- 1915 Nat'l Advisory
Committee for Aeronautics (NACA).
1920, lab facilities Langley
Field, VA.
"to supervise &
direct the scientific study of the problems of flight, with a view to their
practical solution".
air-cooled engines,
aeronautical engineering
Caltech & MIT.
- 1918 airmail service.
1920, NY-San Fran route.
Boeing, Lockheed, Douglas;
United, American, Pan Am
& TWA.
1929, US 61 passenger
lines, 47 mail lines, 32 express lines. Air mail 8 million pounds.
1901 General Electric industrial
research lab, DuPont, AT&T.
1930 U.S. over 1,600
corporate R&D facilities.
"better things for
better living";
1920s, DuPont – rayon;
- 1934 Wallace Carothers
nylon;
plastics - 1935
Plexiglas.
1919-1929, gross nat'l
product rose 39%,
manufacturing output
almost doubled,
corporate profits almost
doubled.
Workers wages average
25% higher.
1917 20% U.S. homes
electrified; 1940, 90%;
1910 1 car for every 184
people;
1930 1 car for every 5.
Radio –
1896 Guglielmo Marconi “wireless
telegraph”;
“listening
in.”
“It’s Great
to be a Radio Maniac”:
“Your wits, learning
and resourcefulness are matched against the endless perversity of the
elements.”
“DXing" - “distance
fiends” or “DX hounds.”
“How far did you
hear last night? A ten year-old
girl in Michigan brings in New York, Denver, Atlanta, Dallas, and other distant
stations.”
“I can travel over
the US and yet remain at home.”
1916 David Sarnoff,
“I have in mind a plan of development which would make radio a household
utility in the same sense as a piano or phonograph.”
1920 Westinghouse “KDKA
Pittsburgh”.
1922, more than 200
radio stations in US; 1926 almost 700.
“There is radio
music in the air every night, everywhere.
Anybody can hear it at home on a receiving set which any boy can put up
in an hour.”
Listeners did “not
sit packed closely, row on row, in stuffy discomfort endured for the delight of
the music. The good wife and I sat
there quietly and comfortable alone in our own home… and drank in the
harmony coming 300 miles to us through the air.”
Atlanta station “covered
Dixie like the dew.”
NBC 1926, CBS 1927
– 1926 World Series;
“unless we watch
our step, the chain stations will be the Czars of the Air.”
Collier’s: radio
will bring “mutual understanding to all sections of the country, unifying
our thoughts, ideals, and purposes, making us a strong and well-knit
people.”
F. Scott Fitzgerald–
1920s “Jazz Age”.
Movies:
1800s, daguerrotypes
George Eastman - 1888 Kodak
- "You Press the Button, We Do the Rest".
1870s, Thomas Edison "peep
show"
1900s, projector.
1905 "nickelodeon".
1927 "talking
picture" - "The Jazz Singer," Al Jolson.
1930, over 13,000
theaters sound equipment.
color 1935,
100 million tickets per
week across country.
Consumer credit - 75% of
radios & 60% of cars bought on installment plan.
1920s census over 50%
Americans living in cities & towns.
1918-1941, "Machine
Age" –
triumph of sci - Albert
Einstein.
- Toys - model
airplanes; chemistry sets; Erector set.
Radio show featuring "real
engineers and their hair-raising adventures,"
1920s 25% American boys wanted
to be engineers.
May 20, 1927 Charles
Lindbergh, Spirit of St. Louis. "Lucky Lindy." “Lone Eagle”
Calvin Coolidge 1923 "The
business of America is business. Business is one of the greatest contributing
forces to the moral and spiritual advancement of the race."
Bull market - "never
sell the United States short,"
"Be a bull on America," "The possibilities of that
company are unlimited."
Herbert Hoover. West
Branch IA 1874;
Stanford;
Mining engineer –
work Australia, China.
the "Great Engineer".
The “Great
Humanitarian”.
Sec’y Commerce
1921-1928:
over 1000 conferences to
cut waste. Standardization, development of new industries (radio, commercial
aviation, television);
1928 presidential
campaign – US "soon in sight of the day when poverty will be
banished from this nation” - landslide.