, to found the firm of De Forest, Smythe, and Freeman. Between 1902 and 1906 De Forest took out thirty-four patents on all phases of wireless telegraphy. The responder that he had been working on for so long never proved satisfactory.
The numerous De Forest companies, reflected his many interests and his inability to carry one project through to a conclusion. Unlike Marconi, but similar to Fessenden, De Forest had great inventive skill which resulted in a great number of companies; but none lasted long. The original partnership of 1901 led to the Wireless Telegraph Co. of America (1901), the De Forest Wireless Telegraph Company (Maine) (1902), and the American De Forest Wireless Telegraph Company (1903), to name a few.
The American De Forest Wireless Telegraph Company was incorporated after De Forest met a stock promoter, Abraham White. While many stations were built by this company, many never sent a message due to static interference. In 1907 two speculators from Denver with large holdings of company stock put the company out of business. The assets were sold to a new company that these speculators organized, the United Wireless Telephone Company. De Forest was forced to resign. He took the triode patents with him.
De Forest joined with one of White's stock salesmen, James Dunlop Smith, and together with De Forest's patent attorney, Samuel E. Darby, they formed a new corporation, the De Forest Radio Telephone Company in 1907. This company set out to develop wireless communication by means of the radio telephone.
In January 1910 De Forest staged the first opera broadcast, with Enrico Caruso singing. The Radio Telephone Company went bankrupt in 1911 following an aborted merger with North American Wireless Corporation. In 1913 he reorganized the company as the Radio Telephone and Telegraph Company and began producing the triode.
The Marconi Company brought a patent suit, claiming the triode infringed on the Fleming valve to which it had rights. In 1916 the court decided that Marconi had infringed the three element De Forest patent and that De Forest had infringed the two element Fleming valve. The result was that neither company could manufacture the triode.
In 1920 RCA acquired the De Forest triode rights through cross-licensing agreements with AT&T which had recently purchased the rights to it. De Forest's company was no match for GE, Westinghouse, and RCA. The De Forest Radio Company (1923) went bankrupt in 1928, was reorganized in 1930, and went into receivership in 1933. RCA eventually purchased its assets.
Marconi Companies
Guglielmo Marconi (1874-1937) came from a wealthy and well connected Italian family. He was able to spend his time developing his inventions and following his own course of action. Marconi spent his entire life developing wireless communication into a "practical" reality. In 1905 Marconi invented a directional antenna. In 1909 he shared with Karl Ferdinand Braun the Nobel prize in physics. And in 1912 he invented the time spark system for the generation of continuous waves. The principal patents in his name were improved types of vertical antennas; improved coherer; magnetic detector for the detection of wireless signals; and improvements on methods of selective tuning. Two other inventions of great importance to the Marconi companies' patent structure were the Oliver Lodge tuning patent and the Ambrose Fleming valve.
In 1895 Marconi made the first successful transmission of long wave signals. The following year he met William Preece, engineer-in-chief of the British Post Office, who was interested in inductive wireless telegraphy. This meeting led to the formation in 1897 of the Marconi Wireless Telegraph Company Ltd. In 1898 he transmitted signals across the English Channel. In 1899 an American subsidiary was formed. The various Marconi companies were the dominant enterprises in both British and American wireless until 1919 when RCA was formed.
From a business standpoint, wireless did not become profitable until long distance communications were accomplished. On December 12, 1901 in St. John's, Newfoundland, Marconi received a telegraph signal in the form of repetitions of the Morse telegraphic letter "S" transmitted from the Marconi station at Poldhu, Cornwall, England. This success, however, was met by opposition from vested interests, particularly the Anglo-American Telegraph Company whose cables terminated in Newfoundland.
So as not to restrict his company's future to one front alone, Marconi decided to exploit the field of communication with ships at sea. In order to control this field he decided in 1900 to lease his apparatus rather than sell it outright. This strategy did not work. Competition developed in Germany (Telefunken Corporation) and the United States (American De Forest and its successor, United Wireless) and Marconi was forced to sell rather than lease apparatus to the navies of various countries. He nevertheless retained numerous restrictions. This led to further friction. At the height of this debacle English stations worldwide refused to communicate with ships without Marconi equipment. This absurd and dangerous situation had to change and coastal stations opened up to all senders in 1908.
Marconi's system was based on spark technology. He saw no need for voice transmission. He felt the Morse code adequate for communication between ships and across oceans. He, along with most others, did not foresee the development of the radio and the broadcasting industry. He was a pragmatist and uninterested in scientific inquiry in a field where commercial viability was unknown.
For these reasons Marconi left the early experimentation with the radio telephone to others, particularly Lee De Forest and Reginald Fessenden.
National Electric Signaling Company
Canadian-born Reginald Fessenden (1866-1932), one of the principal early radio inventors and the first important inventor to experiment with wireless, left the University of Pittsburgh in 1900 to work for the U.S. Weather Bureau. There he invented the liquid barretter, an early radio receiver, and attempted to work out a means for wireless transmission of weather forecasts. After a squabble over patent rights, Fessenden resigned in 1902.
The National Electric Signaling Company (NESCO), primarily intended to support Fessenden's work on wireless, telegraphy, and telephony, was formed by Fessenden and two Pittsburgh capitalists, Hay Walker, Jr. and Thomas H. Given. It began as an inventor's laboratory and never proved successful as a business venture.
Fessenden recognized that a continuous wave transmission was required for speech and he continued the work of Nikola Tesla, John Stone Stone, and Elihu Thomson on this subject. Fessenden felt he could also transmit and receive Morse code better by the continuous wave method than with a spark-apparatus as Marconi was using.
In 1903 Fessenden's first high-frequency alternator needed for continuous wave transmission was built to his specifications by Charles Steinmetz of GE. In 1906 Fessenden obtained a second alternator of greater power from GE and on Christmas Eve broadcast a program of speech and music. The work on this alternator was given to Ernst F. W. Alexanderson. It took years for Alexanderson to develop an alternator capable of transmitting regular voice transmissions over the Atlantic. But by 1916 the Fessenden-Alexanderson alternator was more reliable for transatlantic communication than the spark apparatus.
Fessenden also worked on continuous-wave reception. This work arose out of his desire for a more effective type of receiver than the coherer, a delicate device that was limited by its sensitivity on a rolling ship at sea. In 1903 he developed a new receiving mechanism - the electrolytic detector.
As his work progressed Fessenden evolved the heterodyne system. However, due to faulty construction and the fact that it was ahead of its time, heterodyne reception was not fully appreciated until the oscillating triode was devised, thus allowing a practical means of generating the local frequency.
Between 1905 and 1913 Fessenden developed a completely self-sustaining wireless system. However, constant quarrels between Fessenden, Walker, and Given culminated in Fessenden's forming the Fessenden Wireless Company of Canada. He felt a Canadian company could better compete with British Marconi. As a result, his backers dismissed Fessenden from NESCO in January of 1911. Fessenden brought suit, won, and was awarded damages. To conserve assets pending appeal, NESCO went into receivership in 1912, and Samuel Kintner was appointed general manager of the company.
In 1917 Given and Walker formed International Signal Company (ISC) and transferred NESCO's patent assets to the new company. Westinghouse obtained majority control of ISC through the purchase of $2,500,000 worth of stock. The company was then reincorporated as The International Radio Telegraph Company. The Westinghouse-RCA agreements were signed in 1921 and International's assets were transferred to RCA.
RCA
The development of the radio industry accelerated after 1912. This was due to several factors, the most important of which was the passage of legislation by the US government requiring ships at sea to carry wireless. This created a market incentive and spurred the growth of the industry. Also, with the outbreak of World War I, the larger electrical companies turned their manufacturing output to radio apparatus, supporting the war effort. Three firms were prominent in this industrial endeavor: AT&T, GE, and Westinghouse.
AT&T's early contributions to this effort centered on their improvements of De Forest's triode, particularly in the evolution of circuits, the redesign of the mechanical structure, and an increase in the plate design. The importation of the Gaede molecular pump from Germany created a very high vacuum. The resulting high-vacuum tube brought the practical aspects of the wireless telephone closer to reality. By August 1915 speech had been sent by land wire to Arlington, Va., automatically picked up there via a newly developed vacuum-tube transmitter, and subsequently received at Darien, Canal Zone. By 1920 AT&T had purchased the rights to the De Forest triode and feedback circuit, and had placed itself in a strong position in the evolution of radio technology.
GE centered its efforts on the alternator, assigning Ernst F. W. Alexanderson to its design, and on further development of vacuum tube equipment for continuous wave telegraph transmission. By 1915 Alexanderson, Irving Langmuir, William D. Coolidge, and others had developed a complete system of continuous wave transmission and reception for GE.
As can be seen, both AT&T and GE were diverting major time and expenditures on vacuum tube research. This inevitably led to patent interferences and consequently, to cross-licensing arrangements.
Westinghouse was not in the strategic position of GE and AT&T. Nevertheless, during the war it did manufacture large quantities of radio apparatus, motors, generators, and rectifiers for the European and American governments. Postwar moves led Westinghouse into full partnership with the other two companies.
By the end of the war, all three companies had committed significant resources to wireless. They were hampered internationally, however, by the Marconi Company's dominant status, and in the United States they were blocked by opposing interests with control of key patents.
The US government also was concerned with this lack of solidarity in the wireless industry and over the British domination of the field worldwide. This impasse set a fascinating and complicated stage for the formation of the RCA.
Owen D. Young, legal counselor for GE, was instrumental in breaking the impasse. Through an innovative and far-reaching organizational consolidation, Young was able to persuade British Marconi that persistence in monopoly was a fruitless exercise, because of the strong US government feelings. Marconi, realizing the harm of a potential American boycott, finally agreed to terms. GE purchased the controlling interest in American Marconi, and RCA was formed. Young was made chairman of the board of RCA, while Edwin J. Nally and David Sarnoff of the old American Marconi were appointed president and commercial manager respectively.
On July 1, 1920, RCA signed a cross-licensing agreement with AT&T. The telephone company purchased one half million shares of RCA common and preferred stock for several considerations -- the most important being that all current and future radio patents of the two companies were available to each other royalty-free for ten years. Many provisions of these agreements were ambiguous and led to later squabbles between the RCA partners.
In May 1920 Westinghouse, which had an efficient radio manufacturing organization, formed an alliance with the International Radio and Telegraph Company (NESCO's successor). Westinghouse's part ownership gave them control of Fessenden's patents, particularly continuous-wave transmission and heterodyne transmission. Westinghouse also wisely purchased in October of 1920 Armstrong's patents on the regenerative and superheterodyne circuits -- which also included some of Columbia University professor Michael Pupin's patents. This placed Westinghouse in a strong bargaining position vis-à-vis RCA and in their new consolidated corporation. Westinghouse joined the growing group of radio companies on June 30, 1921. With these mergers, RCA agreed to purchase forty percent of its radio apparatus from Westinghouse and sixty percent from GE.
Through these and other legal arrangements, RCA obtained the rights to over 2,000 patents. These amounted to practically all the patents of importance in the radio science of that day. As a result, other firms in the radio industry, for example, the United Fruit Company and the Wireless Specialty Apparatus Company, entered into cross-licensing arrangements with RCA.
RCA also made arrangements internationally with the three dominant companies in radio communication in their respective countries. British Marconi, Compagnie Generale de Telegraphie sans fil, and Telefunken. Each corporation was given exclusive rights to use the other companies' patents within their own territories.
The rise of amateur radio in the 1920s and, to a greater extent, the demand for new products by the general public contributed to the rise of the broadcasting industry. This put a strain on the earlier agreements between the major radio corporations and between 1921 and 1928 there was a struggle over patents for control of the evolving medium.
An initial attempt by AT&T to control the broadcasting industry -- using its earlier cross-licensing agreements to manufacture radio telephone transmitting equipment -- began with AT&T's disposal of RCA stock holdings in 1922-1923. It ended in 1926 with a new cross-licensing agreement which gave AT&T exclusive patent rights in the field of public service telephony and gave GE, RCA, and Westinghouse exclusive patent rights in the areas covered by wireless telegraphy, entertainment broadcasting, and the manufacture of radio sets and receiving tubes for public sale.
In 1926 after the agreements were finalized, RCA, GE, and Westinghouse joined forces and established the National Broadcasting Company (NBC). Fifty percent of the stock went to RCA, thirty percent to GE, and twenty percent to Westinghouse. The new company was divided into three divisions: the Red, Blue, and Pacific Networks. Independent, competing networks soon emerged. William S. Paley and his family formed the Columbia Broadcasting System (CBS) in 1927. The Mutual Broadcasting System was formed in 1934.
By 1928 RCA had strong patent positions in all major areas of the radio industry, including the research, development and manufacture of vacuum tubes and speakers. Most small companies entering the industry in the 1920s produced their products based on prior research by others and on expired patents. An RCA license, therefore, was essential for the manufacture of any modern radio set or vacuum tube.
In the late 1920s new developments in the reproduction of sound, produced significant changes in the phonograph industry. Among those new developments were the introduction of the electronic record, and the marketing of the Radiola 104 Loudspeaker in 1926. In 1929 RCA purchased the Victor Talking Machine Company. This changed not only the quality but the sales of the phonograph and the phonograph record. A new entertainment industry was born and an ever-expanding market for consumer products was created with cultural implications that continue today.
Telefunken
German industrialists were eager to break the Marconi Company's monopoly. Although Marconi had patents on his inventions in Germany, the Germans developed a rival system through the Telefunken Corporation, incorporated in 1903, based on the inventions of Professor Ferdinand Braun, Dr. Rudolf Slaby, and Count George von Arco.
Before 1903 the Braun-Siemens and Halske system had been developed by Gesellschaft fur Drahtlose Telegraphie (GFDT). The Slaby-Arco system had been developed by Allgemeine Electrizitats-Gesellschaft. After litigation over patents, the German court handed down a decision in favor of the GFDT. The Kaiser, with national interests in mind, ordered that the rivalry cease. The two systems were amalgamated under GFDT, and became known as the Telefunken.
Chronology of Some Significant Events In The History of The Radio Industry
1895 -- Marconi experiments with Hertz's oscillator and Branley's coherer.
1897 -- In March Marconi demonstrates his wireless system on Salisbury Plain, near London, and files a complete patent specification. In May trials of Marconi's system are made over water between Lavernock and Flatholm, a distance of three miles. On May 13, communication is established between Lavernock Point and Brean Down, a distance of eight miles. German scientist Professor Slaby is present. The first Marconi station is erected at the Needles, Isle of Wight. A distance of fourteen and one-half miles is bridged by wireless. In December the Marconi station at the Needles communicates with a ship eighteen miles at sea.
1898 -- In England Oliver Lodge files a complete specification covering inventions in wireless telegraphy.
1899 -- The New York Herald uses Marconi's wireless telegraphy to report the progress of the International Yacht races between the Columbia and the Shamrock off New York harbor in September. US. Navy vessels make trials of Marconi's wireless telegraph system. The cruiser New York and the battleship Massachusetts are equipped with apparatus. Fessenden develops improvements in methods of wireless telegraph signaling.
1900 -- The Marconi International Marine Communication Company is organized on April 25th in London. Reginald Aubrey Fessenden begins work at the United States Weather Bureau. Over the next two years he invents the liquid barretter, an improved radio receiver.
1901 -- In February on board the SS Philadelphia, Marconi receives wireless signals over a distance of 1,551 miles. In March Marconi wireless telegraph service begins between islands of the Hawaiian group. On December 12, Marconi receives transatlantic signal at St. John's, Newfoundland from Poldhu, Cornwall, England. The Canadian government orders two Marconi telegraph sets for use at coastal points along the Strait of Belle Isle.
1901 -- Fessenden procures US patent no. 706737 for a system of radio signaling employing long waves (low frequency). De Forest develops a system of wireless telegraphy in Chicago. 1903-06 10,000 to 50,000 cycle machines, 1 kW, are developed by Steinmetz and by Alexanderson of GE for Fessenden. 1905 Marconi procures patent number 14788 in England, covering the invention of the horizontal directional antenna.
1906 -- At Brant Rock, Massachusetts, Fessenden employs a generator of one-half kW capacity, operating at 75,000 cycles, for radio purposes. He succeeds in telephoning a distance of eleven miles by means of wireless telephone apparatus.
1907 -- De Forest procures a U. S. patent for an audion amplifier of pulsating or alternating current.
1908 -- Marconi stations in Canada and England are opened for radio telegraph service across the Atlantic. Fessenden constructs a 70,000-cycle alternator with an output of 2.5 kW. at 225 volts, for radio signaling purposes. He reports successful radio telephone tests between Brant Rock and Washington, DC, a distance of 600 miles.
1909 -- US House of Representatives passes the Burke Bill for the compulsory use of radio telegraphy on certain classes of vessels. The United Wireless Telegraph Company and the Radio Telephone Company of New York (De Forest and Stone systems) begin the erection of radio stations in the Central and Western states. Marconi shares with Ferdinand Braun of Germany the Nobel prize in recognition of contributions in wireless telegraphy.
1910 -- An act of the US government requires radio equipment and operators on certain types of passenger ships. The Glace Bay, Nova Scotia, Marconi station is opened in September. This station communicates with Clifden, Ireland. The transatlantic tariff is seventeen cents a word.
1911 -- A radio section is organized by the US Department of Commerce to enforce the provisions of national radio legislation. Marconi Wireless Telegraph Company acquires the Lodge-Muirhead patents.
1912 -- Rotary gap is used with Fessenden 100 kW 500 cycle spark set at NAA, the Navy's first high-power station at Arlington, Virginia. Marconi Wireless of America acquires property of the United Wireless Telegraph Company. British Marconi secures the important radio patents of Bellini and Tosi, Italian inventors. Wreck of the SS Titanic on April 15th. The act of 1910 is extended on July 23 to cover cargo vessels. requires an auxiliary source of power on ships and two or more skilled radio apparatus operators on certain types of passenger ships. On August 13, an act provides for licensing radio operators and transmitting stations.
1912-1913 -- High vacuum amplifying tubes (an improvement on De Forest's), using the findings of pure science, are produced almost simultaneously in two great industrial laboratories, by Dr. H. D. Arnold of AT&T and Irving Langmuir of GE.
1915 -- De Forest Ultra-audion three-step (cascade) audio amplifier is announced and introduced into practice.
1916 -- GE and the Western Electric Company develop the first experimental vacuum tube radiotelephone systems for the Navy.
1917-1918 -- First production of vacuum tubes in quantity, both coated filament and tungsten filament types, by Western Electric Company and GE.
1918 -- Lloyd Espenschied procures US patent number 1,256,889 for the invention of a duplex radio telegraph system. (See Lloyd Espenschied Papers, Archives Center, NMAH, Collection #13.) The House of Representatives passes a resolution on July 5, authorizing the President to take over management of telegraph and telephone systems due to war conditions.
1919 -- Bills are introduced in Congress for permanent government control of radio stations. The widespread resentment of amateurs has more to do with the defeat of these bills than the objections of commercial companies. Roy Alexander Weagant, New York, reports having developed means of reducing disturbances to radio reception caused by atmospherics or static. This is the first successful static-reducing system. GE purchases the holdings of the British Marconi Company in the Marconi Wireless Telegraph Company of America, the name of the latter company being changed to Radio Corporation of America (RCA) in October. Edward J. Nally is elected president of the new company.
1920 -- E. F. W. Alexanderson is appointed Chief Engineer of RCA. RCA begins the installation of 200-kW Alexanderson alternators at Bolinas, California, and Marion, Massachusetts. The Tropical Radio Telegraph Company, a subsidiary of the United Fruit Company, New York, operates ten long-distance radio stations at points in Central and South Americirca RCA purchases 6,000 acres at Rocky Point, Long Island, New York, and begins erection of a Radio Central station, comprising a number of operating units for communication with European stations and stations in South Americirca On May 15, RCA inaugurates radio telegraph services between installations at Chatham and Marion, Massachusetts, and stations at Stavanger and Jaerobe, Norway. Westinghouse Company's radio station KDKA, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, broadcasts returns of the national elections, November 2. Development, design, and manufacture by GE of the early receiving and transmitting tubes made available to the public by RCA (UV-200,201,202). Radio telegraph stations and properties taken over by the government under war time powers are returned to their owners at midnight, February 29. The government calls for bids for the sale of large quantities of surplus radio and telegraph and telephone apparatus purchased for war needs and not used.
1921 -- RCA develops Vacuum tubes UV-200(detector) and UV-201(amplifier) -- both triodes with brass shells known as the UV base, and incorporating a filament that required 1 ampere at 5 volts for operation -- for storage battery operation; and at the same time also released to the public the WD-11 for dry cell operation, which employed an oxide-coated tungsten filament. RCA station at Rocky Point, Long Island, opens on November 5. WJZ station established by the Westinghouse Company in Newark, NJ. RCA broadcast station at Roselle Park, NJ (WDY) opens on December 15. It continues operation until February 15, 1922, when its operation is transferred to WJZ, Newark, previously owned by Westinghouse. RCA installs 200-kW alternator at Tuckerton, NJ.
1922 -- First use of tube transmitters by RCA for service from the United States to England and Germany. RCA begins substitution of tube transmitters on ships to replace spark sets. RCA begins replacement of crystal receivers by tube receivers on ships.
1923 -- Broadcast stations WJZ and WJY opened in New York in May by RCA. WRC opens in Washington on August 1. The UV-201A, receiving tubes developed by GE and consuming only 1/4 of an ampere are introduced by RCA. Tungsten filaments coated and impregnated with thorium were employed.
1924 -- Edwin H. Armstrong, demonstrates the superheterodyne receiver on March 6th. In November RCA experiments with radio photographs across the Atlantic. RCA markets the superheterodyne receivers for broadcast reception.
1925-26 -- Dynamic loudspeakers introduced. Magnetic pick-up phonograph recording and reproduction developed. RCA opens radio circuit to Dutch East Indies. Direction-finders introduced on ships.
1927 -- Fully self-contained AC radio receivers introduced.
Provenance:
The collection was donated to the Smithsonian in 1959.
Restrictions:
Collection is open for research but a portion of the collection remains unprocessed and is stored off-site and special arrangements must be made to work with it. Contact the Archives Center for information at archivescenter@si.edu or 202-633-3270.
Gloves must be worn when handling unprotected photographs, negatives, and slides.
Rights:
Collection items available for reproduction, but the Archives Center makes no guarantees concerning copyright restrictions. Other intellectual property rights may apply. Archives Center cost-recovery and use fees may apply when requesting reproductions.
Wright-Patterson Air Force Base (Ohio) Search this
Extent:
733.77 Cubic feet (1508 document boxes)
Type:
Collection descriptions
Archival materials
Correspondence
Publications
Reports
Photographs
Date:
1915-1955
Summary:
Throughout its history the Engineering Division/Materiel Division at Wright Field in Dayton, Ohio, maintained a catalogued library of technical documents, which was turned over to the Air Force Museum and later donated to the National Air and Space Museum. The collection consists of reports and other documents on a variety of aviation-related topics, including general science (aeronautics, physics, chemistry, etc); military air service personnel, organization, and equipment for both US and foreign air forces; as well as operations, and so on. Currently, the finding aid only covers documents from the D52.1 subject code (Airplanes, arranged alphabetically) and only those that are physically located in the Wright Field Technical Documents Library.
Scope and Contents:
The collection consists of reports and other documents on a variety of aviation-related topics, including general science (aeronautics, physics, chemistry, etc); military air service personnel, organization, and equipment for both US and foreign air forces; as well as operations, and so on. Information on foreign services and equipment is usually from military intelligence reports, although some foreign documents or translations are included. The material also includes a large section of test reports from the Material Division itself.
Arrangement:
Every document in the collection has been assigned a multi-part Wright Field Number. This number is adapted from the Air Force central decimal correspondence filing system. Wright Field Numbers are written in the format:
• Subject Code: This number begins with an alpha-numeric subject code. For example, D52.1 (Airplanes, arranged alphabetically).
• Category Suffix: A more specific textual subject reference. For example, in the D52.1 subjects, the suffix is usually a manufacturer name, aircraft name, or a general type of aircraft. (Original Wright Field cataloguers could be inconsistent in how they classified an airplane. For example, a document on a Japanese Mitsubishi A6M could be filed alphabetically under A6M, Mitsubishi, Zeke, Zero, or Misc. Japanese.) It is possible to not have a category suffix.
• Sequence Number: The individual number assigned to the document within its subject code and category. If a document was formerly classified as "Security Information," the sequence number starts with "S," for example "S-1." These are usually filed at the beginning of a range of documents. Sometimes technical manuals are filed using the technical order (TO) number. For example, 01-20EE-3 is the sequence number used for a Boeing B-17 Handbook of Overhaul Instructions, TO-01-20EE-3.
• Sequence Modifier: If there is a revision or multiple parts of a document, this is reflected in a sequence modifier. Ex. Dates, revision numbers, etc.
The documents are arranged alpha-numerically by Wright Field Number in the order of:
Each record contains the title and source from the index cards. Information from the subject field on the cards appears as a scope and content note.
Currently, the finding aid only covers documents from the D52.1 subject code and only those that are physically located in the Wright Field Technical Documents Library. Please contact the NASM Archives regarding additional documents. Some may be located in the Technical Reference Files, cataloguing information may be only on the index cards, or the document has been catalogued as missing from the collection.
Biographical / Historical:
In 1917, the United States Army Air Service established an aviation engineering section at McCook Field in Dayton, Ohio. In 1927, the Engineering Division, as it was then known, moved to nearby Wilbur Wright Field and remained there as the Air Force Materiel Division (AFMD) and Air Materiel Command (AMC) until Wright Field combined with Patterson Field to become Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in 1948. The Engineering Division was responsible for Army Air Services research and development and served as a clearinghouse for information on aviation development worldwide. Throughout its history the Engineering Division/Materiel Division maintained a catalogued library of documents, which was turned over to the National Museum of the United States Air Force at Wright-Patterson and was later donated to the National Air and Space Museum.
Provenance:
United States Air Force Museum, Transfer, 1962, NASM.XXXX.0428.
Restrictions:
No restrictions on access
Rights:
Material is subject to Smithsonian Terms of Use. Should you wish to use NASM material in any medium, please submit an Application for Permission to Reproduce NASM Material, available at Permissions Requests
National Museum of American History (U.S.). Division of Electricity and Modern Physics Search this
Extent:
46 Cubic feet (150 boxes)
Type:
Collection descriptions
Archival materials
Clippings
Newsletters
Scrapbooks
Notebooks
Motion pictures (visual works)
Photographs
Date:
1884-1965
Scope and Contents:
While the collection is focused rather specifically on the development of television in America, including technical details, legal proceedings, marketing and advertisement, and manufacturing, it is also a rich source for the history of American advertising, work cultures, sales, and entertainment. There is also information about radio, mostly in periodicals collected by Du Mont. Information about Allen Du Mont is largely limited to his professional development and activities, except for a few travel photographs and information about and logbooks from his boat.
Materials date from 1884 to 1965, but the bulk come from the years 1931 1960; mostly scattered periodicals comprise the earlier years.
The collection includes correspondence, photographs, blueprints, films, videotapes, pamphlets, books, periodicals, newspaper and magazine clippings, annual reports, organization charts, stock records, ticker tape, legal documents, patent documents, bills, accountants' reports, meeting minutes, scrapbooks, technical drawings, advertisements, catalogs, and technical manuals. Processing included revising the previous series order, refoldering and reboxing all items, and completely revising the finding aid. Duplicates were weeded out; two copies were retained of any multiple item. Materials in binders were unbound. An example of each binder with the DuMont logo was retained, and the materials once contained therein refer to the appropriate binder in the container list. Plain office binders were discarded.
Arrangement:
The collection is divided into 16 series.
Series 1: Personal Files, 1920s-1965
Series 2: Executive Records, 1938-1964
Series 3: Stock Records, 1937-1962
Series 4: DuMont Laboratories, Inc., Patents and Legal Proceedings, 1884-1960
Series 5: DuMont Laboratories, Inc., Financial Records, 1931-1964
Series 6: DuMont Laboratories, Inc., Operations, 1938-1958
Series 7: Radio Technical Planning Board, 1944-1946
Series 8: Federal Communications Commission, 1940-1959 and undated
Series 9: DuMont Laboratories, Marketing and Sales, 1939-1961 and undated
Series 10: Telecommunications for Venezuela, 1952-1957 and undated
Series 11: Du Mont Network, 1944-1952 and undated
Series 12: Du Mont Publications, 1933-1963 and undated
Series 13: Photographs, 1928-1960 and undated
Series 14: Clippings/Scrapbooks, 1933-1962
Series 15: Non-Du Mont Publications, 1892, 1907-1963 and undated
Series 16: Audiovisual Materials, 1948-1955
Series 17: Addenda, 1933-1959
Biographical / Historical:
Allen Balcom Du Mont was born Jan. 29, 1901, in Brooklyn, NY to S. William Henry Beaman and Lillian Felton Balcom Du Mont. He contracted poliomyelitis when he was eleven and was confined to bed for nearly a year. During his illness, he began to amuse himself with a crystal radio set; by year's end, he had built a receiving and transmitting set. He was licensed as a ship's wireless operator when he was fifteen, and took a job a year later as a radio operator on a passenger vessel that ran between New York and Providence, RI. He worked as a radio operator for the next seven years.
Du Mont graduated in 1924 from the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, NY, with a degree in electrical engineering. He had already begun his first invention for the Sound Operated Circuit Controller, a device that turns a switch on or off when it hears a sharp sound; he used it to turn off his radio during commercials with a hand clap. Du Mont began working for the Westinghouse Lamp Company (later a division of the Westinghouse Electric Corporation), raising their output of radio tubes from 500 a day to 5,000 an hour in four years. For this, he received the Westinghouse Achievement Award in 1927. He left Westinghouse to become chief engineer at the De Forest Radio Company in 1928; his inventions increased output there to 30,000 radio tubes a day, and he was promoted to vice president in charge of production. In 1929, he received his first patent, for a radio tube mounting device.
He also worked with television at De Forest, using mechanical receivers with a spinning "Nipkow disk" that scanned electrical impulses and gave the effect of a motion picture. The De Forest experimental transmitter, W2XCD, in Passaic, NJ, broadcast television programs in 1930. Du Mont quickly concluded that there was no future in scanning discs; they produced a small, dark picture, and were difficult to build correctly. Others had developed television pictures that were produced by an electronic beam scanning rapidly across a florescent screen at the end of a tube. However, those cathode ray tubes were still imported from Germany, were very expensive, and burned out after only twenty five to thirty hours.
Du Mont left his job at De Forest in 1931 and started a cathode ray manufacturing business in a garage laboratory at his home. He developed a tube that lasted a thousand hours and could be manufactured inexpensively. There was almost no market for his tubes; gross sales income the first year was only $70. However, the tubes were an integral part of the cathode ray oscillograph, an instrument widely used in physics laboratories that measures and records changes in electrical current over time. The business, incorporated in 1935 as DuMont Laboratories, Inc., prospered in the oscillograph market. DuMont Labs moved in 1933 into a series of empty stores, then to a plant in Passaic, NJ, in 1937. Du Mont also acted as consultant to manufacturers with cathode ray tube problems and served as an expert witness in patent litigations.
Du Mont used the money he made from oscillographs to develop television. His innovations in making precise, quickly manufactured, inexpensive, long lasting cathode ray tubes made commercial television possible. In 1938, Du Mont sold a half interest in his company to the Paramount Pictures Corporation to raise capital for broadcasting stations. In 1939, the company became the first to market a television receiver for homes, and was part of a major display at the 1939 World's Fair in New York. Television development and sales were cut off by World War II, since DuMont Laboratories converted entirely to wartime production of oscillographs and to radar research. DuMont Laboratories returned to television production in 1946 and was the first company to market a postwar television set. By 1951 the company grossed $75 million a year and had four plants manufacturing television sending and receiving equipment in Passaic, Allwood, East Paterson, and Clifton, NJ. Du Mont had become the television industry's first millionaire. He was chosen in a Forbes magazine poll as one of the twelve foremost business leaders of America that same year, and was once characterized as "one of the very few inventors in the annals of American industry who have made more money from their inventions than anyone else has" (Rice, 36).
Du Mont began an experimental television station, W2XTV, in Passaic, NJ, in 1939. He added WABD (later WNEW TV) in New York City, WTTG in Washington, D.C., and WDTV (later KDKA) in Pittsburgh, PA. He concentrated on technology and business, leaving entertainment to others in the company. However, the DuMont Network "featured such names as Ernie Kovacs, Morey Amsterdam, Ted Mack, Ernest Borgnine, Jan Murray, and Dennis James. Its long running variety hour, Cavalcade of Stars, showcased not only Jackie Gleason but The Honeymooners, which made its debut as a Cavalcade sketch" (Krampner, 98). The 1950s
superhero Captain Video became famous on the DuMont network, and Bishop Fulton Sheen's inspirational show, "Life is Worth Livinq," won surprisingly high ratings (Watson, 17). Ultimately, America's fourth network failed: in 1955, DuMont Broadcasting separated from Du Mont Laboratories, Inc., becoming the Metropolitan Broadcasting Company and, with the addition of other properties, Metromedia, Inc.
Du Mont testified frequently before the Federal Communications Commission to set technical standards for American television broadcast between 1945 and 1952. In 1946, Du Mont's company was one of several to oppose the Columbia Broadcasting System's petition to the FCC to establish color television standards; Du Mont preferred to wait for further research to develop all electronic color television, rather than the mechanical method CBS favored. He felt that method produced a picture far less than optimal, and would have required persons who did not own color sets to purchase adapters to receive broadcasts being produced in color. Standards were developed by the National Television Standards Committee in 1951 1953; the Federal Communications Commission accepted them in 1953, and regular transmission of color programs began on the major networks, including the DuMont Network, in 1954.
Sales of television receivers from DuMont Laboratories, Inc. peaked in 1954; by the late 1950s, the company was losing money. The Emerson Radio and Phonograph Company purchased the division that produced television sets, phonographs, and high fidelity and stereo equipment in 1958. In 1960 remaining Du Mont interests merged with the Fairchild Camera and Instrument Corporation. Du Mont was president of DuMont Laboratories, Inc., until 1956, when he became chairman of the Board of Directors. His title changed to Chairman and General Manager in 1959. In 1961 he became Senior Technical Advisor, Allen B. Du Mont Laboratories, Division of Fairchild Camera and Instrument Corporation.
Du Mont received many awards for his work, including honorary doctorates from Rennselaer (1944), Brooklyn Polytechnic Institute (1949), Fairleigh Dickinson College (1955), and New York University (1955). He received the Marconi Memorial Medal for Achievement in 1945, and an American Television society award in 1943 for his contributions to the field. In 1949, he received the Horatio Alger Award, "a yearly prize bestowed by the American Schools and Colleges Association on the man whose rise to fortune most nearly parallels the virtuous careers of Ben the Luggage Boy and Tattered Tom" (Rice, 35). He held more than thirty patents
for developments in cathode ray tubes and other television devices. His inventions included the "magic eye tube" once commonly seen on radios and the Duovision, a television that could receive two programs simultaneously. Du Mont was also noted for success in predicted log power boat racing; in his television equipped Hurricane III, he became the national champion of the power cruiser division of the American Power Boat Association in 1953 1955 and 1958. Du Mont died November 15, 1965; his obituary appeared on the front page of the New York Times. He was survived by Ethel Martha Steadman, whom he married in 1926, and their two children, Allen Balcom, Jr., and Yvonne.
Sources
Current Biography 1946, pp. 162 164.
Krampner, Jon. "The Death of the DuMont [sic] Network: A Real TV Whodunit." Emmy Magazine (July August 1990): 96 103.
Obituary, New York Times, 16 November 1965, 1:3.
Rice, Robert. "The Prudent Pioneer." The New Yorker, 27 Jan. 1951.
Watson, Mary Ann. "And they Said 'Uncle Fultie Didn't Have a Prayer . . . "11 Television Quarterly 26, no. 3(1993): 16 21.
Who's Who in America, 1962.
Related Materials:
Materials in the Archives Center
Edward J. Orth Memorial Archives of the New York World's Fair, 1939-1940
Warshaw Collection, Worlds Expositions, New York World's Fair, 1939 (AC0060)
Larry Zim World's Fair Collection (AC0519)
George H. Clark "Radioana" Collection, ca. 1880-1950 (AC0055)
Division of Work and Industry
Related artifacts consist of cathode ray tubes, oscillographs, television receivers (including a Duoscope), and other instruments. See accession #:EM*315206, EM*315208, EM*315209, EM*327728, EM*327735, EM*327742, EM*327743, EM*327745, EM*327749, EM*327751, EM*327756, EM*327758, EM*327759, EM*327760, EM*327763, EM*327770, EM*328155, EM*328178, EM*328182, EM*328193, EM*328198, EM*328200, EM*328209, EM*328212, EM*328224, EM*328231, EM*328247, EM*328253, EM*328258, EM*328264, EM*328269, EM*328271, EM*328277, EM*328280, EM*328282, EM*328283, EM*328286, EM*328299, EM*328305, EM*328306, EM*328315, EM*328316,
EM*328322, EM*328325, EM*328327, EM*328336, EM*328337, EM*328343, EM*328348, EM*328352, EM*328353, EM*328366, EM*328368, ZZ*RSN80323A74, ZZ*RSN80552U05, ZZ*RSN80748U09, ZZ*RSN80748U11, ZZ*RSN80844U09, and ZZ*RSN81576U01.
Library of Congress
Records of the Allen B. DuMont Laboratories, Inc. 1930 1960 (bulk 1945 1960). 56 lin. ft. Consists of nine series: Administrative Files, 1935 1960; General Correspondence, ca. 1930 1960; Interoffice Correspondence, ca. 1935 1960; Financial Records, 1932 1960; Sales and Advertising File, 1936 1960; Production and Engineering File, 1932 1960; Television File, ca. 1935 1960; Hearings File, 1935 1957; and General Miscellany, ca. 1937 1960. National Union Catalog of Manuscript Collections number 68 2021; National Inventory of Documentary Sources number 2.1.243.
Wayne State University, Walter P. Reuther Library, Archives of Labor and Urban Affairs
John H. Zieger Papers, 1942 1980. 1 box (type not specified). Correspondence, clippings, leaflets, and memoranda, related to Zieger's union activities with Western Electric Employees
Association and Allen B. Du Mont Laboratories. National Union Catalog of Manuscript Collections number 91 2872.
Provenance:
Immediate source of acquisition unknown.
Restrictions:
Collection is open for research. Gloves must be worn when handling unprotected photographs and negatives. Special arrangements required to view materials in cold storage. Using cold room materials requires a three hour waiting period. Only reference copies of audiovisual materials may be used. Contact the Archives Center for more information at archivescenter@si.edu or 202-633-3270.
Rights:
Collection items available for reproduction, but the Archives Center makes no guarantees concerning copyright restrictions. Other intellectual property rights may apply. Archives Center cost-recovery and use fees may apply when requesting reproductions.
National Museum of American History (U.S.). Division of Engineering and Industry Search this
Extent:
1 Cubic foot (3 boxes)
Type:
Collection descriptions
Archival materials
Patents
Charts
Technical notes
Photographs
Technical reports
Lectures
Correspondence
Diagrams
Date:
1952-1984
Summary:
Papers, mostly technical, relating to Caruthers' development of automated machine tools. The papers include technical reports and notes; schematics for specific inventions including diagrams, graphs, photographs and plans bound together; patents and related correspondence; operators' manuals; copies of papers delivered by Caruthers at engineering events; and assorted trade literature.
Scope and Contents note:
This collection consists largely of bound copies of technical manuals, providing information on automatic machine control equipment, including its operation, servicing and parts. The papers include technical reports and notes; schematics for specific inventions including diagrams, graphs, photographs and plans bound together; patents and related correspondence; operators' manuals; copies of papers delivered by Caruthers at engineering events; and assorted trade literature. Published materials include a book co-authored by Caruthers. A partial personnel history of F. P. Caruthers is included together with his hand-written notebooks.
Arrangement:
1 series.
Biographical/Historical note:
Felix P. (Phil) Caruthers was born in Brooklyn, N.Y. (ca. 1915) and took an early interest in radio, constructing his own transmitter at age nine. He continued this interest, obtaining an advanced-class amateur license. After graduating Princeton University (BSEE 1938) Caruthers joined EBASCO Services, specializing in long-distance high-voltage utility systems.
After Pearl Harbor, Caruthers enrolled in a course at Brooklyn Polytechnic Institute specializing in radio wave analysis and pulse techniques which predated radar. When the instructor was called to a government assignment, Caruthers took over his place and completed the course. He then volunteered in the U.S. Navy and was assigned to a program under Sperry Gyroscope Co. which was developing night fighter aircraft and radar. Promoted to the rank of Lieutenant, Caruthers was put in charge of all plants producing this equipment. Later, he was assigned to work on antennas and other components of radar equipment.
On his return to civilian life, Caruthers joined Thomson Equipment Co. as vice president and chief engineer, producing precision machined products and metal toys. Later, the firm's output shifted to machine tools, which Thomson not only manufactured but also designed, introducing new concepts of machine control.
In 1968 Caruthers organized Caruthers & Associates, Inc., consultants to various industrial firms, and also served as Director of Engineering of Industrial Control Equipment for the Bendix Corporation.
Provenance:
Collection transferred by Division of the History of Technology, National Museum of American History, Engineering and Industry Collections.,12th Street and Constitution Avenue, N.W., Washington, D.C. 20560.,Transfer.,ACNMAH 812; Nonacc. No. 2002.3050.
Restrictions:
Collection is open for research. Register by Robert S. Harding and Don Darroch, 2 pp., avaiable in repository.
Rights:
Collection items available for reproduction, but the Archives Center makes no guarantees concerning copyright restrictions. Other intellectual property rights may apply. Archives Center cost-recovery and use fees may apply when requesting reproductions.
1.83 Cubic feet (consisting of 3.5 boxes, 1 folder, 2 oversize folders, 1 map case folder, 1 flat box (partial).)
Type:
Collection descriptions
Archival materials
Advertising fliers
Reports
Mail order catalogs
Business records
Technical reports
Commercial catalogs
Print advertising
Technical manuals
Business ephemera
Legislation (legal concepts)
Commercial correspondence
Illustrations
Advertising cards
Advertising
Advertising mail
Advertisements
Catalogues
Publications
Trade literature
Periodicals
Photographs
Printed materials
Printed material
Receipts
Sales letters
Manuals
Catalogs
Sales catalogs
Trade cards
Business letters
Manufacturers' catalogs
Test reports
Trade catalogs
Ephemera
Business cards
Invoices
Legal documents
Printed ephemera
Sales records
Correspondence
Letterheads
Date:
circa 1832-1959
Summary:
A New York bookseller, Warshaw assembled this collection over nearly fifty years. The Warshaw Collection of Business Americana: Accounting and Bookkeeping forms part of the Warshaw Collection of Business Americana, Subseries 1.1: Subject Categories. The Subject Categories subseries is divided into 470 subject categories based on those created by Mr. Warshaw. These subject categories include topical subjects, types or forms of material, people, organizations, historical events, and other categories. An overview to the entire Warshaw collection is available here: Warshaw Collection of Business Americana
Scope and Contents note:
Contains a broad scope of freshwater capture and use topics, with particular emphasis on the machinery and systems required for managing water resources and business aspects of the costs of goods and services. Includes coverage of home and farm use, agricultural solutions, and large scale operations such as public utilities such as damns, watersheds, reservoirs. Some of the technologies used are drilling, wells, hydraulics, engines and pumps, in addition to natural power sources in the form of windmills and turbines, and water wheels. both as methods of conveyance of water and in powering other devices such as grinders and saws. Purification and softeners address make up the bulk of treatment. Some materials address legal and regulatory issues but water rights is not significantly covered.
Materials include business records, marketing and advertising, some informational documentation in the form of guides and reports. A few schematics are present. A small amount of regulatory publications provide a glimpse of how municipalities dealt with local water issues, including billing and taxation. Miscellaneous writings includes a few tangential topics such as inland waterways and swimming pools, and a perspective essay on water.
Arrangement note:
Waterworks is arranged in three subseries.
Business Records
Genre
Subjects
Forms Part Of:
Forms part of the Warshaw Collection of Business Americana.
Missing Title
Series 1: Business Ephemera
Series 2: Other Collection Divisions
Series 3: Isadore Warshaw Personal Papers
Series 4: Photographic Reference Material
Provenance:
Waterworks is a portion of the Business Ephemera Series of the Warshaw Collection of Business Americana, Accession AC0060 purchased from Isadore Warshaw in 1967. Warshaw continued to accumulate similar material until his death, which was donated in 1971 by his widow, Augusta. For a period after acquisition, related materials from other sources (of mixed provenance) were added to the collection so there may be content produced or published after Warshaw's death in 1969. This practice has since ceased.
Restrictions:
Collection is open for research. Some items may be restricted due to fragile condition.
Rights:
Collection items available for reproduction, but the Archives Center makes no guarantees concerning copyright restrictions. Other intellectual property rights may apply. Archives Center cost-recovery and use fees may apply when requesting reproductions.
Warshaw Collection of Business Americana Subject Categories: Waterworks, Archives Center, National Museum of American History, Smithsonian Institution
Sponsor:
Funding for partial processing of the collection was supported by a grant from the Smithsonian Institution's Collections Care and Preservation Fund (CCPF).
Technical manual on motors. Part 1: "Fundamentals of combustion engines."
Collection Creator:
United States. Army. Ordnance Department. Ordnance Research and Development Translation Center Search this
Container:
Roll 26, Item FE 584
Type:
Archival materials
Microform
Collection Restrictions:
No restrictions on access.
Collection Rights:
Material is subject to Smithsonian Terms of Use. Should you wish to use NASM material in any medium, please submit an Application for Permission to Reproduce NASM Material, available at Permissions Requests
Collection Citation:
Captured German Documents (World War II): Fort Eustis Library (FE) Microfilm, Acc. NASM.XXXX.0468, National Air and Space Museum, Smithsonian Institution.
German radar set FuSE 64 (Mannheim), technical manual.
Collection Creator:
United States. Army. Ordnance Department. Ordnance Research and Development Translation Center Search this
Container:
Roll 46, Item FE 800
Type:
Archival materials
Microform
Collection Restrictions:
No restrictions on access.
Collection Rights:
Material is subject to Smithsonian Terms of Use. Should you wish to use NASM material in any medium, please submit an Application for Permission to Reproduce NASM Material, available at Permissions Requests
Collection Citation:
Captured German Documents (World War II): Fort Eustis Library (FE) Microfilm, Acc. NASM.XXXX.0468, National Air and Space Museum, Smithsonian Institution.
This series includes guides, product books, information manuals, samples, and Formica Facts , a product book containing technical specifications for plastic laminate dated 1988. These technical manuals and fabrication guides provide use and care guidelines, offer tips for handling and storage, and describe techniques for working with plastic laminate.
Catalogs, brochures, and samples provide information on new product lines, patterns, and colors of the surfacing laminate from 1965 to 1994. Formica's product literature documents: atomic patterns and space-age colors of the 1960s, the top-selling laminates of sliced avocado, bittersweet, and harvest yellow of the 1970s, and the pastels and post-modern designs of the 1980s and 1990s. Catalog brochures, 1965-1970, parallel advertising campaigns of the time, featuring titles such as Join the Revolution for Easy Living ; Join the Colour [ sic ] Revolution , and Of Course You Want a Formica Laminated Plastic Color-Kissed Kitchen . The series also includes color systems developed by Formica such as the Color Grid, Color + Color, and Color System/Color Compliment. These systems, developed by the Design Advisory Board in the early 1980s, enabled both distributor and consumer to mix and match samples of COLORCORE more effectively.
Collection Restrictions:
Collection is open for research but is stored off-site and special arrangements must be made to work with it. Researchers must use reference copies of audio-visual materials. When no reference copy exists, the Archives Center staff will produce reference copies on an "as needed" basis, as resources allow. Contact the Archives Center for information at archivescenter@si.edu or 202-633-3270.
Collection Rights:
Collection items available for reproduction, but the Archives Center makes no guarantees concerning copyright restrictions. Other intellectual property rights may apply. Archives Center cost-recovery and use fees may apply when requesting reproductions.
Collection Citation:
Grace Jeffers Collection of Formica Materials, Archives Center, National Museum of American History
Robert Truax was one of the great originals of American rocketry and a major proponent and inventor of ultra-low-cost rocket engine and vehicle concepts.
Scope and Contents:
This collection consists of material relating to the career of Robert Collins Truax including correspondence, photographic material, technical drawings, technical manuals and reports, presentation and conference materials, papers by Truax, news clippings, published materials and business records for Truax Engineering, Inc.
Projects and programs referenced in this collection include the Knievel Rocket Car (Truax X-2 Sky-Cycle); X-3 Volksrocket; amphibious launchers, including the "Sea Dragon," "Sea Horse," and SEALAR (Sea Launched Rocket); the Space Shuttle program; the Gemini and Apollo programs; Rocketdyne LR89 Liquid-Fuel Motors; Rand Project; the Corona Reconnaissance Satellite; and Project Private Enterprise.
The researcher should note that the collection also contains audio-visual material. These items are not included in the finding aid but the NASM audio-visual archivist can assist you regarding access.
Arrangement:
This collection was arranged into series by the processing archivist. There was no original order when the collection was received.
Series 1: Personal & Business Papers
Series 2: Papers Authored by R.C. Truax
Series 3: Drawings
Series 4: Images
4:1 - Slides
4:2 - Photos, Negatives & Floppy Discs
Acronyms:
Numerous acronyms were used by the creator when labeling his file units. Some will be obvious to the researcher but the archivist has identified some acronyms that might be more unclear. Not all acronyms were able to be identified.
AFRL - Air Force Research Lab
ATD - Advanced Technology Development
BAA - possibly Broad Agency Announcement
BMDO - Ballistic Missile Defense Organization
CDRL - Contract Data Requirements List?
CPAI - Chemical Propulsion Information Agency
ITAR - International Traffic in Arms Regulations
KACST - King Abdulaziz City for Science & Technology
MSFC - Marshall Space Flight Center
PMRF - Pacific Missile Range Facility
RSLP - Rocket Systems Launch Program
SEALAR - Sea Launch & Recovery
TEI - Truax Engineering Inc.
TPIPT - Technology Planning Integrated Product Teams
Biographical / Historical:
Robert Truax (1917-2010) was one of the great originals of American rocketry and a major proponent and inventor of ultra-low-cost rocket engine and vehicle concepts. A longtime member of the American Rocket Society (serving as its president in 1957,) He received the Robert H. Goddard award for outstanding work in liquid propellant rockets as well as the Legion of Merit citation for his conceptual work on making the "Polaris" guided-missile submarine a primary naval weapon. Truax was also inducted into the Air Force Space and Missile Pioneers Hall of Fame in 2003.
Inspired by Robert Goddard, Truax began building rockets when he was a teenager in California. From 1936 to 1939, while enrolled at the United States Naval Academy, he tested liquid-fueled rocket motors. During the late 1940s, he organized the US Naval Missile Test Center's propulsion laboratory at Point Mugu, California, and headed rocket development within the Navy's Bureau of Aeronotics where he advanced the concept of a staged combustion system upon which the Space Shuttle's main engines would eventually rely. In 1946, Truax led a team that interrogated the rocket engineer for Nazi Germany, Wernher von Braun.
By 1955, however, his proposal for a submarine-launched ballistic missile had failed to win Navy approval and he joined the Air Force's newly established Western Development Division (WDD) From 1955 to 1958, Captain Truax headed the Thor intermediate-range ballistic missile (IRBM) development program. Truax studied the sea launching of rockets, such as the Sea Bee and Sea Horse projects. In 1959 he retired as a Captain, and headed the Aerojet-General Advanced Development Division and Aerojet's Sea Dragon project in the Advanced Development Division until leaving in 1967. In 1966 Robert Truax founded Truax Engineering Inc. (TEI,) which studied sea launch concepts similar to the earlier Sea Dragon—the Excalibur, the SEALAR (Sea Launched Rocket,) and the Excalibur S. Here his low-cost booster program plan was elaborated and further studied, but he was again unable to interest NASA or the USAF in the concept of cheap access to space.
In the 70's and early 80's, Truax, heretofore prominent in scientific communities, emerged in popular culture. Literally building rockets from his own backyard in Saratoga, Truax built both of Evel Knievel's "Skycycles" for his 1974 for attempt to jump the Snake River Canyon. He later competed in the original X-prize competition to send a private astronaut into suborbital flight.
Robert Truax, died on September 17 aged 93, as a key figure in the rocket research that took America into the space age, while also being an inspiration to the do-it-yourself, back-yard amateur.
The collection documents railroad ephemera, primarily relating to Amtrak and Conrail.
Content Description:
The collection contains photographs, internal documents such as safety and procedures manuals, employee copies of schedules, a scrapbook of clippings and photographs, brochures, timetables, advertising, "consists" (i.e., listings of which types of cars were on each train and in what order), maintenance regulations, track charts, publications such as annual reports, maps, etc. The collection relates almost entirely to Amtrak and Conrail. A file on fellow railroad collector and enthusiast is also included.
Arrangement:
Collection is arranged into seven series.
Series 1: Directories, Instructions, Manuals and Rules, 1907-2000
Series 2: Publications, 1942-1992
Series 3: Timetables, 1967-2000
Series 4: Photographs, 1940-1994
Series 5: Train Consist Books, 1971-1983
Series 6: Maintenance Programs and Track Charts, 1947-1985
Series 7: Ephemera, 1867-1989
Provenance:
The collection had been the property of Railroad History Collection of America, Inc., which was liquidated after the death of the corporation's owner, Frank Perrin. The collection was donated to the Archives Center in 2014 by the heir, Patricia Mathis-Oster, through attorney Andrew Jiranek, Receiver.
Restrictions:
Collection is open for research but is stored off-site and special arrangements must be made to work with it. Contact the Archives Center for information at archivescenter@si.edu or 202-633-3270.
Rights:
Collection items available for reproduction, but the Archives Center makes no guarantees concerning copyright restrictions. Other intellectual property rights may apply. Archives Center cost-recovery and use fees may apply when requesting reproductions.
This collection consists of the complete set of Seaboard & Western Airlines annual reports, from 1947-1979, as well as the following two Seaboard & Western technical manuals: Canadair CL-44 Operating Manual and a Lockheed Model 1049 Super Constellation Flight Manual. In the Lockheed 1049 manual, there is also a Lockheed 1049 exam (completed by Lawrence Nelson), a memo, and two issues of "Canadair Service News", one from October 1960 and one from September/October 1961.
Scope and Contents:
This collection consists of the complete set of Seaboard & Western Airlines annual reports, from 1947-1979, as well as the following two Seaboard & Western technical manuals: Canadair CL-44 Operating Manual and a Lockheed Model 1049 Super Constellation Flight Manual. In the Lockheed 1049 manual, there is also a Lockheed 1049 exam (completed by Lawrence Nelson), a memo, and two issues of Canadair Service News, one from October 1960 and one from September/October 1961.
Arrangement:
The Seaboard & Western Airlines Collection is arranged by content type.
Biographical / Historical:
Seaboard & Western Airlines was founded by Arthur and Raymond Norden. These brothers were both World War II veterans of the Army's Air Transport Command. Over a 33 year period the airline these men helped create established itself as the preeminent carrier of cargo on the world's richest trade routes. This airline was the first to fly an all-cargo flight across the Atlantic, the first to land and takeoff at Idlewild (now John F. Kennedy) Airport, the first to fly support for the Berlin Airlift, the first to fly a Military Air Transport Service (MATS) charter, the first to support Pacific Airlift for the Korean Conflict (with a planeload of Air Force fighter pilots), the first to order and operate the Lockheed 1049D Super Constellation, the first to order and operate the Douglas DC-8-55, the first to order and operate the DC-8-63 CF, the first to order and operate the Boeing 747F (first 747 built as a freighter from the beginning of its production), the first all-cargo airline to join the International Air Transport Association (IATA), and the first airline in the world to equip its entire fleet with Inertial Navigation Systems. On April 4th, 1961 the company's name changed to Seaboard World Airlines after Richard M. Jackson was brought in as the new Chairman and President. On October 1, 1980 Seaboard World Airlines was absorbed by The Flying Tiger Line, Inc., and on December 16, 1988 The Flying Tiger Line, Inc., was absorbed by the Federal Express Corporation.
Provenance:
David O. Hill, Gift, 2002
Restrictions:
No restrictions on access.
Rights:
Material is subject to Smithsonian Terms of Use. Should you wish to use NASM material in any medium, please submit an Application for Permission to Reproduce NASM Material, available at Permissions Requests
Technical Manual of Airplane Structures, War Department Publication No. TM 1-410, November 30, 1940.
Container:
Box 6, Folder 5, Item 6
Type:
Archival materials
Collection Restrictions:
No restrictions on access
Collection Rights:
Material is subject to Smithsonian Terms of Use. Should you wish to use NASM material in any medium, please submit an Application for Permission to Reproduce NASM Material, available at Permissions Requests.
Collection Citation:
Early Aeronautical Writings, NASM.XXXX.0923, National Air and Space Museum, Smithsonian Institution.
![View Early Aviation Collection [Arango] digital asset: Finding aid](https://ids.si.edu/ids/deliveryService?max=120&id=https://sirismm.si.edu/siris/findingaid.gif "Finding aid")
