Weekly television digest (Jan-Dec 1960)

6 AUGUST 22, 1960 NO ‘ECHO’ FROM THE NETWORKS: Don’t tune your TV set to “Echo I” — you’ll be wasting your time. There’s lots of public interest in the 100-ft. space balloon (in N.Y. last week, you could get Echo I’s next sighting, as well as the current correct time, just by dialing ME 7-1212), but there won’t be any network TV shows bounced off it — or so the networks told us. Plans have been considered, however. ABC-TV Pres. Oliver Treyz, who knows a good publicity idea when he sees one, backstopped a contact between ABC and the National Aeronautics & Space Administration as far back as last Jan. ABC had in mind a one-cushion TV shot — Mt. Wilson, Cal. to Empire State Bldg., N.Y. via space balloon. What punctured this balloon idea was a simple matter of cost. ABC was told that special “steerable antennas” would have to be set up to transmit & receive, meanwhile tracking the balloon accurately in orbit, for a one-shot telecast of any length. Sure, said ABC; what’ll they cost? Reply: Oh, about $500,000. And that was the end of that. Saluting the balloon (via AT&T cables) is something else again. Just about everyone’s been doing that. First off the mark Aug. 15 was NBC-TV with a 30-min., 9:30 p.m. special (including Bell System as sponsor) titled “Project Echo.” It was the result of considerable advance planning between NBC and Bell officials. The show included films of Project Echo preparation and even a filmed interview with Bell Labs’ research dir. Dr. John R. Pierce. CBS-TV and ABC-TV covered in network newscasts. Non-network stations were in the act, too. WPIX N.Y. telecast a 15-min. filmed documentary (not the same as NBC’s footage) about Echo I (Aug. 18) obtained from Bell (which didn’t, however, sponsor it). * * * Collins Radio bounced the first live 2-way message off satellite Echo I, beating Bell Labs to the balloon by several hours. On Echo’s 10th journey across the continent, at 1:07 a.m. Aug. 13, Collins engineer Donald Molander, at the Cedar Rapids hq, bounced a “1-2-3-4” voice test to the company’s Alpha Corp. subsidiary in Dallas. Simultaneously, Alpha engineers Ollie Metzgar & William Atterbury duplicated the test from Dallas. Reported Molander: “It was a readable message, not quite as good as a telephone.” Bell Labs’ 2-way message bounce from coast to coast came on Echo’s 12th passage. . . . Collins Radio came back into the picture Aug. 19 by bouncing an AP Wirephoto of President Eisenhower off the 1,000-mile-high balloon. At Dallas, Alpha Corp. received the signal, fed it into a Wirephoto receiving unit. The picture transmission required less than 5 min. ' * ♦ ♦ On Thursday, Discoverer XIV was successfully placed into polar orbit equipped with gear that included special instruments to radio back pictures of terrain over which the satellite is passing. « * • A TV & radio system is accompanying, observing and reporting back on the 2 dogs sent into orbit in a new Soviet spaceship reported launched by them Aug. 19. Preliminary data indicated the systems were working normally. • • • Traffic system for satellites to avoid jams in “near space” was urged last week by Westinghouse radar engineer Peter R. Dax in an address to the International As tronautical Congress. Asserting that space traffic will increase markedly in the next lO-to-50 years, Dax added: “It would be dangerous to suppose otherwise, and it can only be assumed that the traffic pattern will follow that of aircraft, the automobile or any other invention that has introduced ‘a new era.’ ” He suggested a world-wide satellite tracking & cataloging system, embracing 7 computerfeeding radar installations around the earth, to keep inventory of equipment in orbit and to detect new satellites. « * New type of communications satellite — a globe-girdling belt comprising billions of tiny metal antennas — is slated for test by the Air Force, reports Aug. 15 N.Y. Times, adding: “The antennas are to be half as thick as human hair. Their length — a matter of inches — ^will depend on the radio frequency to be used. An effort will be made to bounce messages over the horizon — in straight-line segments from ground to metallic belt to ground — in much the same fashion as messages transmitted by way of the 100-ft. Project Echo balloon.” » * ♦ High-resolution scanning antenna for experimental studies of the ionosphere has been developed by the National Bureau of Standards at its Boulder, Colo, research station. It scans a 42-degree azimuthal arc, can determine immediately the direction of signals received from forward scatter transmission. The antenna has no electrical or mechanical moving parts. Technology The first report, supposedly, of a proven frequencyspecific effect of radio waves on human chemistry was presented at the 4th Annual Tri-Service Microwave Conference at NYU Medical Center last week. Lt. Col. Sven A. Bach of the Army Medical Research Lab in Ft. Knox, Ky. reported on producing “a profound molecular change” in human gamma globulin with specific wave lengths of radio waves in the high frequency to the vhf range. Radio-detonated capsules, designed to distribute medication at precise points in patients’ digestive tracts, have been developed by Smith, Kline & French Labs, Philadelphia. As described at the 107th convention of the American Pharmaceutical Assn, in Washington, the X-ray-observed drug-filled capsules containing tiny coiled mechanisms are exploded harmlessly in the body by radio waves. Aspirin experiments with dogs have been successful. Low-temperature lamp for TV & film studios which reportedly emits 33% less heat with only a 5% sacrifice in brightness, compared with conventional lamps, has been announced by Japan’s Toshiba Electric Co. The new Toshiba lamp, named “Cool Beam,” uses a mirror designed to absorb heat-generating infra-red rays. Underwater TV camera capable of transmitting pictures from 360-ft. depths has been developed by the Naval Ordnance Lab in Washington. It’s been used in mine-recovery work off Fort Lauderdale, Fla. The Atomic Energy Commission has used a similar TV device to inspect radioactive waste deposits in waters off Boston. Underwater TV cameras capable of use in inspecting dams & spillways are wanted by the Tenn. Valley Authority. It will take bids at Knoxville until Aug. 30 for equipment to be used by skindiving cameramen.